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Earth to Fellow Coffee Enthusiasts!

Posted by Stone Creek Coffee Roasters on June 10, 2008 at 10:00am

Posted by: Christie BoivinWe are proud to announce that we have adopted a coffee compost program in our stores. Look for the bright green garbage can and help yourself to a bag of free coffee grounds for your compost pile or garden! (This program will be running throughout the summer) Here s a little information about coffee and composting:Every day across America, Asia and Europe, millions of pots of coffee and tea are brewed, and the millions of pounds of wet grounds, filters and bags are thrown in the trash. The grounds from coffee are rich in many vitamins and minerals and are proven to work as an excellent, environmentally safe way in composting and gardening.Some Gardening Tips:-Use coffee grounds directly into the soil in flower and vegetable gardens.-Sprinkle grounds in soil directly. Dilute with water for a gentle, fast-acting fertilizer.-Outdoor plants: 1 part coffee to 2 parts water. Indoor plants: 1 part coffee to 4 parts water.Have fun, Sip slowly, and be green!

Best Coffee Conferences/Fests worldwide?

Posted by Fede Cabrera on June 10, 2008 at 6:00am

Hi,I would like to know which are (in your opinion) the 3 best Conferences/Fests in the Coffee Industry, and why.Best regards,Federico

Coffee in a small Town

Posted by Taylor on June 9, 2008 at 3:05pm

There are many challenges in small towns for a barista. Not the least of which is actually getting a job. So far, I am confined to making single espressos with a friend on his thrift store machine. It's a party every day, though.What are the things we miss most when we are away from our callings? I miss people. Face to face, emotion to reaction. I miss the perfect crema. I miss the "God Shot" and "Jamie's Spicy Tuna". I miss the music. I miss the machine. Ah, the machine... the instrument of our creations. The weight of a porta-filter, the spin and twist ritual of a snug connection. The hiss of steam and dance of pressure timed perfectly for cascade... for crema rimmed clouds.These are the things I miss. The things my hands and olfactory senses crave when idle or working. Smile, though, and try again. Just as a customer/barista dance so I serenade my heart in cheerful sorrow.- dedicated to my friends of many years with whom I share a mutual passion or two -- much love, Tay -

Coffee Kids in Copenhagen

Posted by Coffee Kids on June 9, 2008 at 11:16am

A little more than a month after the trip to Minneapolis for the SCAA Conference (check out our pictures on our Flickr site), we'll be taking off for Copenhagen, Denmark for the SCAE 'Wonderful Coffee' Conference and Exhibition. Coffee Kids Executive Director Carolyn Fairman, Board President Rob Stephen and Membership and Development Manager Heather Ferraro will be attending the conference.If you plan on attending be sure to visit us in Booth #91. See you all there!

T-Mobile Sues Starbucks Over Free Wifi

Posted by Shane on June 8, 2008 at 3:35am

http://gigaom.com/2008/06/07/t-mobile-vs-starbucks-free-wifi/

How do we improve the quality level of the world coffee drinks' market?

Posted by Peter Tam on June 7, 2008 at 5:30pm

For the top level of those coffee professionals, we may be at the similar level for the quality of espresso drinks.But, most people cannot make others to do the same, or even better coffee drinks. It is mainly due to the understanding about espresso and its brewing skills.As I said once, we can train about 30 - 50 people in 15 days, if there are enough people coming.Someone said that, they can do many more. Does it mean that they can have those people to make their cafes and the coffee drinks great? OK, let us make a simple calculation.Suppose they can train 80-100 people, then it would be > 150 people per month, and 1800 people per year. How many cafes they can have? it is probably 500 cafes? Or an half of them? In three years, their cafes will cover the whole country and improve their local coffee market totally. Does it happened somewhere?For us, the difficulty is mainly too few people who want to be trained, or know how to choose a right place to be trained. There are indeed many trainers here. If one care enough to visit some of them, and taste their coffee drinks, they can easily find that we are better. But, most people do not. Specially for those young people, they chat with others on the internet and go with them, without careful searching.On the other hand, our trainees are mostly the potential investors for cafes, only few would work as barista. They are mostly high educated and know how to choose the right one from several training places. So, the number of "high qualified cafes" are still small, but continuously increasing. For last year, it was about less than ten, but for this year, it is expected to be around 20-30 for the whole country.As many people knows, we are extremely different from the world coffee industry and those professional organizations. But, our theory really works well. Do you want to give it a try?If someone would have our "barista training" set up for other countries, we can give the best condition for cooperation, because the globel market is so huge and we cannot cover it all. We also expect to improve the quality level of the world coffee industry. So, we need your help.

