There’s something about recipes that feel like an inheritance of sorts. They aren’t just instructions, but tiny windows into how someone lived. My grandma’s recipes were mostly simple, but thoughtful and always meant to be shared. When I began working on the recipe for the Carrot Cake Latte for our Libertyville Café seasonal menu, I kept coming back to that same idea: creating something simple, thoughtful, and worth passing around. 

I think somewhere along the way, everything just… expanded. Sizes got bigger, menus got longer, prices got higher, and the ever-so-innocent cappuccino got swept up in it all. It adapted. It stretched. It lost a bit of its sense of self.  Now it shows up rebranded, reinterpreted, and occasionally followed by the one silly question that keeps me up at night. “Hot or iced?”

We hosted our second-ever latte art competition at our Highwood café, and it was an absolutely awesome night. On February 28th, folks from all over Chicagoland, and even some out-of-staters, joined the Tala crew in throwing down behind the bar. Contenders showed up, showed out, and showed us their best pours.

Mastercol – Terra is our first fresh-crop coffee of the new year from Huila, Colombia, arriving after an exceptional run of standout Huila lots throughout 2025. It immediately caught our attention as a double-fermented, single-varietal Caturra from Mastercol—one of our most trusted producer groups and long-term partners since 2017. This is a coffee that feels both familiar and exciting, building on everything we love about the region while offering a renewed sense of vibrancy.

It started as an experiment, and now it’s the drink our regulars refuse to let us take off the seasonal menu. The beloved Baklava Latte was formerly an exclusive drink at our Libertyville café, but it was met with such rave reviews that we knew it needed a semi-permanent spot on the seasonal menu at all of our cafes. 

We’re thrilled to share our newest single-origin release: Rung’eto Kii, a vibrant and beautifully classic Kenyan coffee from Kirinyaga. Coffees like this one remind us exactly why Kenya remains one of the most celebrated coffee origins in the world. After a few challenging years for producers, it’s exciting to see Kenya’s coffee legacy shining bright once again, and this cup captures everything we’ve been missing.

Matcha has exploded in popularity, thanks to social media trends, its striking bright-green color, and the rise of specialty cafes serving it up in lattes, baked goods, and more. But behind the buzz lies a growing challenge: matcha supply simply isn’t keeping up with demand.

Finca El Jardin is a naturally processed Pacas varietal that shines with balance and clarity. The profile opens with crisp tones of navel orange and raspberry, zesty and refreshing, layered over a cozy, round sweetness of dates, brown sugar, and raisins. It’s a harmonious dance between juicy brightness and warm depth, proof of the careful processing and precision at the farm.

It happens at least once a week.

Someone points to our menu, eyebrows raised. “What’s a Gibraltar?” they ask, half-whispering like they’re worried it’s a secret club they weren’t invited to.

Let’s start with this: a Gibraltar is just another name for a Cortado at Tala