Buzz on the Hill: Peregrine Espresso

AFTER HALF A year of sitting empty, the old Murky Coffee location on Capitol Hill has pulled a phoenix act — or, rather, if we're talking birds, a peregrine act.

Thanks to the newly christened Peregrine Espresso, Hill-dwellers can get their java fix again. Coffee on the way to the Metro! Coffee after a day of shopping at Eastern Market! Coffee for the sake of coffee! Ryan Jensen, the 29-year-old former manager of Murky, bought the location from his old boss, Nick Cho, after the D.C. Office of Tax and Revenue seized the place in February of this year for back sales taxes and evicted Cho.

But enough of that unpleasantness. Coffee is back on the Hill.

Jensen and his wife, Jill, who have both "always wanted to do our own coffee place," were putting off the big move because of the cost of doing business in D.C.

Jensen had left Murky in 2006 to work for Counter Culture Coffee, a fair-trade, organic coffee importer and roaster (which supplied beans to Murky and now to Peregrine, too), but in the spring, when "the whole Murky thing went down," Ryan says, "it was like, 'Wow, here's this opportunity where I know all the customers, and I even know how much business was going through there.'"

Jensen isn't too worried about duplicating a hit. "With people I've known that have taken over coffeehouses, they change one thing and people complain. It's like, 'I'm trying to run my business — why won't you let me?' [But] with the renovations we did, people have walked in and said 'Oh, this is a different place.' This isn't just a new coat of paint. It isn't just a recycling of an old business."

Peregrine's distinguishing features are twofold: no to "big, sugary, out-of-control coffee drinks" and yes to "microbrewed" cups of drip. The store has two syrups: chocolate and house-made vanilla, and those who ask for a white chocolate mocha or a caramel macchiato are out of luck. No espresso-based drinks larger than 12 ounces, and no $5 hot chocolate (for that you'll have to head to Murky's still-extant location in Clarendon later this winter). And your regular cuppa — unless you come during the morning rush and just want to grab and go — is "microbrewed," which means the Peregrine staff will grind just enough beans for one cup and brew them right in front of you.

"It's a little bit of wait, but people are used to waiting a minute or two for espresso," Jensen says. "Typically, when you walk into a coffee shop, they don't really always have fresh coffee on hand."

Maybe in the end folks aren't going to care about the name of the 7th Street SE coffee
shop. As long as people can get their caffeine, does it matter? But there's one core difference between the old and the new. When asked whether Peregrine will serve espresso over ice to a customer as Murky infamously would not, Jensen burst out laughing.

"I have no qualms with people getting what they want," he says, finally. "The day after we opened, somebody came in and ordered that. It was just like, 'Are you joking?' But that was what they wanted."

» 660 Pennsylvania Ave. SE; open Mon.-Sat., 7 a.m.-9 p.m.; Sun., 8 a.m.-8 p.m. (Eastern Market)

By Express contributor Rachel Kaufman

Photo courtesy of Peregrine Espresso