Joe's Coffee Blog

A picture's worth a thousand words...

2008-12-28T18:09:00.001-08:00

Happy Holidays....

Order by Tuesday for Delivery before Christmas!

2008-12-22T08:36:00.000-08:00

Just a heads up to our web clients, if you order UPS Next Day Air by tomorrow, we can get your package where it needs to go before Christmas. I recommend dropping us a line first to make sure that we have the coffees you're ordering available for same day shipping.

Enjoy,
Matt

Coffee Gift Ideas

2008-12-17T09:48:00.000-08:00

It's almost time for last minute holiday shopping, people. Soon enough our website will be overrun with customers looking for last minute deals, and trying to figure out whether they need to use Next Day Air, or if 2nd Day will cut the mustard. I know this from experience as I will soon be doing the same thing!!

This year I have 2 great ideas for coffee gifts.

The first is our Organic Coffee Club Auto-Ship program. This sends 2 to 4 pounds of coffee to a recipient, for 3, 6 or 12 months. It's a reoccurring gift that will remind your loved ones that you're thinking of them year round! We mail fresh coffee out at the middle of each month, and change it up each month with different coffees, both single-origins and blends. For more info on this product click here! (ps I just remembered we throw in a free French Press when you order the coffee club!)

The 2nd idea is the Organic/Fair Trade Gift Package. This is 4 pounds of coffee, in a nice wicker gift basket with a personalized card. We select 4 of our freshest coffees and send them right out! This has become our most popular present online. To learn more about this package click here!

One thing that is really nice about both of these gift ideas, besides their affordability, is the fact that all of the coffee is organic and Fair Trade. Sending a sustainable, and socially-conscious gift in 2008 is more important than ever. People from all over the world are aware of the green movement, and also of the importance of Fair Trade products. For more info on Fair Trade, read this article from last year. For more info on Organics, read this article.

Let me know if you need any help with your holiday shopping. We're around the office a lot at this time of year, and always ready to assist in any way we can.

Best,

Matt

New French Presses have arrived!

2008-12-08T09:59:00.000-08:00

Just a heads up, we've added the Chambord French press, by Bodum, to our accessories page. It labeled as a "4-cup press," which is about a mug and a half, or to coffee drinkers like us "enough for one person." This is the orginal French Press, designed in Normandy, France in 1924. Constructed from glass and chrome-plated brass, it's one of their most beautiful preses. The Chambord might make a perfect stocking stuffer!! Click here to check it out.

Weekend Coffee Break

2008-12-06T12:36:00.000-08:00

Next week Fresh Coffee Now selling coffee at two great spots in New York:

Scribner Hollow Lodge, in Hunter, Ny, is an awesome ski lodge/hotel a few feet from Hunter Mountain. It's a beautiful stucture that literally wins architecutural awards, and is also reknowned for their food and wine. We think FCN will be a great fit there for sure!

The 2nd spot is The Jonesville Store in Clifton Park, NY. The Jonesville is a gourmet deli and specialty food store, that also doubles as a restaurant and gift shop. We will be selling the coffee in bags, at the deli counter and in the restaurant, and soon hope to have it in bulk bins as well.

If you live in the upstate New York (Catskills or Capital Region) these are great places to stay and shop. Let us know if you get to try any of our coffee there!

Don't Call it a Comeback!!

2008-12-03T13:28:00.000-08:00

Well at least not THAT kind of comeback! --->

It has been 5 long months of no FCN blog posts. I'm posting today to let everyone know that we're officially back! I apologize for my lack of attention to the blog for the past season, but I have a great excuse, I promise: I got married. In October, months of planning (and perhaps years of anticipation) came together and my wife and I tied the knot. Now, after a brief respite, it's time to return to work full time, and get back to updating our customers and friends as to what's been going on in our warehouse.

Over the next few weeks I'll be making a lot of posts, catching people up on what we've been up to. We have some new coffees, and some old faves are back in stock. We also serve our coffees in about 15 new locations, so I'll be updating the map and letting everyone know where they can get a cup o' Joe. In the meantime, for any of our Jamaican fans, we have put Moy Hall on sale for $39.99 until Friday evening. This is the beginning of our Holiday sales run, where we feature discounts on different coffees or gift packages until the new year, allowing our customers to send something to that special someone far away.

Enjoy the Jamaican, and cya soon...

