Filter a Coffee House

I’m not a coffee drinker, I don’t appreciate the setup of the room, enough of the negative, this place is not bad! Even though I’m not a coffee drinker, they have something for everyone here… I love their Italian sodas, and I love there panninis, great place to spend some quiet time and get some homework done!

If you’re going to blast music, at least blast GOOD music. Hot n Cold by Katy Perry is not conducive to working, conversation, or anything for that matter.
This doesn’t mean I will never go back, it just means I will always bring headphones.
As for the coffee and other stuff, it was good. In North Park, however, where you have millions of coffee to choose from, it doesn’t stand out.

Great place to study… in the mornings its super quiet (almost feels like im in a hipster library) and in the afternoons they play good music thats not too loud which is perfect!
The décor is chill and the tables that are old arcade games can be fun especially if youre taking a study break! The staff is really friendly although the service was a little on the slower side and took a while to get our food… but it was all good since I wasnt in a rush anyways. The jasmine cherry tea is my fav and the lyla panini (chicken breast, provolone, tomato, sun-​dried tomato/​pesto sauce) is delish! The prices are definitely reasonable and they have variety of healthy options for all those clean eaters!
Only downside is they dont have a/​c so it can get kinda hot in here (better seat next to a fan or get them refills on water to keep cool). Overall love the atmosphere, love the food/​tea, and love the jams!

Location. location. location. I love it. Is a great place to hangout with friends. IS also good for study but you’ll probably get distracted by looking outside the huge windows. I love that! Staff? well, so far I’ve had bad experiences so far. Actually, last time I went there, probably about three weeks ago, the guys who helped me had a Queen attitude. I mean, seriously, I also work in customer service and I know how important it is to be friendly and welcoming, but he was the exception. If they were more friendly I would of given a 4 star, and I would definitely go more often.
To keep it simple, coffee is ok, good food choices, great atmosphere and location, but lack of customer service.

This place is great.
Service is friendly. The coffee rocks and the food is good.
A funky and spacious place to do homework and have coffee.

This is a tough 3 stars, because I want to give filter more… however there are a few reasons to not give them the whole enchilada.
Positives
Good coffee
plenty of space
free wifi
tons of seating
serves food
food that I have had was always good
clean
Negatives
–The furniture is quaint but needs a steam cleaning and some reupholstering
–kind of dark inside, even during the day
–the guy at the front counter spends more time outside smoking than behind the counter. I and the 3 customers after me all had to wait at least 2 – 3 minutes for him to finish a cigarette or conversation before being helped.
— they ALWAYS pour the coffee up to the rim even when you ask for more room for milk
Cool place to hang, quiet on weekdays, but could use some work in the service dept. Also, some new furniture wouldn’t hurt anyone. Overall, it is 3 stars. However, I would take it over Claire de Lune any day!

It’s a good place to study when I need out of the house. In the winter. Don’t bother during summer months — it is sweltering inside. In the winter it is cold and they don’t shut the doors, but I just bundle up. I also bring headphones because it can be a bit noisy.
The coffee is not great to the point where the employees there prefer Calabria. Haha. I’m not huge coffee snob, though, so it does the trick for me! I’ll have to give Calabria a try one day.
The service is efficient, but not always friendly. There can be some annoying fellow patrons that have been seated long enough that they should probably put down a rent deposit.
The food is never good. Avoid the food.

I can’t believe I’m actually saying this, but Starbucks makes better coffee. Since Filter is within walking distance of Calabria and Calabria closes early, the group I was with decided to move our studying there. I wish we’d have driven to Lestat’s instead.
First of all, the inside of this place is hot — soporifically hot. And this is at 12:30AM. If it’s that hot past midnight, I don’t even want to think how hot it must be during the day. If they have air conditioning, they don’t turn it on when it definitely deserves to be turned on.
Now, the coffee. I didn’t have high expectations, and I’m not rating this place poorly because the espresso was sour and weak. I’m rating this place poorly because my iced mocha (which I ordered because I thought bad coffee couldn’t mess it up) was so sour and weak that I literally did not drink more than my first sip. My entirely-​full iced mocha sat on the table for the whole hour and a half we were there. What a waste of chocolate milk :(
One extra star because the barista brewed fresh coffee when my friends ordered it. And MAYBE the bad shot in the mocha wasn’t his fault: maybe the pressure gauge on the machine broke, or someone was using the grinder for drip and forgot to re-​tighten it, or something. However, I don’t think I will return to find out.