Yirg, Yirg and more Yirg!!!! Friday Cupping 6/6/8

Posted by scott@herkimercoffee.com on June 5, 2008 at 9:18am

Checking out some Ethiopian Yirgacheffe and possibly some other africans on friday afternoon. 2pm at Phinney. See you then!Cheers,ScottHerkimer Coffee7320 Greenwood Ave NSeattle WA 98103206-784-0202

Bellissimo wins Award at the 2008 WorldFest-Houston International Film Festival for WBC documentary

Posted by Matt Milletto on June 5, 2008 at 9:00am

Bellissimo Media Productions wins Award at the 2008 WorldFest-Houston International Film Festival for documentary about The World Barista Championship Portland, OR - Bellissimo Media Productions Wins Bronze Award at the 2008 WorldFest-Houston International Film Festival for The World Barista Championship 2007: Tokyo. “The World Barista Championship 2007: Tokyo,” co-produced by Bellissimo Media Productions and the World Barista Championship (Wbc), was honoured with a Bronze Remi Award at the 41st Annual WorldFest-Houston International Film Festival held April 11-20, 2008 in Houston. This elite award was given to only 158 video/film productions out of a total 4,500 category entries from 37 countries. WorldFest-Houston is the 3rd longest-running International film festival in North America and one of the premier film festivals in the world. Previous WorldFest-Houston winners include Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Oliver Stone, Jonathan Demme, Ridley Scott, the Coen Brothers and Ang Lee, who were novice filmmakers when they each received their first awards at WorldFest. WorldFest-Houston offers 12 major areas of competition and awards. “The World Barista Championship 2007: Tokyo” won its award in the Film and Video Production Category in the training sub-category. “It’s a great honor to win this award,” said Bruce Milletto, Bellissimo president and the DVD’s director. “Knowing the criteria and how difficult it is to win an award at WorldFest makes this particular honor very sweet.”

“The World Barista Championship 2007: Tokyo,” documents the 8th Annual World Barista Championship (WBC) held in Tokyo, Japan July 31 to August 2, 2007. The DVD is the first of its kind produced in the eight-year history of the WBC, and uniquely captures both the heart and mind of the exciting 2007 championship event. This documentary-style DVD includes interviews, local colour shots and footage of many of the competitors in action. The film was shot and edited by Dana Vion of Sky’s the Limit Productions also based in Oregon. “The DVD documents the full WBC experience, and allows viewers to see and feel the excitement generated by this competition as well as to hear from the participants, attendees and coffee professionals from all over the world,” said Milletto. This is the third time Bellissimo Media Productions has been honoured by WorldFest-Houston. In 2001, the Bellissimo/Kenneth Davids production, “The Passionate Harvest,” was one of only 15 festival entries to win a Platinum Award, and in 2005, “Advanced Barista Training: Extreme Pours,” won a second place Gold Award in the training category. You can also find this DVD at PT's Coffee Roasters website or at Espresso101.com

Looking for Great Coffee?

Posted by Scott Baldwin on June 4, 2008 at 5:21pm

Well, It has finally happened. I finally got the Dream Job of a life time back in Specialty Coffee. I now work for Caffe Vita. So for all of you reading this... Go to CaffeVita.com Right Now! And even if you do know about or think you do. I still would recommend you to go to CaffeVita.com Right Now! There is a really great aspect to Caffe Vita on the top of the website called CaffeVita+OnePot. Deffinately Check it out! Great information about farm direct coffees and traditional rituals that take place when roasting coffee at the estate.More to come soon.

BBQ Drum Roaster

Posted by Jim on June 4, 2008 at 10:27am

I got a BBQ Drum Roaster installed this weekend and I have to say it will take a little getting used to to get the roastes to come out right. I also tasted some Kenya AA for a company, they had an Iced coffee recipe that came out great. Now I know what my next endeavor will be, a cold brew coffee maker. Toddy makes one that sounds easy.

Market Time!!

