If you are around Strathkinness, near St Andrews in Fife, then a newly-opened food offering, the Miller Coffee Cabin, is worth a visit.
Michael Miller is the man behind the Miller Coffee Cabin which has been serving hot rolls, burgers and, of course, coffee at Nydie Camp Site, near Strathkinness.
The 33-year-old has worked in hospitality his entire life but, along with his father, decided to bring out his own range of coffee after going out for a meal and finding out that the after-dinner coffee was, well, rubbish!
His latest venture takes Michael back to his roots of providing great food for hungry customers – and he is loving every minute of it, despite working seven days a week.
With his signature, Miller Burger (a succulent burger topped with thinly sliced steak that has been seasoned with six spices, cheese and three sauces), proving popular, the coffee cabin’s reputation is growing.
Gap in the market
Having worked in hospitality in a number of well-known hotels and restaurants, Michael, who is married to Alison with whom he has two children Charlie, 9, and Brooke, 4, moved into producing coffee with his father, also Michael, after seeing a gap in the market in 2018.
“I have been general manager of hotels, worked at the Apex as duty manager there, I have worked at Fairmont and the Old Course, so hospitality is my speciality. Then I have worked with chefs like Dean Banks, from MasterChef, at Haar and then I went into coffee,” he explained.
“My father and I decided we would get into coffee after we went out for a meal and the coffee afterwards was awful so we jokingly said ‘Let’s make our own’, and that was what we did, establishing Miller Coffee.
“I have a roasting house in Dundee which I share with another producer. We roast our own coffee which is ace. That is how it all started and our coffee is now in 11 Michelin Star restaurants in the UK including the Peat Inn, the Grange in St Andrews and other places are stocking our coffee too.”
Gie it Laldy
And he has some unusual names for his coffee – Gie it Laldy, Gonne No Dae that and Miller B +.
“The Gie it Laldy is the one we supply to the restaurants and it is named after where I am from around the NC500,” added Michael who hails from Thurso but moved here 16 years ago.
He said things really took off with the coffee, with the opportunity to take on the cabin one he didn’t want to miss.
Michael continued: “We started off by roasting the coffee, then we went online and it all spiralled from there. I was invited to come up here and take these premises on and because of how well it did online it has been doing extremely well here, too.
“I have only been open for three weeks and things have been going really well.”
On the menu
Great coffee, hot chocolate, morning rolls and burgers are what you will find on the menu at Miller Coffee Cabin.
“We are doing coffee and tea, bacon rolls, my Miller-style rolls. The black pudding roll we do is a little strange as we do black pudding and jam which people don’t think would work but it goes really well together,” Michael revealed.
“We do some great burgers; steak burger, steak and cheese and we have a special pork burger which is on currently, and then we do our special Miller burger which is extremely popular. That is with sliced steak on top, cheese, spices and three of my sauces.
“We are hopefully going to be bringing in Janettas ice cream. We do espresso, Americano, lattes, flat whites, cappuccinos. We do our own hot chocolate, which includes a Bailey’s hot chocolate and a luxury hot chocolate.”
While weekdays are steady at the coffee cabin, the weekends are proving incredibly popular revealed Michael who has plans to expand his business.
“From Monday to Thursday we tick over, but Friday, Saturday, Sunday it’s just chaos! As the word is getting out there it has snowballed, it’s great,” he said.
“I would like to have a deli. I go to a lot of Fife Farmers’ Markets, the produce that is produced here in Fife is some of the best in the world in my opinion and I would like to showcase that produce by having a deli, using Miller Coffee and then by having that range of amazing produce.”
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