Grinds and Gravel: Farewell Coffee

In a digital age, few places feel more community-oriented than coffee shops. From the staff to the coffee and unique design choices that personalize one of the cornerstones of the modern third space, coffee has long served as a gateway to community and connection in my life. More than just a portal to caffeine, bikes ground coffee shops more than the typical means of transportation here in the United States because they personalize the experience of getting to businesses that often double as workspaces, gathering points, and places of nourishment. If there’s something I’ve realized since I started riding bikes, it’s that how you get somewhere is just as important as where you arrive. In this first installment of Grinds and Gravel, I’ll be exploring a coffee shop here in Asheville that has helped me feel more grounded in my new home: Farewell Coffee.

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Last winter, when I first moved to Asheville, North Carolina, I was starting fresh for the first time in over a decade. I’d spent most of my life in one place. Sticking to the same routines, groups of people, and sides of town, finding a place to experience community felt like one of the most important ways to successfully plant roots in my new home.

Farewell had been recommended to me by a few friends, and when I stopped by for the first time, something about it felt like home. Be it the quiet smile of the owner, Max Peterbaugh, or the subtle but unique decor of the interior, Farewell quickly became a place I could go to and feel grounded. Part of that is down to the space’s intimate nature. As a former coffee industry professional, layouts were among the things I thought about (and labored over) most during my time in a management position. In most cases, you’re either blessed with a good space or not, and Farewell’s is one I’d say is uniquely positioned for connection.

Grinds

Though they lack a sizable bar space—an area typically reserved for folks more open and willing to converse—the closeness of the available indoor seating makes it a much more interactive space. I’ve had more than a few conversations with someone in the shop that ended up involving others by nature of the setup. Other than the closeness, however, limited seating makes sharing a table with a stranger all but commonplace and has, on more than one occasion, allowed me to meet new people. Farewell itself has an active component as they host run clubs and a traveling sauna on the weekends, but riding from any corner of town is entirely possible given its proximity to downtown, which I’d consider one of the more bikeable parts of Asheville.

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Like many businesses, Farewell evolves with the seasons. In the warmer months, their garage door opens up to an outdoor patio that is perfectly situated with spots in the sun and shade, directly adjacent to the bustling city streets of South Slope. In the winter, everyone huddles inside near the thoughtfully placed foliage along the cafe seating area. It’s cozy, quaint, and a great place to get work done, meet some friends, or sit quietly and read a book.

Farewell itself might not be a roaster, but in the past, they’ve played host to several roasters that I’m partial to. Among others, Little Wolf is one I consider among the best in the country, and when I found out they used their beans, I knew I’d found a new favorite shop. That said, thanks to the expertise of one of their employees, the shop recently decided to start producing its own blend, Welcome Home. Having already created a loop I enjoyed riding to and from the shop, I thought the release of their Welcome Home blend was the perfect opportunity for the debut post in this series and a chance to further ground my experience and time in Asheville.

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Caleb and his wife Megan, along with his miniature but mighty home setup.

As for the coffee itself, it’s roasted by part-time employee and local roaster Caleb Bilgen. Caleb owns his own coffee roasting business, Animó!, and while I’ll save the deep dive for another episode of Grinds and Gravel, the Welcome Home blend is a solid combination that uses a 50/50 split of natural process Guji, Ethiopia, and washed Colombian beans. It’s a little bit of an atypical choice for a take-home bag, at least for me, given that the blend was designed to be the shop’s espresso standard. Blends created for espresso tend to work better in milk drinks, where add-ons can obfuscate the brew’s taste, but the Welcome Home blend is equally good on its own.

Speaking to Caleb in his home, he said that Max and he aligned on the blend’s function and wanted to choose something that wouldn’t be a struggle to piece together if the beans they’d initially spec’d were no longer available. It’s a bit inside baseball, but it’s the kind of expertise and forward thinking consistent with someone who knows their stuff. Not every blend is the same, but being able to land on a flavor profile that is reasonably attainable with a different concoction of beans if a drought, blight, or new set of tariffs pokes a hole in their ability to source the original product is smart.

Gravel

Blessed with a number of great climbs in the city of Asheville, few are off-road. Though the damage to the city wrought by Hurricane Helene made something like Stoney Fork infeasible, Webb Cove, albeit quite different in makeup from what it was before the storm, remains a great, largely car-free means of ascent. With a few rocky perches, Elk Mountain’s summit is one of the city’s highest peaks within reach of the shop. It makes for a great coffee outside spot, given that the ride there is fun and the view is phenomenal. In the valley below, you can see the road taken to get to Webb Cove, followed by the historic Grove Park Inn just to the north. Beyond that lies the main portion of the city nestled between the mountains of lower Appalachia.

