Vashon Island Coffee Roasterie

This building is a piece of Northwest coffee history. Stewart Brothers Coffee, the company that became Seattle's Best Coffee, moved its roasting to Vashon in the early 1980s and did it here, in a hundred year old structure built of old growth island fir. The faded red SBC script is still on the south wall, and Jim Stewart's original vintage roaster is still in use. Starbucks bought Seattle's Best in 2003; Eva DeLoach and her family took on the building afterward and have run the Roasterie as a family business since.

The roasting style is described as rustic Northern European, in light, medium and dark roasts. The owner's stated favorite is the Midnight Blend, and the Twilight Series coffees earned a Seattle Times headline in 2009 when Smith Brothers Farms began delivering them to doorsteps in place of Tully's.

The building is worth the stop on its own: high ceilings, wood floors, an underground bean cellar and a heavy timber covered porch where island trade workers and visitors share the morning. Minglement, an organic food and herb store that dates to 1972, occupies one side, and a small museum section lays out the timeline. Whether there is a food menu beyond a scone is not something the Roasterie publishes.

Winter hours are Monday through Saturday 8 to 4 and Sunday 9 to 2; summer hours are not posted online.