Just steps off the Eastside Trail, Atlanta’s newest coffeehouse is doing more than pouring lattes. Milk & Maple Coffeehouse, which celebrated its grand opening on November 1, 2026, is the first fully kosher café on the BeltLine and a deliberate front door for Jewish community life in one of the city’s busiest pedestrian corridors.

Located at 730 Ponce de Leon Place NE, just north of Ponce City Market and inside the Chabad Intown campus, the coffeehouse sits roughly 20 steps from the trail. A dedicated outdoor ordering window and new pathway make it easy for walkers, runners, and cyclists—nearly 200,000 of whom pass the building each month—to grab a drink without breaking stride. A spacious patio with seating offers a place to linger while watching the trail traffic.

The Vision Behind the Cup

The café is the brainchild of Rabbi Eliyahu Schusterman and his wife, Dena, who founded Chabad Intown in 1997 and moved the center into its 21,000-square-foot BeltLine building in 2018. The roughly $500,000 project grew from a simple goal: create a welcoming, high-quality kosher space that meets people where they are. Concept work began in late 2024, led in part by the couple’s daughter, Mira Levy, with launch manager Berri Dworcan (the Schustermans’ son-in-law) overseeing operations. Two major gifts of $100,000 each helped move the project forward.

The name itself is intentional. “Milk and Maple” nods to the Torah’s description of the Land of Israel as “a land flowing with milk and honey.” Everything on the menu—coffee, matcha, teas, pastries, salads, sandwiches, and Arden’s Garden smoothies—is certified kosher by the Atlanta Kashruth Commission, the largest such agency in the Southeast. Dairy meets the higher chalav Yisrael standard, and baked goods are pat Yisrael. Sourcing ingredients that met those standards was one of the biggest challenges, with much of the food coming from outside Georgia.

A Space Designed to Linger

Inside, the aesthetic is clean and modern, with green tile, marble counters, pendant lighting, comfortable seating, abundant outlets, high-speed Wi-Fi, and shelves of books. An iconic apple-green couch from Chabad Intown has a place of honor. The design (with input from Pimsler Hoss Architects and Atelier Davis) prioritizes both quick trail-side service and longer stays—whether for a laptop session, a conversation, or simply people-watching. The soft opening in mid-October already drew visitors who came for coffee and left having noticed programming flyers or even put on tefillin.

The standout drink is the house salted maple latte (available hot or iced), alongside standard espresso drinks, matcha, and chai. Pricing is intentionally competitive with non-kosher shops nearby so that kosher quality doesn’t come at a premium.

Hours and Practical Details

Milk & Maple is open Sunday through Friday from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. and closed on Shabbat. The grand opening on November 1 included a ribbon-cutting at 11 a.m., family entertainment, and giveaways. The location is adjacent to Be Hot Yoga Atlanta and sits in a converted retail space along the trail.

More Than Coffee

For the Schustermans and Dworcan, the café is both a business and a mission. “The primary objective was to engage people. We simply wanted to get people through the door,” Rabbi Schusterman has said. Some visitors will sign up for classes or light Shabbat candles; others will simply order a latte and continue down the trail. Either outcome is viewed as success. As Dworcan put it, even when deeper engagement doesn’t happen immediately, “people are choosing to eat kosher, people are choosing to make blessings. It’s amazing.”

In a city where the BeltLine has become a defining public space, Milk & Maple offers something distinctive: a high-quality, fully kosher pit stop that doubles as an open invitation to community. Whether you’re there for the salted maple latte, a workspace, or simply a shaded patio seat, the coffeehouse has already carved out a new role on Atlanta’s Eastside Trail.