Great but not excellent coffee, I LOVE the mango smoothies. But, the Owner, Steve has been a complete a$$hole to me. I USED to come there to socialize regularily with a social group of guys of about 40 on Saturdays and about 10 — 15 on wednesdays.
It is the policy of management that in order for you to be IN the Filter you MUST make a purchase. It does not matter what group you are with, the purchase is the door charge.
But lets be real.
Its too hot in the summers, and the place is absolutely filthy. The non-​existant airconditioning is too much for me to handle. i will be taking MY business elseware. You know who has GOOD coffee, and GOOD customer service? AIR-​CONDITIONING during the summer? GOOD FOOD? Café Calabria, just down the street.

Why are all the coffee houses around this city (except for Starbucks) so grungy? Is that cool? I think not.
Bored barrister, dirty floor, hot & stuffy and everything looked stale. The coffee was nothing to write home about.
Don’t bother coming here.

If you want to go to a nearby coffee shop in North Park for an after dinner continued catch up conversation with friends Filter is not the spot, especially during finals.
You will get the stink eye.
You will feel like you just walked into a university’s library.
You will get the hint and leave.

The good: Lots of tables and seating. If you’re gonna be there awhile, you can start a tab which is pretty nice.
The bad: Oddly quiet. Library-​like quiet. This is good if you’re studying (as it appears most people here were doing), but weird otherwise. It was also kind of warm inside, even with all the fans blowing and the doors open.
The ugly: Kahlua cheesecake. Wow, was it ever awful. It tasted like it’d been sitting in the refrigerator case for weeks, had no discernible Kahlua flavor, and had the grossest texture ever.
Although Filter is within walking distance for me, I doubt that I’ll be back any time soon.

Place has got CHARACTER. That’s all I ccan really say about it. I probably spent a good 5 minutes looking around the place before settling down to study. It feels like stepping into an antique store or a garage sale. Everything they had was different; not one thing matched. It was seriously interesting; CHARACTER.
I did feel a little grungy and dirty sitting a one of the tables. It’s a pretty open area so there were bums coming in and out which knocks me off my security requirement. Especially since most of the time I tend to study on my own.
Food was decent, I had their breakfast sandwich and a mexican mocha. My friend who joined later had their salmon bagel. All we’re good, but I’ve definitely had better.
The girl that helped me at the register was nice and sweet but the lady that handed me my food and coffee seemed to have had a bad day or something cuz i couldn’t knock that frown off her face as I flashed a smile and thanked her when grabbing my food and drink.
Not sure if I’d come back on my own, I pribably wouldn’t mind coming back if some friends wanted to study here. It’s a convenient location. OHHHH and they’re dog friendly! Because of the open outdoor patio, i could bring my little pup here if I didn’t feel like leaving him at home on a study day :)

Such a cozy place to get together with a friend!
Love the super comfortable furniture and the décor that makes it feel very home-​y and wonderful.
I always get the iced black tea… simple, classic, and antioxidant PACKED.
There is a selection of games to amuse you and your pals. My friend and I had an absolute ball playing Mad Gab, talking about boys, and laughing our butts off.
Goku, the barista, is really sweet!

This place is descent enough. I had a iced nonfat latte and I saw some pistachio baklava, but I had to pass because I wasn’t that hungry. To bad because it looked good.
I sat outside and read a magazine as I drank my iced latte. The latte was good and I enjoyed it. After a while, I had to move inside because some smokers came outside and lit up, not a big fan of the smokies.
I sat on a nice big black comfortable leather chair for a while. (
) The inside was cozy, but can get a little loud if you are trying to read.

