Heritage Bicycle – General Store

Bicycles and coffee, an interesting pair but Heritage really makes it work in their favor.

Let it be know this is my alltime favorite coffee shop in the Lakeview neighborhood for sitting outside. There is not one that I have visited that can beat their set up!

Here it is; you walk up and the first thing you will notice, unfortunately, is a massive Chicago Cub mural painted on the outside of the brick building. Being a White Sox fan that is why I find this to be unfortunate. Living in Chicago I still find it really cool. The mural overlooks the outdoor siting, which during the summer months consists of four picnic tables a three have umbrellas and one does not, or at least today it did not. This all next to their old school volkswagen van! In the fall they are know to move a few of the picnic tables and set-up a bonfire, they keep this going majority of the day too! Very cool, I have yet to sit by the bonfire but I plan to try that out this fall!  

That just being the outdoor seating there is still a good amount of seats for butts inside too. First item to note, there is the coffeeshop entry and there is the bicycle shop entry, I recommend entering through the coffee shop door where you will be greeted with the smell of freshly ground coffee, espresso and usually something sweet.

Today was a little more busy that I would have originally expected, all the tables inside were taken up. The seating inside includes two window tables, one on each side of the entry way and then a long community table down the middle of the coffee shop. The coffee counter is on your left and at the end of the community table there is another counter that I have never noticed before, but this is where the breakfast food aside from the baked good is prepared.

Just look at these cute planters hanging near the food prep counter! LOVE<3

Wandering up to the coffee counter I was scanning the menu for all the drink options, there is a bored covering all the coffee shop basics, then the coffee beans they have roasted for today and them small boards below all that featuring the seasonal drinks and flavors.

I spy vanilla lavender, instantly a sucker for that flavor, everywhere I have tried it it’s been SO good. While waiting our turn in line I was checking out all the baked good, not that my drink wouldn’t have been sweet enough for me, but on Yelp there were raving reviews about the chocolate chip pretzel cookie they offer here. Sounds amazing right, well I would have loved to try it but I was not seeing it in the case this morning,  such a bummer. All the other baked goods looked so delicious as well, the barista told us they bring all their baked goods in from West Town Bakery.

I’ll give you a few minutes to scroll through their site, you won’t regret it but your waistline might.

While waiting for our coffees to be ready I took this opportunity to explore into the back half of the coffee shop, this is where it turns more into the bicycle shop. Also, this is the way you would want to head if you are eventually trying to make it over to the bicycle portion, they connect back here and there are secret couches back here too! I almost thought about getting one of their T-shirts, they were so soft and pretty cute too!

Luckily my latte was ready so I hurried back to the bar to pick that up. Heritage has fun looking bicycles and equipment but it will cost you a pretty penny too. Still fun to look, my father would love this shop, not the prices but he is a bicycle junkie, I tried to wait and come here with him for this post but I couldn’t hold back much longer. I just love this place, it truly is they type of coffee shop you could hang out in all day long.

Coffee in hand we of course went to sit outside on this beautiful day. We were able to score a whole picnic table to ourselves, I this was because it happened to be the only table without an umbrella set up, others were smart to seek shade, it was hot this afternoon. I loved soaking up the Vitamin D for a little. It was a stunning afternoon, I think we sat there for at least an hour and a half till we started to get too hot and a little hungry so that’s when we knew it was time to get moving. Another great feature about this coffee shop is their wifi reaches the seating outside, so realistically if you got a table with an umbrella you could post up with your laptop and get some work done at the same time, also being right along Lincoln Ave. there will be plenty of people watching too. Not a chance for getting bored while here.

if you could not tell by my huge smile in this picture the latte was awesome-sauce! Yum I’m already missing it and wish I had one in hand while I wrote this post, you will not be disappointed in this latte, the perfect sweet without over powering the delicious espresso flavor.

Heritage Bicycle on Lincoln Ave. is location number two, technically called the General Store, the original is call the Outpost and it’s a little further north in Uptown. I’ll have to head back up that way to check out the original someday.

Have any of you been to Heritage Bicycle in Uptown? Would love to hear more about it before going!