Pop-Up Doughnut & Coffee Shop, shown with menu and the “Summer”

This morning, my boyfriend announced that he wanted to take me on a date—right at that moment. Where would we be going on a date at 10:30 in the morning? Well, as it turns out, The Inventing Room (a team of renegade culinary alchemists), had recently opened a pop-up restaurant at Table 6, serving up innovative doughnuts and craft coffee creations. So, naturally, I took a break from writing and enjoyed a leisurely trip to this ephemeral sweet shop.

On the menu, we found decadent confections like the Oink, which came topped with maple pastry cream, bacon-Nutella powder and spicy house-cured bacon; the PB&J, which was loaded with cream, burnt peanut butter marshmallows and grape “caviar”; and (my personal favorite) the Summer: a glazed doughnut topped with tangy lemon curd, flavorful blueberry butter cream and crumbles of grilled yuzu pound cake. Oh. My. God. It was pure sugar overload. (And if my personal trainer is reading this, yes, this is where I was instead of your morning CrossCut class. Feel free to punish me tomorrow.)

Eric from Two Rivers Coffee, making some badass brew

Serving up craft coffee was master barista and owner of Two Rivers Coffee Eric Yochim, whose friendliness and enthusiasm was absolutely contagious. I couldn’t help but get excited too, when he was showing us the intricacies of three different coffee brewing processes: French press, the pour-over and siphon brewing. The way he explained it, each method expresses the coffee beans in a unique way, from bringing out the robust, tannic elements (French press) to something a bit more refined but still bold (the pour-over) to achieving a level of crispness and clarity (the siphon). “We get the best beans, and we’re just trying to do those beans justice,” he says.

I’m not sure if it was the massive quantity of sugar I consumed, the multiple cups of unadulterated caffeine or the romantic mid-morning escape, but I left the pop-up doughnut shop feeling totally buzzed and ready to take on the rest of my day.

Note: The pop-up doughnut shop is open for only two more days (until July 14), from 6 a.m. – 11 a.m. Get in while you can!