Best,
Matt

Stealth Sale

2008-06-30T14:26:00.000-07:00

Things have been hectic around here lately, but I wanted to make a quick post alerting folks to some stealth sales. As many of you know I'm trying convert our coffees from conventional to Fair Trade as much as possible (see post below) and with that in mind I'm going to discontinue our Sumatra Grade-1 and El Salvador coffees, and only sell their organic/Fair Trade counter parts. I'm also going to discontinue the Panama Berlina. All three of these coffees are amazing and we drink them daily around here, but now that I'm able to get more Fair Trades, I would like to focus on that.

So these coffees are on sale for a few $ off each, until we get rid of the remaining supply (for the Sumatra that is not much, but I think there's a bunch of the El Salv and Panama). So, get some cheap coffee while you can, and enjoy!

Best,
Matt

Ps, the Kona is on sale for a couple more days too!!

Kona's on sale!

2008-06-23T14:48:00.001-07:00

In honor of July 4th, the anniversary of American Independence, we have decided to put the lone American coffee that we offer on sale. The good news for coffee lovers is that the lone coffee happens to be Hawaiian Kona!

Our Kona coffee comes from a wonderful estate called Greenwell Farms. The estate has been growing and exporting coffee since 1850, so suffice to say they know what they're doing. We buy "extra-fancy" beans, which defines about 20% of the crop. The "extra-fancies" are a larger and rarer bean.

Kona coffee gets its name from the region it's grown in "Kona," on the big island of Hawaii. It is known for it's smooth flavor, while retaining a full body. It doesn't have any bite or bitterness to it whatsoever. The plants in Kona are nurtured by rich, volcanic soil, and the clean air at extremely high elevevation helps yeild the smoothest of coffee beans.

Our Kona is on sale 15% off for the next week, starting Tuesday AM, so give it a try and let me know what you think.

Thanks!!
Matt

Fair Trade at a glance...

2008-06-20T14:37:00.000-07:00

I've been doing a bunch of in-store demos lately, where I basically meet customers at supermarkets, IGA's and co-ops, and give info about and sample of our coffee away. One of the most common questions I get relates to Fair Trade coffee. People want to know what it's all about.

I'm going to post a link to a blog post from last year, that is something all of our customers need to read. The Fair Trade movement is a big deal, not just in coffee but for all products that offer it, and I encourage everyone that reads this blog to learn more about Fair Trade, pass on the info to friends and family, and act upon what you read.

Here's the link to the old blog post entitled Fair Trade 101.

There is a video under the "About Us" section of the Fresh Coffee Now website that discusses Fair Trade. Click here, and then scroll down and look to the right, to view it.

Thanks!
Matt

A plug for cold brew ice coffee

2008-06-15T14:14:00.000-07:00

My calendar says summer is officially here, and the time for Iced Coffee is surely upon us. I've been a fan of cold-brewing iced coffee for a long time. Several stores in Vermont are serving their coffee this way, and people are loving it (our record so far was 7 gallons of iced coffee in one lunch rush, at City Market in downtown Burlington!!)

So here is an article I read last summer in the Times, describing ice coffee and the cold brew. Beneath it is a great recipe. Don't forget to make coffee ice cubes, so the melting ice won't dilute your drink. We recommend our Organic Nicaragua or Organic Mexico coffees for the cold brew method. Enjoy!
Matt

Iced Coffee? No Sweat

By CINDY PRICE

BEFORE I go telling everybody that the secret to great iced coffee is already in the kitchen, my friend Keller wants me to confess: I didn’t know iced coffee from iced coffee until he showed me the light.

It’s important to cop to this now, because not a summer goes by that he does not painstakingly remind me, a rabid iced-coffee drinker, that he’s the one who introduced me to the wonders of cold-brewed iced coffee. The funny thing is, when the subject came up we were holed up in a summer rental with three friends off the coast of Puerto Rico, on a tiny island not exactly swimming in upmarket coffee houses.

Our first morning there I brewed a blend from the local grocery in the coffeepot, laced it with a little half-and-half and sugar, then let it cool. Classy, I thought, carrying the pitcher to the table. “I’ll just take it hot,” he mumbled, while I blinked in disbelief.

Clearly, this boy didn’t know any better. A drink has a time and place. Surely he didn’t subscribe to drinking hot coffee in summer?

“No, I only drink iced coffee if it’s cold-brewed,” he said.

