Driving up Central Avenue from northeast Minneapolis approaching Columbia Heights, you might have noticed the sign—big, bright-red metal letters (and one white one), arranged on a trellis in an off-kilter pattern spelling “COSMIC.” It’s a cheerful display, one that recalls vintage shops and secondhand stores with hidden treasures tucked inside.
Or maybe you haven’t noticed it at all! As Cosmic Coffee owner/barista/cook/sole employee Dusty Wahl notes, this shop—which sells coffee, not knick-knacks—is just a little further out than many of us city dwellers venture.
“That’s one of the special things about it,” he says. “It’s a little further north than everything else, which really ties it to this neighborhood here.”
That neighborhood is Waite Park, where Wahl has lived for a decade, just a few blocks from the shop. He visited that building on the corner of Central & 33rd Avenue—long a restaurant or cafe of some sort—countless times before occupying it, watching it change hands more than once and wondering in an offhand sort of way what it would be like to open a coffee shop of his own in the space.
There was one small problem: “I didn’t know much about coffee,” Wahl chuckles. But having worked in restaurants before, including a stint preparing meals for a community support program in south Minneapolis, he thought he could figure it out. And when the building became available once again following the departure of Sammy’s Avenue Eatery, Wahl decided to go for it. He took over the lease in December of 2021, opening Cosmic Coffee the following February.
A few short years later, Cosmic feels like it’s been there forever. Inside, a hand-painted message spans one wall: “Welcome to Cosmic. You are welcome as you are. We’re glad you are here.” Pew-like wooden benches line the perimeter, and outside there’s a sprawling patio and garden peppered with picnic tables and mismatched chairs. It feels more like a fun aunt’s backyard than a coffee shop.
Looking around the patio on a recent afternoon, Wahl muses that someone must have taken a few chairs recently, “but that’s the first thing that’s gone missing out of here,” he says. People warned him, as he readied to open, that he’d have to lock everything down, but he hasn’t found theft to be a problem: “I actually gained two kittens,” he says.
(The “Cosmic Kitties,” as they came to be known, were abandoned out front of the shop in the winter of 2021, and resided in the basement during the shop's early days. They live at home with Wahl and his wife now, but they’re honored on bags of Cosmic’s house blend: Mac and Midnight, which like all the coffee here comes from Minneapolis’s Vitality Roasting.)
Food-wise, Cosmic serves up breakfast sandwiches that are a steal at just $4, plus breakfast burritos that’ll run you between $6-$8. Bread and pastries are sourced from nearby Heights Bakery, occasionally supplemented with orders from another NE bakery, Sarah Jane’s.
There’s no hood in Cosmic’s kitchen, so Wahl assembles the breakfasts rather than cooking raw ingredients: “I view it more as kind of a food truck vibe, in the way that I serve and the way that I do things,” he explains. And at times, the coffee shop has operated… sort of exactly like a food truck. Last summer, he stayed open in the evening hours, serving hot dogs and ice cream truck treats out of the window facing Cosmic’s patio.
Wahl says he feels like he’s living out a dream, and he wants to help other people live out theirs. Many surfaces inside Cosmic are lined with items from local makers: broccoli earrings and eggplant keychains, crocheted cowls, art prints. Wahl, a longtime maker himself, isn’t precious about the display, with a motto that’s more, “If you can find a spot for it, put it out there.” He doesn’t charge a commission or consignment fee either—he’s got the room, why not fill it with local wares?
It’s the ethos that underscores everything at Cosmic Coffee. A neighbor wants to host a cookout on the patio? Sure, why not. Someone abandons kittens? We’ll take ‘em in. The coffee shop is a place for the community to connect, and Wahl loves seeing this slice of the city grow with him, chatting with regulars and watching as neighbor kids start to come in on their own for the first time.
“What I really enjoy is that since it’s just me, you only see me, and I see you, and I get to know you very well because of that,” he says. “Especially the people who regularly come through from the neighborhood.”
Cosmic’s sign is a symbol of that connectivity. One neighbor gifted the letters and the planter beneath it, while another neighbor gifted the lattice, and it all came together thanks to the creative vision of a third neighbor.
“I feel like I’ve made a lot of friends,” Wahl grins. “We’re building—I hope we’re building—something that can last.”
Cosmic Coffee
Address: 3301 Central Ave. NE, Minneapolis
Hours: Tuesday-Friday 6 a.m.-12 p.m.; Saturday-Sunday 8 a.m.-12 p.m. (but check online for updates)