Posted by Stone Creek Coffee Roasters on June 4, 2008 at 10:00am

Posted by: Steve HawthorneFor us here at Stone Creek, there's always one sure sign that summer is here...Farmer's Market Season! The time as finally arrived to kick off the markets. This weekend, you can find us pedaling our wares at the East Town Market in Cathedral Square Park. Our Farmer's Market manager, Stephanie and her team have been gearing up for another great season. You can catch them this Saturday from 8am-12:30pm.We will also be working Bay View's South Shore Farmer's Market in South Shore Park this summer. You'll have to wait a few more weeks for that party to kick off, though...The South Shore Market runs 8am-12 noon beginning on June 21. So come on out and sip slowly with us at the markets!

bX - Upcoming release on Thursday, June 5 from 9-9:15 p.m.

Posted by Matt Milletto on June 4, 2008 at 9:12am

A message to all members of Barista Exchange! I wanted to let you know that we are rolling out a new release to the bX network this Thursday, June 5, from 9 to 9:15 p.m. bX will be offline during this brief window. There are a number of features in this release, including: 1) Forum Improvements. In addition to a redesigned forum, you will now have the option to choose between two styles of threads: "Flat," where replies are shown in chronological order, or "Threaded," where replies are indented below the post or the reply that they respond to. 2) Allow members to customize their My Page layout. Members will now be able to drag-and-drop modules around their profile pages. This will allow you as a member to fully customized what you want on your My Page. 3) Enhanced Widget Distribution. Members can easily spread Barista Exchange badges, widgets, individual videos and photo album slideshows to MySpace, Facebook and 15 other popular destinations without the need to copy and paste HTML embed code. Thanks for your patience I am hoping the site will only be down for 15 minutes. - Matt

A Robot Barista? Starbucks to install selve serve coffee bars

Posted by Matt Milletto on June 3, 2008 at 12:08pm

After all their latest pushes to express their passion for quality coffee and espresso, Starbucks now is launching a self serve coffee kiosk, without baristas!? This reminds me of the DVD rental kiosks now littering large supermarkets. Will consumers really want a machine to serve their flavored lattes? The supermarket employees are the ones to refill beans and milk it says, and one can only wonder about the "training" they will receive. Will be interesting to see how these fly with the consumer. - Matt Link to Full Article (Bizjournals) Starbucks Corp. is experimenting with selling espresso drinks from a machine, sans barista. The company, through its Seattle's Best Coffee label, has teamed up with Coinstar Inc. and a small Bellevue company, Concordia Coffee Co. Inc., on automated, self-serve espresso kiosks in grocery stores in eight states. The idea is to "bring coffee to places where you wouldn't or couldn't put a full-service espresso bar," said Tom Ehlers, general manager and vice president of Seattle's Best Coffee.

Ghost Flute Glassware - Barista Competition Signature Drinks?

Posted by Matt Milletto on June 2, 2008 at 12:21pm

I am always on the look out for cool glassware and cups that would work well in a barista competition. A lot of baristas serve small volume signature drinks and I wanted to share these beauties. They look awesome and come in Flutes, Tumblers and Goblets. Would be cool to experiment with, and would add a nice visual flare to any presentation.

Want to be a Beer Connoisseur?

Posted by Matt Milletto on June 2, 2008 at 11:26am

I found a great website that does an amazing job of educating the consumer. Here's to Beer, Beer Connoisseur takes you through an extensive curriculum of beer history, ingredients and even beer pairings. This site is inspiring me to explore how to convey this info to the coffee world as well. You do need to log in to utilize the BC, but the Heres To Beer site is also pretty awesome. Here are a couple more screen shots:

Interesting Fundraising Idea

Posted by Coffee Kids on June 2, 2008 at 9:05am

I read a blog this morning about an interesting fundraising idea being used in a coffee shop called Kurekure in Melbourne, Australia. Here's the blog where it appeared originally. The coffee shop gives patrons a card to let them know when their orders are ready. When the patron returns, the shop has a variety of trays where patrons can return the card. Each tray lists a non-profit or effort that the coffee shop supports. The patron returns the card to one of the trays when they pick up their order and the coffee shop donates the proceeds from that order to the indicated non-profit.Take a look at the blog if you get a chance. Seems kinda' clever.

New owner....

Posted by Jeremy Meiss on May 31, 2008 at 10:16am

ok - I am going to be terrible at updating this thing - but oh well.My wife and I just purchased Black Dog Coffeehouse, and take ownership on June 1, 2008. So excited!If you're in the area, stop by!

