Rush Rush is run by Nanigui and Simon, who started out as baristas in different coffee shops and fell in love with the complexity of coffee flavours. Their interest in tasting and testing steered one of them towards roasting and the other towards cooking, and their shared excitement for “things that taste damn good” became the Rush Rush Roastery. Simon finished second at the World AeroPress Championship in Vancouver.

Rush Rush chooses beans it likes to drink and roasts them light for fruity, floral flavours that are true to the fruit, with attention to traceability and seasonality. Most coffees come in separate filter and espresso roasts, beside a Brazilian espresso meant for milk drinks. The roastery can be visited on request. For businesses it helps choose machines and grinders from La Marzocco, Rocket and Kees van der Westen, plans the counter layout, runs cupping sessions to select a coffee and trains baristas.

The café came from wanting to share the coffee with customers directly, and the founders opened it as the kind of bar they felt was missing in Antwerp. It sits in Zurenborg, the city’s architectural neighbourhood, and serves the current coffees with seasonal dishes and homemade cakes and pastries. There are no reservations. A Rush Rush glass jar holds 200 g of filter coffee and can be refilled at the café without packaging.

Partner cafés

Coffee on the shelf

Photograph: Rush Rush Coffee Roasters