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The same spot at two very different points in the year, along with a wonderful sentiment.

This view means a lot to me, as it is generally a spot where I’ve come to reflect on and process some big moments over the last year. Elk itself, either way you slice it, is a climb that asks a lot of the rider. Whether you take the slightly less arduous way up and onto the parkway or the three-part punch that is Elk Mountain Scenic Highway from just off the main road back into town, it’s the most demanding and awe-inspiring climb that’s still within a reasonable distance to the shop. Webb cove is host to a number of increasingly awesome switchbacks that yield ever-better views as you ascend. Then, at the top of the climb, riders have a choice: north onto the parkway and to much larger peaks like Craggy Gardens and Mount Mitchell, or South on the road to the top of Patton Mountain and back into town. It’s a loop I’ve become accustomed to and something I still pinch myself while riding when thinking about the flat, urban slop I used to ride back in Florida.

Gear

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Given the relative lack of serious technical riding to the top of Elk, the Bassi x Keystone Belmont I have in for review felt like the perfect bike for this coffee outside. Equipped with 700 x 48mm Rene Herse Hatcher Pass tires, its modest road double and low-trail geo felt like a Cadillac going up and down Elk Mountain. As a bonus, taking Webb Cove up to the top means a fast descent is on the cards on the way back to town, and doing so without the alertness provided by a good cup of coffee is simply a bad idea.

There’s a joke among folks in coffee that mirrors the bell curve, consistent with many hobbies and interests. When you first get into something like coffee, I think you’re just surprised to learn that it doesn’t have a single, universal “flavor,” and that bean juice can be as, if not more, complex than something like wine. Then, if you catch the bug, you start to get granular about things like grind size, extraction, brew method, and water temperature. You read scientific papers about the nature of what makes a good brew. Maybe you invest far too much money in a home setup. You really dive deep.

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Nevertheless, after almost a decade in and around the business of beans, I’ve hit some form of a middle ground. I care about the coffee I consume. I haven’t been to a Starbucks since before COVID. I bring a high-quality instant with me when traveling, and if there isn’t a solid option available, I’ll just go without. However, my daily grind is no more complex than what can be achieved with an Aeropress, a basic scale, and my watch. When outside, I just eyeball it—something the Aeropress lends itself to, as you can get a pretty solid feel for where things should be, depending on the coffee. Once you understand the correct dosage, your water should generally be the same as well. With the Aeropress mini, my 11-gram coffee-to-200-gram-water recipe derived from coffee YouTuber James Hoffman serves me exceptionally well.

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The same goes for coffee selection. As much as I enjoy some of the great things happening in coffee right now, I tend to steer away from the fancier, complex co-ferments or rare single-origin coffees with flavor profiles that ask a lot of one’s palate, primarily because I just enjoy a good daily drinker. Though run-of-the-mill espresso blends can be a bit boring, I think Caleb and Max knocked it out of the park, as the tasting notes here are soft but discernible.

The blend has a nice, solid body, and though there isn’t a ton of fruity notes available, there’s a hit of something more complex in the background of what is otherwise a very smooth cup of coffee. As someone with experience in roasting, I think this is what I like about coffees like the Welcome Home blend. In my opinion, a significant part of what makes great modern coffee is high-quality sourcing. Doing the beans justice is the least the roaster can do, and as I alluded to with the mention of co-ferments or fancy single origins, a great complexity of flavors can be achieved with a number of coffees these days. However, what is usually a testament to both good sourcing and roasting is the ability to make a great cup of coffee from beans that do not insist upon themselves.

That’s what I’ve found here in the Welcome Home blend. Doing so atop one of my favorite climbs in the city is the cherry on top of what is likely the best way to spend a Saturday morning.

The Route

While future iterations of this series will feature routes with a greater percentage of dirt than asphalt, I felt this was fitting for a few reasons. It connects the shop directly to the experience of what has become a special ride for me. Though most of us yearn to get away from the pavement and onto the dirt, leaving cars and signs of civilization behind, I also deeply value the experience of pedaling from the door as opposed to starting from a car. This route, though largely paved, offers the opportunity to enjoy a great cup of coffee outside, with as much dirt as possible, while still connecting the experience of the roaster and the shop’s place in the city of Asheville.

What do you think? What else do you want to see explored in this series? Different coffees, locales, roasters, or routes? Be sure to let us know in the Conversation below…

Further Reading

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