Love this thread. I really like Paksong Bolovens Gold--Lao coffee, from the Boloven Plateau. I look for it when I make visa runs to Laos, but have never seen it for sale in Thailand. Maybe it's on Lazada?
https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/laos ... index.html
Thailand also produces some very good coffee. One of my neighbors is a French guy named Alain, who owns a coffee roasting company called Symphonies on the Ring Road very close to the entrance to Ruysuk Hotel. He has coffee beans from many different areas of Thailand and will roast the beans to your specifications. His minimum is only one kilo. Not cheap, but hey, it doesn't get any fresher than to watch the beans come out of the big burlap sacks and go into the roaster as you watch.
Alain is extremely knowledgeable about coffee and will share that with you. Ask to sample! He was brought from France to Thailand in 1993 by the Royal Projects Agency to help develop the Thai coffee industry, so he knows his stuff. Because I want less caffeine, I usually get my beans roasted to what he calls, "mocha."
The beans go right into my home freezer and we only grind a small amount at a time. Also, I've found that using the best tasting water I can find leads to better tasting coffee. Maybe that's not really necessary, but I like to hedge my bets.
Mixing robusta and arabica beans is a common practice, but some would argue coffee houses do it as a money-saving measure.
http://worldofcaffeine.com/2011/10/21/c ... after-all/
Beyond Cafe's locations are my favorite for an Americano. Cheap prices, good coffee, nice decor, and pleasing eye candy.
The trendy-looking coffee place up by Ban Na Ka on the way to Nong Khai is called RJ8, I think. Look for the black-and-white sign on the west side of the highway that says COFFEE BAKERY. (See the photos)
But their coffee is very bitter--maybe they burn the beans like Starbucks, or simply grind them extremely fine.