“Issue” Coffee and “Sustainability”
“Issue” Coffee and “Sustainability” and our appreciation of it… It’s well documented that our preconceptions of a gustatory product have a strong influence on our perceived appreciation of it (whether...
View ArticleHe’s ALIVE! (My POST-Halloween, awaking from a coma, etc, Post.)
Oh, the slings and arrows (all self-shot*) of my outrageous fortune…I lift a listless paw, backhanded, to my deeply furrowed brow (can everyone see the furrowed brow?) and beseech my non-existent...
View ArticleWeak Coffee, Part One
Weak Coffee I do not understand weak coffee and never have… I used to think, when I first got in the coffee business, that this had something to do with the cost of coffee; that coffee drinkers were...
View ArticleSo, what’s “strong” coffee?
So what do I mean by STRONG (see last post)? It is, after all, a relative term. Here is how I brew coffee: 1) I use freshly boiled water that is either filterer or bottled (the important thing is...
View Article“High Praise” for “Strong Coffee” (The beverage, if not my actual post…)
NPR has a podcast called “It’s All Politics” that I highly recommend and the two guys (Ron Elving and Ken Rudin) that put it together and are featured on it each week often refer to their “listener” in...
View ArticleSome (slightly re-heated) comments on Climate Change (& Coffee)
Warning: This post contains curmudgeonly chest-beating, credit-taking and self-serving horn-tooting that some readers may find objectionable; especially in view of the tragic situation that the author...
View ArticleThe Aroma of Coffee and the Memory of it…
Has Coffee Ever Lived up to it’s Promise? Has the taste of coffee ever lived up to the seducing aroma of its first whiff? For me it has not. From the time I was allowed coffee as a child, I spent many,...
View ArticleComments from the Specialty Coffee of America 2013 Symposium
I was asked if I would write some posts emanating out of the SCAA’s 5th Annual Symposium… in addition to their posting them on their blog page I have posted them here as well on a separate page for...
View ArticleYet More On Coffee in Restaurants
There’s was some discussion several weeks ago about the efforts that a particular restaurant, Noma in Copenhagen, was making to serve a very good cup of coffee. First, there was this article by Oliver...
View ArticleA New Page: Coffee in the Media
I used to think I was a coffee expert, when I knew a whole lot less about coffee. Even still, though, coffee is the thing I know the most about and when I hear something in the news about coffee that...
View ArticleMight Specialty Coffee Finally Be Cut Adrift from its Market Moorings?
There’s a lot going on in the world of coffee but the headline right now is this: The internationally traded prices for coffee have fallen dramatically over the past few months while at the same time,...
View ArticleMany (Most?) SCAA Past Presidents Support SCAA/SCAE Unification
It has been some time since I have posted anything here. I have “thought I should” many, many times. I am now moved to say something when, ironically, I feel my voice, un-voiced for so long, was being...
View ArticleCOFFEE, in Exclusive Interview, Steams, then Preens, over Cancer Label
Someone wrote to me a few weeks ago and suggested that I write an “Onion” inspired piece for April Fool’s Day on some coffee-related topic. In the meantime, though, I had the opportunity to actually...
View ArticleCoffee Meme’s Rant Points to a Larger Problem
OK, alright, it had been a while since we spoke directly with COFFEE (see previous post), but we usually just have a cup of the stuff, so to speak, and get on with our day. So it was a little bracing...
View ArticleOrganically Flawed
In the sense of its first meaning (1509, according to Merriam-Webster), the word organic described something intrinsic to the whole of a thing, and not incidental. As someone who has traveled to...
View ArticleWho’s In Charge?
After my last post the world seems to have reversed in its orbit. This is what it’s like to live in a time when no one is in charge and everyone else is to blame (except the ones that are supposed to...
View ArticleWho? You.
There has been an ongoing conversation regarding the U.S.A.’s pending candidacy for Failed State Status. I am sure that this goes back further than 2006, when Noam Chomsky wrote a 240 page indictment...
View ArticleA: Possibly A Bottle, A Cork and A Label for Coffee Q: What is Blockchain?
Blockchain is a technology in search of work, or more work, and it will get it because it aids people in archiving and managing data. It does so while protecting that data and people seem to...
View ArticleGood Coffee vs Great Coffee
“Coffee drinkers in the U.S. don’t know how much work it is to produce our coffee — how much more work it takes to grow a great coffee, if they did they’d want to pay more for our coffee, they’d...
View ArticleWho? Us.
During a recent visit to Portland (20-23 April’23) for the 2023 SCA Expo, a barista, fifty or so years younger than me, asked what was the last thing that surprised me in the world of Specialty Coffee...
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