Fri 27 Oct 2006
I’ve been asked what roaster and beans I’m using, so here are the details:
And that’s it! It’s fun and economical to bust out 3 ounces and do a micro-roast.
Brian
Sat 21 Oct 2006
I’m officially a home roasting newbie now. I acquired a West End Poppery II off of Ebay and placed my first Sweet Maria’s order. It’s nice to see how cheap it is to buy green beans, even for the end consumer. For $30 shipped, I managed to acquire 5 pounds of green. Sweet.
So I was standing in my driveway Friday night trying to roast beans in a popcorn popper. No doubt the neighbors wondered what the hell I was up to. The first couple tries outside were a wash as the beans never seemed to get quite hot enough to really go through the first crack. It was a bit frustrating, but the process didn’t seem too messy so I moved the whole operation into the kitchen.
Doing the roast under the exhaust vent worked a lot better! I got a nice full city roast of Espresso Monky. Very cool to hear those beans crackling away, knowing that uber fresh coffee await for Saturday morning!
It was fun to try a new espresso blend Saturday morning, but doubly so because I’d roasted it up the previous night. It was admittedly, not as good as the sainted Black Cat, but still a very respectable espresso blend. My only complaint was that the body was not as full as the Black Cat and I’m not sure if that’s attributable to my newbie roasting technique or is characteristic of the blend.
I also fired up a batch of the Organic Ethiopia Dry-Process Sidamo, which I’m enjoying right now as I hammer away at WordPress’s rich text editor. (Does anybody remember the old days of the web when men were men and we edited web pages in asinine programs like DOS “edit” or “notepad”. Now it’s just all *fancy*. What’s a crack caffeine addict to do?) Anyway, I dig the Sidamo. Yum.
PS: If this obscure blog post reaches any roasting aficionados, give me a shout out. I’m eager to suck knowledge from the brains of complete strangers.
Sun 3 Sep 2006
I’m digging The Albina Press, a coffeehouse here in Portland, OR. I came here specifically to try shots pulled by Billy Wilson, this year’s USBC runner up, but quickly came to love the general feel of the place.
The cafe is in the Albina neighborhood, which feels like an ex-industrial neighborhood turning over into a hip, bohemian place to “just chill.” The people here are relaxed, frequently tattooed, and roll through the shop looking for individually tailored espresso fixes.
My first impression entering the place was one of space. It’s very open and spacious inside, with plenty of space around the bar. The decor is a balance of the rugged and a more modern chic, just like the neighborhood outside. I love the cool juxtaposition of the distressed hardwood floors and newer cafe furniture.
The bar occupies the center space like a monument to the bean. Barista awards are draped around it and a focused barista is stationed the Marzocco behind it. The man with the tattoos on both arms is apparently the dude himself. He mans the equipment with the concentration of an artist oblivious to the surrounding world. It’s cool to see that level of detailed focused on providing me with the perfect cup.
My shot came up and he yelled out, “ristretto!” That shot was quite short, chocolate-flavored, and very airy. It was good enough to order a second, but Billy waved my money away when I admitted that the first was a bit shorter than I was accustomed to. I would have been happy to pay for both, but I just love that level of attention to detail and dedication to perfection!