Gwanghwamun date café with Earl Grey cake and a yogurt bowl: Center

A kind, spotlessly clean café Center Coffee Gwanghwamun brews great coffee A solid dessert date spot Recommended: brewed coffee and Earl Grey cake

Where is Center Coffee Gwanghwamun, and what are its hours?

Center Coffee Gwanghwamun is a coffee and dessert spot five minutes on foot from Gwanghwamun Station. My girlfriend and I were out in Gwanghwamun, walked along Cheonggyecheon for a bit, and stopped by here to rest. This is already our third visit. We always order something different, and it's delicious every time.

Open weekdays from 7:30 am to 9:00 pm. It opens early for commuting office workers and stays open late until 9 pm, which is a real plus. I think Center Coffee is the best of the franchise café brands out there — it's a recognized café with 8 Blue Ribbon Survey mentions.

Inside Center Coffee Gwanghwamun: atmosphere and seating

Center Coffee is a stylish café that manages to feel both upscale and comfortable. The chairs, tables, lighting — every piece of furniture and interior detail is beautifully done. Once you've ordered, it's fun just to look around.

There's plenty of wide seating set up for office workers near Gwanghwamun Station. I'm so jealous — if this were near my office, I'd come all the time. The chairs are so comfortable, too. After walking around Cheonggyecheon and Gwanghwamun, sitting down here with a coffee made all the fatigue disappear.

Choosing a coffee by smelling the beans

At Center Coffee Gwanghwamun, you can sniff a variety of coffee beans before ordering. I love coffee, but sometimes it's hard to decide just from a name and description. Smelling notes of flower, fruit, chocolate and more before choosing means you end up with a coffee whose flavor really comes through.

Drip bag gift sets and cold brew concentrate to take home

There's also a Chuseok (Korean harvest holiday) drip bag gift set, beautifully packaged. It's said to include three of Center Coffee's blends. It seems like it'd make a great gift for a coffee-loving family member or friend.

They also carry various drip bag sets and cold brew concentrate. Center Coffee's cold brew in particular gets a lot of glowing reviews.

Center Coffee Gwanghwamun is spacious and comfortable, and the coffee aroma makes it a place you want to linger in.

What we ordered: Earl Grey cake, yogurt bowl and hibiscus tea

We ordered Earl Grey cake, the yogurt bowl, and hibiscus tea. The tea tasted really clean and smelled wonderful. Even iced, the tea's deep aroma came through fully.

Earl Grey cake: how dense is the cream?

The Earl Grey cake is my favorite menu item at Center Coffee. The Earl Grey cream is uniquely delicious — thick yet soft in texture, with the Earl Grey aroma coming through deeply. Underneath is a layer of butter-scented cream; this yellow cream brings out a nutty flavor and richness. Below that is sponge, and at the very bottom, a tart-textured base.

The new yogurt bowl at Center Coffee Gwanghwamun

We ordered Center Coffee's new yogurt bowl. It's granola, shine muscat grapes, and banana piled on thick Greek yogurt.

The fruit was fresh and the granola sweet and crunchy — really delicious.

Above all, the yogurt itself was so thick and had a great texture. With this flavor and texture, I feel like I could come eat it every day. Center Coffee makes great coffee, but its desserts are just as good.