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Divinity School Coffee Shop
Rating Details »
Category: Coffee & Tea
Neighborhood: Hyde Park1025 E 58th St
Swift Hall Basement
Chicago, IL 60615
(773) 702-4806
- Hours:
Mon-Fri. 8:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- No
- Price Range:
-
$
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- No
- Outdoor Seating:
- No
8 reviews for Divinity School Coffee Shop
This business is a Yelp Sponsor
5/28/2007
6/1/2009
1/12/2009
5/20/2008
9/12/2007
7/30/2007
2/19/2008
11/12/2006
5 photos
One of the Business' Favorite Reviews What's This?
It took me a few months to find the mysterious "Div School Coffee Shop" that everyone talked about. The secret: walk into Swift hail. In front of you and to your left you'll see a staircase leading down. Follow it down to the basement, then walk all the way down the hall. You've just discovered the holy grail of Hyde Park coffee shops.
Get here around 1030ish or so and you'll find piping hot samosas delivered fresh from Ragun' Cajun. Get in before then and you can get fresh-baked croissants and other pastries. Stop in for lunch and you'll find an array of offerings from local restaurants, including lots of vegetarian and vegan-friendly offerings.
But the coffee. Oh the coffee. The cheapest Fair Trade coffee in Hyde Park, hands down. And $1 lattes three days a week. If you wind up in Hyde Park, jonesin' for coffee, head to the Div School coffee shop.
After hearing so many people rant and rave about this place, I expected to be blown away. But really it's just a normal (albeit cool) coffee shop.
It's hidden away in the basement of a building on U of C's campus, but so many people know about it, the place is often packed. They have a lot of drinks and some food too, so worth visiting if you work or go to school on campus or nearby.
Only bad things: not open NEARLY late enough to be located on a COLLEGE campus (and they kick you out of the lounge where there is seating even earlier, at about 3:30), and they just upped their prices on the food from local restaurants such that it is difficult to get a super-cheap lunch there.
On the plus side, this is definitely my favorite student-run U of C coffee shop to lounge around in--somehow the people seem better than in Cobb or Uncle Joe's. And of course, the personal attention to the drinks they make and nice staff keep me coming in AND tipping.
Where god drinks coffee (supposedly).
I love me some dollar-lattes (M, W, F from 10:30-11:30 am, I think. Or maybe 10-11 am?). The lattes are ALMOST always delicious (I think once I got one that tasted funny and once I got one that was 90% foam which was weird, the cup was super light and there wasn't much to drink...). They now write people's initials on the cup, which has solved the latte-poaching problem that has bugged me in the past (waiting and waiting for my beloved latte, then losing it to someone who came in and ordered after me! Someone more aggressive and vocal than me, shouting out "mine" and making off with it before I can clear my throat to object...)
The folks working here and generally nice and chill. I like that they have take-out from Rajun Cajun and pizza by the slice from Giordanos (spinach deep dish, yummm).
I have a lot of nice memories of getting food from here and eating it outside on the quads in the grass in the springtime with friends.
EDIT: okay, now the coffee is a WHOLE DOLLAR instead of 75 cents as they moved exclusively to fair trade but the fact that they focus on ethical coffee makes it well worth an extra quarter. they also got a new espresso machine that works wonders.
----
Seventy-five cents for fair-trade organic coffee. It's wonderful.
**UPDATE: As of Winter 2008, the Div School now only serves fair trade coffee, thereby negating one of the pros in my list. I've downgraded them, and I'm considering switching back to Cobb as my main coffee shop. At least as long as it's cold enough outside to drink hot beverages.**
The Div School coffee shop used to be tied with Cobb for cheapest coffee on campus, but then Cobb raised their prices. Hooray for Grounds of Being keeping their prices low!
There are several other reasons why the Div School Cafe is my favorite spot on campus to get coffee:
-They have a punch-card thing where you get a free coffee after buying 10.
-They charge different amounts for Fair Trade and regular coffee, rather than just jacking up the price for everyone.
-As far as I know, this is the only student-run cafe where you can get iced drinks. Who knew ice was so hard to come by?
-They have special drinks that sound really good.
-The tip-jar voting system is pretty clever.
The pre-brewed coffee isn't excellent but it's decent, and more importantly it contains caffeine. The only prepared drink I've had was an iced mocha, and it was really good. If they started providing Splenda I'd revise my rating to 5 stars.
In all of my visits to the Div. School coffee shop ... I have had ONE, count 'em ONE delicious beverage. And that was just recently (as in, yesterday), so that's why this review is finally being written. So thank you to the long-haired blonde boy who made my small Vanilla Latte with Soy -- you are a true champion of baristas.
