El Barrista cafe

new york city runs on coffee in a way that's almost physiological, and the sheer number of places competing for your attention makes it easy to overlook what's actually good. el barrista, sitting on 3rd avenue in east harlem, is the kind of place that its regulars have figured out and quietly kept to themselves. the neighborhood around 116th street and up through the 120s has its own pace, a little removed from the manhattan that gets written about constantly, and a cafe that takes root here and genuinely holds people's loyalty is doing something right. if you're making your way up the east side, 2154 3rd ave is worth the specific trip, not just a fallback. come for the morning coffee.