Death to the Doser

Posted by Chris DeMarse on May 30, 2008 at 10:36am

I feel that most people would do a much better job in articulating the technical aspects of coffee equipment. James Hoffmann, no doubt, could talk circles around me when it comes to his knowledge of coffee theory and equipment (if you don't believe me, check out www.jimseven.com). So, in light of that, let me pose a more philosophical question. What is the purpose of the doser?Let me clear the air by letting you know that I have an amazingly superficial emotional attachment to my doser. I like the feeling of flicking my wrist rapidly and watching the coffee drop down from the chamber in neat little piles to the left in my portafilter basket; it makes me feel as if I have something very significant to do with the whole grinding process. Nevertheless, I have come to question its function as I spend more and more time in coffee.As I understood it, dosing chambers were created with a very specific purpose; to make dosing consistent and quick in a busy shop. If a dosing chamber is half full of coffee, then, within reason, each click of that handle means a set amount of grounds dropping into the portafilter.Now, if you have surveyed the technique of the modern barista, you find that the doser does not quite serve the same function as its intended design. As soon as the barista flips the switch or timer of his/her grinder, he/she begins what I can only describe as a percussive and violently fast dosing cycle. I, too, am in the habit of dosing this way. I believe we do this because, as our understanding of coffee freshness grows, we only grind exactly what is needed for our double shot so as not to let any residuals go to the wayside of 2 minutes without extraction. I heartily agree with this philosophy on dosing as it maintains a high standard for freshness, but what practical use or functionality does the doser prove in this situation?I took a Mahlkonig K30 to the Great Lakes Regional Barista Competition and was met with wide-eyed stares of curiosity and wonderment. Amongst the towering, stately Roburs my short, fat K30 stood out like a steak at a vegan restaurant. I had many people come up to me and ask me about the grinder. Most had only heard of the grinder, and many met it with skepticism (though I'm not sure the skepticism was over the flat burrs and grind speed or the fact that it had no doser). With all the blank looks and confusion, I would have thought that such a thing as a grind-on-demand grinder would fit in the ranks of a super-automatic espresso machine in the minds of the American barista.Yet the Europeans seem fairly comfortable with such an idea. Many people in the UKBC, The North Ireland Barista Competition, and others have been using grinders like the K30 with confidence in competition with great results. I even had the pleasure this year of feasting my eyes on Kyle Glanville's prototype Rubor doserless g.o.d. at USBC. His grind times were about 3 seconds with no waste, and he managed to win the competition using such a grinder. Even people using the new Anfims are modifying them to time out their dose like Billy Wilson did in competition this year.Am I too progressive in my thinking? Maybe. Am I too quick to throw out a traditional element of coffee that has been integral to the preparation of espresso? Possibly. But I do know that the doser does need questioning. I don't think getting carpal tunnel is fun. I don't think it's fun to tear apart a 14 piece, spring loaded debacle to replace little plastic cogs from excessive doser usage. Whatever the case, I hope that people question the wheel every once in a while in hopes that tradition never becomes a barrier to progression in this industry.

Starbucks vs. Rat City Rollergirls?

Posted by Alexa Baehr on May 29, 2008 at 10:00am

You have got to be kidding me!http://www.komonews.com/news/local/19345659.html

Drip Coffee And Espresso!

Posted by Peter Tam on May 28, 2008 at 11:45pm

Drip coffee is not only the coffee made of the drip machines, but also vacuum pots, French press, and so on. It is good for brewing single orgin beans, specially for arabica beans.Theoretically, all brewing tools can make the same drip coffe with proper management and control. Essentially, they are same.Espresso should use specially processed beans, and can be very well tasted. Although in several countries, all cafes serve only espresso drinks, not drip coffee any more. I do believe that drip coffee can be another choice.Same as espresso, one has to make drip coffee well. For example, *$s has its drip coffee much deep roasted and so all their drip coffee has "burnt" taste. Is that a difficult thing to know to solve? They must have their "experts" for roasting, but that simple mistake kept till now. What is wrong with them, or maybe the problem comes from the whole coffee industry.Another example is a cafe of one German chain, in Beijing. As franchised, the owner was trained for roasting because they all have to buy a Probat 5kg roaster for their shop. But, they were not trained for coffee brewing, neither coffee knowledge. When they want me to taste their single origin beans, they made it by a small superauto machine, and made a caffe lungo, to about 120 ml. Is that because the German company would care of training them well, or they do the same in their own shops?If drip coffee can not be well made, it may disappear for sure. So, try to improve drip coffee if you do like it or even love it. In our local market, most drip coffee are drinkable but never taste good. Probably, they want to make it bad, but not able to do it as bad as their espresso. Poor guy, they need a big "holloware" to "boil" the beans, not even grounds.

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