This place is so hot & humid inside, my weave almost came unglued!
Charming yet not so aesthetically pleasing but then again when it is so warm in a place only a Tinker Bell would notice the lack of decoration skills!
The staff and the owner are very nice, cordial but refuse to turn up the AC; good place to be in the winter but I’ll take an air conditioned chain place over this java joint in the summer time anytime thank youes very mucho!
You can even BYOB. oh yeah, Gran Manier in my coffee. ah…not a good idea. oh what the hell I did!
They allow your pooch inside too; poor doggies panting up a storm and water bowls everywhere.
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There is a coffee group that meets here every Saturday and Wednesday from
10 AM to 11 AM (mostly retired guys or, those like Marty and I who make our own hours).
A bunch of catty queens if you ask me but a few of the guys are pleasant and, not poisoned by Rainbow Flag Fever!
I went on Saturday with Marty when I was down last and, in the past he had complained that group give a hard time about sweating in there and the like.
Well, I walked in and you read the beginning of my review (about the heat) and with my Chelsea Handler mouth I made it VERY clear how hot it was in this place.
LOUDLY too!
I used words with letters that start with:
F
S
GD
WTH?!
WTF???
They make nice snack but just your typical coffee house fare, nothing special really.
I’ll give them this, their coffee is so strong (just how I like it-​Bagdad Café Coffee Strong!) Marty grabbed my cup as I was socializing and said «Honey, you’re cut off!»
So, if you like New Orleans in the summertime heat & humidity then this is the place for you.
I was looking a little like this:

(Instramental) Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeey Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiice Cuuuuuuuuuup!
For those of you who didn’t understand my Filter reference, they’ve got pretty darn good coffee here. Nice flavor and really strong, but I didn’t ever get that feeling like I was cracked out.
Inside the furniture is a little dingy, but kinda feels like you’re in your grandmothers basement. It’s a good comfy spot to get a decent amount of work done if your office is a laptop like mine.
I can’t for the life of me remember what was in the Panini I had here, but I do remember thinking how it was much better than I thought it was going to be. It was a pleasant surprise, making Filter pound for pound one of my favorite spots to post up at for a few hours in North Park.

Filter a Coffee House
SD: North Park
Monday May 2 2011
Four Stars
Good Peach Black Ice Tea.
Open until 2 a.m.
Plenty of Sitting but no big tables.
Free Wifi with a changing password to prevent free loaders.
Surprisingly Quiet.

Filter is a very, very average coffeeshop with all the advantages and disadvantages of such a label.
Advantages:
–Eclectic collection of people, chairs, smells, lamps, menu options, etc.
–Free wifi (with clever password of the day!)
–Recent addition of beer and wine to the menu.
–Occasionally witty barista
–Very «neighborhoodish» location in North Park
–The presence of the awesome Civilized Conversation group, which meets every Thursday at 7 PM at the large table. If you’re interested in having an enlightening conversation on any one of a huge variety of topics, this is your chance to shine.
— Random TV showing «Earth» if you want to just zone out to some trippy-​looking penguins or wildebeests for awhile.
Disadvantages:
— Service definitely hit or miss. I’ve had them forget my orders on some occasions, take 15 seconds on others, take 10 minutes on a basic café au lait on some, take 1 minute on a complicated order on others.
— Smells. The bathroom smells like a pit toilet and its odor is rather overpowering.
— Pricey. Even the teas are kind of expensive, though the basic coffee is not bad. But $ 4.75 for a blended drink is pretty expensive and the paninis/​salads aren’t worth the price.
— Can get crowded with people some nights all hanging out on their laptops instead of talking, but that’s again just part of a coffeeshop.
Overall, it’s a decent place, but there’s definitely potential to make it better if the service became more consistent, the drink prices were lowered just a bit, and someone got that bathroom cleaned up and deodorized.

Sooooo… apparently Dottie has been «let go». Maybe I’m not a good judge of barista character?
Well, my two favorite baristas would have to be Dez and Ashley. They are both vegan/​vegetarian, so you can get a good idea of what to eat/​drink off the menu from them.
Dez, the dude with «Dez» tatted on his knuckles :) is super friendly and will always remember your drink order and chat you up each time you come in.
Ashley is cool too, but she doesn’t take any crap from ppl that come in and just want to use the internet without buying anything. She also makes/​sells some delicious vegan jerky from time to time.