For five days we watched him sullenly sip his hot coffee on a broiling Caribbean island in the dead of summer. We chided him for his pretensions, ridiculed him, tried valiantly to break him, but he patiently waited us out. Once we tried it we would understand, he explained. Like friends disputing a baseball stat in a bar with no access to Google, we had no way to settle the argument.

Two weeks later, back in Brooklyn, I saw a sign: “Cold-Brewed Iced Coffee Served Here.” Fine, then. I threw down two bucks and took a sip. Though it pains me to admit, the difference was considerable. Without the bitterness produced by hot water, the cold-brewed coffee had hints of chocolate, even caramel. I dropped my sugar packet — no need for it. The best brews hardly need cream. It really is the kind of thing a gentleman might spend five days in hot-coffee solitary confinement for.

Most days I’m too lazy to hunt down the elusive cold-brewed cup. But recently I discovered an interesting little fact. Cold-brewed coffee is actually dirt simple to make at home. Online, you’ll find a wealth of forums arguing for this bean or that, bottled water over tap, the 24-hour versus the 12-hour soak. You can even buy the Toddy cold-brew coffee system for about $30.

But you can also bang it out with a Mason jar and a sieve. You just add water to coffee, stir, cover it and leave it out on the counter overnight. A quick two-step filtering the next day (strain the grounds through a sieve, and use a coffee filter to pick up silt), a dilution of the brew one-to-one with water, and you’re done. Except for the time it sits on the kitchen counter, the whole process takes about five minutes.

I was curious to see how it would taste without all the trappings. The answer is, Fantastic. My friend Carter, something of a cold-brewing savant, turned me onto another homegrown trick: freeze some of the concentrate into cubes. Matched with regular ice cubes, they melt into the same ratio as the final blend.

Very fancy. Can’t wait to tell Keller.

Recipe: Cold-Brewed Iced Coffee

Time: 5 minutes, plus 12 hours’ resting

1/3 cup ground coffee (medium-coarse grind is best)
Milk (optional).

1. In a jar, stir together coffee and 1 1/2 cups water. Cover and let rest at room temperature overnight or 12 hours.

2. Strain twice through a coffee filter, a fine-mesh sieve or a sieve lined with cheesecloth. In a tall glass filled with ice, mix equal parts coffee concentrate and water, or to taste. If desired, add milk.

Yield: Two drinks.

Coffee cupping for beginners..

2008-06-11T06:17:00.000-07:00

Last Friday, Joe and I, and the new intern, Ben, began cupping coffees together around 10am. We are going to make this a weekly habit if possible, and Ben and I are going to post some of our tasting notes to the blog. Please keep in mind that we're new at this, so we'll get better at describing what we're learning as we go...

The process of cupping coffee is a technique used to evaluate the aroma and flavor profile of coffees. It also is a great way to taste differences in different coffees by trying them side by side. Subtle nuances in each coffee, that might not be noticed or remembered if you waited a few days to try against a different coffee and compare them, are more easily recognized during a cupping. You can cup just to learn about new or different coffees, or you can use it as a tool to detect defects in the coffee, or to help in the creation of new blends of two or more coffees.

The first thing you do in a coffee cupping is grind a small amount of each coffee and put them into a small glass. You usually want a few glasses with each coffee in it, in case you get one cup of grinds that has bad beans in it (from being burnt or just defective). We chose to cup 4 coffees on Friday, our Organic Mexico, Organic Nicaragu a, Organic Guatemala and Organic Colombia Reserva. You can see in this picture the 3 glasses of each of the 4 coffees.

We first smelled the coffee grinds in each glass. This is the "fragrance" of the coffee. I couldn't tell too much of a difference with most of them, although I thought the Guatemala smelled a bit more flowery. The next step was to boil water and fill each cup up 1/2 way, and smell them all again. By the way, each cupper smells all 3 of each coffee, as the quality control I mentioned above in case one of the cups contains defective beans. The fragrance is much more pronounced after adding the water, and even beginners like me can start noticing large differences.

The next step is to fill the cups up with water and let them sit for a minute or two. The coffee hardens a bit at the top of the cup, forming a "crust" of part coffee part water. You then "break the crust" with a spoon, holding your nose right above the spoon and cup, and take a big whiff. This allows you to taste the aroma of the coffee. It is pretty potent compared with the previous smells you've gotten up until then.

