Interview and photos by Iman Qureshi
She was just a farm girl.
“My husband grew up on a farm, I grew up on a farm. Our parents did the same things all their lives. Our siblings did the same things all their lives. Our grandparents did the same things all their lives, right? And then we’re like, how do we inspire our kids to do something different, to take a risk, if they don’t see an example of it?”
One of the places I go to the most often in Edmonton is Century Park, a fairly popular transit centre, towards the south of the city. Being around here every day, you quickly find that there isn’t much to do while waiting for your bus, but recently, a café called BE Coffee opened right across from the transit centre, making a great spot to sit down to do some work or grab a snack.
I spoke with Deb Hoover, who owns BE Coffee along with her husband, and with their four children. This family-owned and operated café opened on May 13, 2023, with a location purposefully chosen by the transit centre to give people a place to work, especially students.
With kids of her own in University, she understands the struggle of needing to “find a place to pick up your laptop and find a place to work, and pick up a cup of coffee while you’re at it.”
But moreover this café’s goal is to ultimately create a connected community of people, and “to make roots in the community.”
The bright yellow honeycomb logo along with the bee theme of the café isn’t one you see everyday, so I started by asking about the bee theme, and what the story behind the logo and the name was.
“BE came from the phrase Beginning to End. From the beginning of the day to the end of the day, people drink coffee. It’s an all day type of drink. But as a sports mom, I’ve been known to be carrying a cup of coffee around with me wherever I go, so it’s kind of my thing. Shortened it to BE Coffee.”
Further encapsulating the intimate personality of the café, Deb continued to tell me about how the significance of it came out of the relationship she had with her daughter.
“I would do the baby bumblebee song with her, and she has a bee tattoo, so when I think of [her], I think of bees. That’s how everything came together.”
The interior of the café is brightly lit with its large windows, and light coloured furniture. The inside is designed with various honeycomb structures on the walls, but my favourite part is probably the wooden hexagons that cover the entire ceiling of the café . These are often decorated for the season, and when I came in, there were upside down Christmas trees hanging from the ceiling, replacing the regular vines.
“My husband works as a custom home builder, but about two years ago, we thought ‘what are we doing with the rest of our lives – are we going to do what we’ve always done?’ I was an administrative assistant and I realized I didn’t wanna do this for another 15 years. This seemed to be a good fit for the family… It was more like taking a step of faith. This has been a totally new learning experience for me. It’s way out of my comfort zone,” Deb said, when I asked about the inspiration behind opening this café .
With the help of her husband and many of her friends, and endless nights on Pinterest, they were able to put together the perfect interior design for the café , making the most use out of the big windows and natural lighting. The unique part of this café is that nearly everything, including the benches, tabletops, the front counter area, an accent wall, and all the shelving and most wooden wall décor, was built by her husband.
In order to help with community building, they plan to host events down the road to spread coffee knowledge. So far on the agenda is a planned coffee tasting, hopefully in the near future. These kinds of coffee tastings are formally called ‘cupping.’ Here, they plan to bring in multiple roasts for people to try, in order to help them discover what works for them, and what coffee flavours they prefer.
The café also sells items suiting the bee theme, sourced from local businesses and vendors, such as beeswax candles, honey, beeswax wraps, soaps, sweatshirts, bottles, and more, many of which sport the café ‘s adorable honeycomb logo. Many of the paintings displayed around the café are commissioned from local artists and student artists in the area. This includes the food, which is either baked in store or locally sourced.
I tried the chocolate crinkle cookies while I was there, and the cookies’ chocolate-y sweetness paired super well with a hot coffee! This café has syrup flavours that I’ve never tried in my coffee before. I got my usual latte, with an added pump of maple flavoured syrup, sticking true to Canada’s heritage. The light, sticky sweetness blended perfectly with the espresso and it quickly became one of my favourite latte flavours. I don’t know of any other café that does maple lattes, so I’ll definitely be back here for more.
My favourite part was where the menu says ‘Canadiano’ instead of ‘Americano.’ I ended by asking Deb what her favourite drink was from this place. She said if you’re into coffee, she loves the Salted Caramel Latte. If you aren’t a coffee drinker, her go-to tea is a London Fog with cold foam on top, which elevates every drink.
They have a 10% student discount from 7:30 AM to 10 AM and 6 PM to 8 PM. If you’re ever in the area, bring over your homework and sit down for a nice cup of coffee and cozy café vibes!
BE Coffee
11015 26 Ave NW, Edmonton
(780) 341-6654
website
Hours:
Mon-Fri 7.30 am – 8 pm
Sat & Sun 8 am – 7 pm
Holidays 9 am – 5 pm