Now, I don't know how many people work at the Div School shop, but I swear there are three new faces every time I go in. Is there a high turnaround? Is this why the beverages tend to suck? The coffee is never good -- a friend once referred to it as "toilet water," and I can't help but agree. I guess the tea would probably be safe, but all specialty drinks are completely hit or miss. I'd say the good/bad ratio for me is, well, you guessed it, about 1 in 50. That, folks, is not a good set of odds.
It's nice, though, I'll admit it, to have someplace right there. But I think I'll trek to Argo or Starbucks for a cup of Joe, and even pay the extra couple bucks or so, to avoid drinking ... well ... the toilet water.
At first glance, it is hard to imagine that this dark basement hole-in-the-wall would be the place "Where God Drinks Coffee." But spend a few moments in the company of the divinity school students who run the coffee shop and the myriad devoted customers who join the staff and their deity for a daily cup of joe, and you will begin to understand the understated and simple appeal of this classic U of C establishment.
Customers have a choice of ordering either Regular or Fair Trade coffee, both of which are very reasonably priced (nowhere else can you get 16 oz. of Regular or 12 oz. Fair Trade coffee for 1 smackaroo). Fair Trade coffee is a darker roast with strong flavor, and it is an ethical brand of coffee that ensures that the farmers and growers of coffee beans are paid a fair wage for their labor. Not that purchasing Regular coffee is unethical by any means - it is grown locally by a small group of farmers outside of Chicago. Either choice supports the little guys rather than reinforcing the deeply-lined pockets of The Man.
Espresso can also be purchased for one lowly dollar, and the Div School standard is that all shots come doubled at a strong and healthy 2 oz. If you are lucky enough to come in MWF between 10:30-11:30, you will hit the jackpot Latte Hour and get a 12 oz. latte or cappuccino for (you guessed it) $1. Any other time of the week, espresso drinks are roughly $2 - a far cry from the $4 you'd pay at Starbucks!
Pastries are catered in locally from La Petit bakery every morning, but they usually sell out well before lunchtime. The Div School was actually the first campus location to broker lunch catering deals with local restaurants, and as a result they have the lowest prices on boxed lunches from places like Siam, The Nile, Cedars, Soul Veg, Edwardo's, Good to Go Foods and more. Most boxed lunches sell for $5.25, but you can find many other fares (slices of pizza, spinach pies, pasta salads) priced anywhere from $1.75 - $4.25. Add a beverage from the generously stocked fridge, and you can have lunch for an average of $6. Not too shabby.
The cheap coffee and catered food is what attracts the majority of patrons around the lunch hour, but loyal patrons who frequent the shop in the early morning (the shop opens at 7:45 in order to serve you coffee before you have to be behind your desk at 8:00) come back for the friendly staff and quirky atmosphere. To wit: recently, a "Battle of the Gods" was waged March-Madness-style on the giant chalkboard behind the counter, and patrons cast their tips to vote between the heavyweight religious, imaginary, and literary likes of Muhammad, Jesus, Poseidon, Foucault, John Lennon, and - this round's ultimate champion - Optimus Prime of Transformers fame. The first battle lasted more than three months, spawned loyal followers, and grew into a local phenomenon for its kooky and irreverent treatment of typically weighty religious figures.
The Div School Coffee Shop is staffed by graduate students, managed by students, and run by students - and its independent financial status from the U of C means that all its profits are used to directly benefit the Divinity School and (of course) its students. The laid-back atmosphere in the shop is a product of its student-run status - this is no Starbucks! The lack of sophistication (there isn't even a cash register, so all tabs are calculated via quick mental math) will frustrate patrons who want their triple-shot low-fat mocha raspberry iced lattes within a minute of placing the order, but all other patrons will likely be charmed by the slow pace, intellectual banter, and friendly staff. Order the same drink more than twice from the same worker, and chances are good they'll remember it for you on the third visit. They'll probably know your name by the fifth visit, and the names of your children and pets and childhood imaginary friend by the tenth. Like I said, this is no Starbucks!
Keeping with the support-the-students atmosphere, adorning the walls are the works of talented U of C senior art students, providing a means for young artists to display their pieces and discerning patrons to potentially purchase original art for a fraction of the price. If you don't want a painting, you can purchase a T-shirt or travel mug for $10 to commemorate your trip to God's Coffee House.
In short: The Divinity School Coffee Shop is a quirky and off-beat find, run in an anti-Starbucks environment by students who believe in dispensing non-specific salvation - one fairly-traded cup of coffee at a time.
***The power of God compels me to confess: this review may have been slightly influenced by the fact that I am, indeed, the senior student employee of aforementioned coffee shop. You can direct any complaints to my manager, the Big Java Drinker in the Sky. This is God's coffee house, so take up your issues with Her.