The final part of the cupping is tasting for flavor. Here you place some of each coffee in the spoon and slurp it into your mouth, attempting to get the coffee to hit every taste bud on your tongue. This should allow you to detect all sorts of different qualities that the coffees possess, the most important being taste, acidity, body and aftertaste. Joe gave us up a flavor profile wheel for the occasion since Ben and I are inexperienced at this and were having trouble identifying the flavors that were coming through. We took notes of most of this, although mine at first were more about the process than the actual profiles of the coffees. In the end, I did learn a LOT about what kind of coffees I like and dislike.

Here are my notes from the final flavor cupping:

Organic Mexico:
Harsh, dirty first taste. Full body, medium acidity and smooth aftertaste (compared with the original, harsh taste).

Organic Nicaragua:
Clean taste. Light/medium body, chocolatey aftertaste.

Organic Guatemala:
Flowery taste, light body, high acid, winey aftertaste.

Organic Colombia Reserva:Clean, balanced flavor, medium body. Medium acidity with a sweet finish.

No surprise that the Colombia Reserva was my favorite here. The fact that I did not enjoy the Guatemala at all (keep in mind that I DO like this coffee when brewed normally) was a surprise, as was the harshness of the first sip of Mexico, which is another one of my favorite coffees. I found from this tasting that I enjoy medium to full-bodied coffees, and tend to want more from a low-bodied brew.

Overall, this was a really informative process. I'll be taking better notes next time, as I won't be so wrapped up in the actual cupping process, and hope to pass on some good info to you the reader!

Best,
Matt

Roasting Jamaican Coffee (on Video!)

2008-06-06T10:32:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned in my last blog post, and as some of you might have seen on our mailing list, we are doing a promotion on Jamaican coffee for Father's Day. As expected, we're selling quite a bit of the coffee, so Joe roasted a couple batches this morning, and began teaching our new intern Ben about the coffee profiling process. I shot the video of the beans coming out of the drum and into the agitator and then panned over to show the roast profile on the roasting control unit. If you ordered Jamaican Moy Hall from us yesterday or through this weekend, this is most likely the batch of coffee you'll be getting.

If you're interested in learning more about Jamaican coffee, and why it is so expensive and hard to find, please check out these posts from last year:

The Price of Excellence, Part I

The Price of Excellence, Part II

Enjoy!
Matt

Father's Day Specials and New Coffee!!

2008-06-03T11:32:00.000-07:00

Joe and I have been working away for the past week and I suddenly realized this morning that I haven't posted on here to let everyone know what the heck we've been up to.

First off, we're going to do some nice sales for Father's Day. Dad's are cool, and they deserve something nice for "their day." Our best coffee, Jam aican Moy Hall, is going on 15% sale, and we're also going to put the Organic Gift Pack 20% off, until the Sunday of Father's Day. Order now and we'll make sure your dad gets it before the holiday!!

We also have a new coffee that we're excited to announce: the Organic El Salvador. This is a great coffee that we haven't had in 2 years, and this time it's Fair Trade, too. It was one of our best sellers, and it was replaced by the "El Salvador" minus the organic. Finally we've got it back and we're releasing it for sale today. In the next few weeks we'll be putting the old El Salv on sale while we move on to only sell the organic/Fair Trade version. Check it out!

Lastly, I'll be @ Fresh Market/Cheese Traders in Burlington Friday afternoon, and Natural Provisions in Williston giving away coffee. Julie will be @ L.A.C.E in Barre on Sunday doing the same. Come say hi and drink some coffee with us if you're in the area!

Best,
Matt

Long Weekends Rule!

2008-05-25T14:07:00.000-07:00

Life in the northeast revolves around weather. The weather becomes good right around May 1st, and stays that way until say November-ish. As the nasty weather fades into "mud season" and then into Spring/Summer, everyone around town becomes a little bit happier. Business picks up, people actually get tan, and that ghost-like "vermonter-ness" fades for a few months, as being outdoors becomes more realistic (and doesn't require 8 layers of clothes).

The many long weekends of the Summer are some of the best times we get up here, and Memorial Day seems to really kick it all off. This weekend, I drove down to the Poconos, in Pennsylvania, and have been working in the garden, and fly-fishing for a couple hours a day. Joe stayed up in Vermont, and my guess is that he's been riding his motorcycle around at 80 MPH, enjoying the amazing weather and causing local police everywhere to wonder what that brown cruise missile driving down the street could be?

So, I don't have much to say about coffee today, other than we have 2 new organic coffees that we just got in. I'll write about them next week, as we roast and cup 'em. I hope everyone enjoys the long weekend, as we are in Pennsylvania and Vermont respectively.

Cheers,
Matt

ps. here's a couple pics: one of Joe mocking my espresso-making ability, and the other of the FCN mascot, Seven, holding court around a barrel of Jamaica Moy Hall!

Summer Reading

2008-05-22T13:05:00.000-07:00

Hey, for those of you wondering what you're going to do with your summer vacation time, here's a great idea...read a book! Not just any boring book, but a book about coffee!!! To help you choose a great book about coffee for the summer, I've put together a few reviews of coffee themed books. first off is a great book called "The Devil's Cup" by Stewart Lee Allen (author of The Devil's Garden). The Devil's Cup is a perfect Summer read because it is an interesting and light story about the author's voyage to find the beginning of coffee. He travels the world in search of coffee's history. However, to add some humor to the book, Allen also decides to sample coffee everywhere and to determine which is the worst cup of coffee he tries and which is the best coffee. This book is perfect for a light yet factual read, great for a lazy summer day.
If you are looking for a more serious read, pick up Coffee A Dark History by Anthony Wild. While this book has a similar premise to the Devil's Cup, it is a lot heavier. Wild, another coffee enthusiast searching for the history of coffee, relates the history to modern day world issues, politics, and corruption. This book is more history based and less of a story. However, A Dark History raises some very good points that will make you think.
Finally, for more active people, there is Coffee: A Guide to Buying Brewing and Enjoying by Kenneth Davids. This book gives tips, hints, and offers advice on picking out coffees and methods of brewing. this book is a great companion to those who want to start a new coffee brewing hobby over the Summer. Davids offers solutions and answers to common problems or misconceptions about coffee as he shares his vast knowledge with the reader.

You can get any of the books (or all of them) at your local bookstore or amazon.com. Hope you enjoy them and feel free to leave comments containing your Summer reading reviews!

A new espresso machine, Part 2

2008-05-20T18:59:00.000-07:00

Late last week I came home with a new present for Joe: a 3 group La Marzocco espresso machine. Joe has been raving about this machine for as long as I've known him, claiming that the La Marzocco is the "Ferrari of espresso machines." I believed him, of course, that this machine was great, but until I had my first shot from it the other day I must say I had no idea how good espresso could taste. Our espresso blend is pretty amazing in it's own right, but coupled with a machine like that, you really can't get much better. Good call Joe!

So yeah, now we have three espresso machines: the La Marzocco, a La Cimballi M30, and our old faithful 2 group Gensaco. I think for space reasons alone, I'm going to have to put a couple of 'em on Craigslist or Ebay, so let me know if anyone needs a machine for your restaurant, office or home!

Speaking of espresso, we cupped coffee with Kevin out at Village Wine and Coffee in Shelburne, VT today. Okay, Joe cupped coffee with with Kevin, and I cupped Burgundy wines with him, but what's the difference? Kevin has a GREAT store, and knows a ton about coffee and wine. I'm pleased to report that he is going to start selling our Organic Sumatra coffee next week, and we're hoping to get a few more coffees out there soon.

Tomorrow Julia and I will be giving away coffee @ City Market in Burlington from 10 - 2pm. On Friday Julia will be out in Richmond, at the Richmond Corner Market from 2pm - 5pm, with our Nicaragua and Peru Decaf organics, and she'll also be in Barre @ L.A.C.E. for their brunch service, sampling our Mexico and Nicaragua organics. Come say hi if you're in the neighborhood!

Best,
Matt

FCN blasts off @ Outer Space!!

2008-05-13T18:27:00.000-07:00

Today we debuted our coffee at Outer Space, the cafe across the street from our office on Flynn Avenue in Burlington. Outer Space is a great little cafe! It is inside a quirky brick building called the Flynn Dog, which also doubles as an art gallery and houses a pilates center, and an engineering firm among other things. Everyone we met was really nice, and seemed excited about getting easier access to "the coffee from across the street." Select Design and Burton both have offices near by, and I know a bunch of people that work at both of those places, so it was nice to run into some of them!

The rest of the week is going to be busy, as we're starting a new online ad campaign on the FCN website. Every two weeks for the next few months we are going to put at least one great coffee or gift pack on sale, and also see if we can get more people to sign up for our Jamaican and Organic coffee clubs!

Julia is doing some demos somewhere this weekend, and as soon as I find out where they are I will post it, so any coffee lovers nearby can come geek out with us.

Matt

New website is live!

2008-05-12T18:00:00.000-07:00

Big news: Our new website is live, with some new graphics and a little easier to use navigation on the home page. Check it out here!

We'll be announcing some specials on a bunch of coffees in the next few weeks, to help promote the website launch, so keep your eyes on the monthly mailer for details.

In other news, Bistro Sauce started serving our Organic Mexico as their drip coffee this evening, and they will be French Pressing our Organic Nicaragua!

If anyone is reading this from Burlington tonight, come say hi at Outer Space, on Flynn Ave inside the Flynn Dog Art Gallery. I'll be there from 7am-10am.

Cya soon
Matt

Just a little sip?

2008-05-11T19:23:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Julia and I did a coffee demo @ Middlebury Natural Food Co-Op, which might be my new favorite place to hang out. Everyone there, from the staff to the clients, were really friendly, and most of them really liked our coffee. Even the lunch we had was awesome!

Throughout the day, we met some extraordinary people! Bill Eichner, coffee plantation owner and husband of author Julia Alvarez, was the first. After that, Bud from Bud's Beans, a local Middlebury coffee roaster / legend stopped by. He "approved" of our Organic Mexico coffee, and brought the deli manager over to tell him in person (thanks, Bud!). But our best guest was a nameless 5 year old girl, who ran up to Julia and demanded a cup of coffee!

This girl was so outrageous and cute from the get-go that I immediately wished I had a video camera to record her in action. She literally ran right up and screamed "I drink coffee at home gimme some gimme some gimme some!" When we told her she might be a little bit too young for coffee, she po uted, until she saw me taking pictures and she started to pose for the camera. Finally her dad came over and gave her a little sip of coffee, at which point she ran off at full speed and we never saw her again. This was probably over the course of 5 or 6 minutes, which were the most hilarious minutes of an overall very funny day!

Now it's time to take a moment to thank all the Mom's out there for doing what you do. Happy Mother's Day!

Best,
Matt

Upcoming Happenings

2008-05-09T11:55:00.001-07:00

Hello blog-world!

Tomorrow Julia and I will be traveling to the Middlebury Natural Food Co-Op, in Middlebury, VT to do a demo from 10Am-2pm. I've never been there, but I've heard great things, and they have been selling our Mexico coffee for about a month so it's high time we payed them a visit. If any readers are in that area please stop by and say hi!

On the way down, we'll be swinging by The Inn at Shelburne Farms in Shelburne, and Three Squares in Vergennes, two restaurants I can't really say enough great things about, to cup some coffee and see what they're up to during the weekend!

Next Tuesday, I'll be at a new account, Outer Space in the Flynn Dog Gallery, across the street from our office, from 7am-10am. I'm going to meet their morning customers and introduce some new coffees to them. Should be fun!

Only other real news is our new website, which will go live next week. I should have a preview of it before then, to post on here. And our specials, which include discounted El Salvador, as well as our Peaberry Sampler Package.

Mother's Day Coffee Sales!

2008-05-05T18:59:00.000-07:00

It's almost Mother's Day and FCN has unveiled a new Mother's Day gift package. The package includes a pound each of Jamaica Blue Mountain: Moy Hall, Organic Colombia Reserva and Organic Sumatra. Three of our best coffees for Mom! You can check it out here!

We also took 20% off of the El Salvador, another one of our popular premium coffees.

Good news ahead: we have a new website design that will launch in about a week. We've been working on it for the past couple weeks, and it's ALMOST ready to launch. It's pretty exciting for us, and I'm hoping to have a sneak peak posted to the blog at the end of the week.

The Perfect Shot?

2008-04-24T08:42:00.000-07:00

Chances are you love coffee. Unfortunately, you will sometimes get a badly prepared cup of coffee at restaurants and gas stations. Even nice bistros with great food and wine skimp out on the coffee! Cafes are touchy. I have to sniff around for a while before I'm convinced it's worth going in. Sometimes, I find a café with pictures of beautiful cappuccinos with “rosetta” designs in the foam: that’s a start! It's hard to be sure without pictures unless you personally know a barista, and know for a fact that he or she kicks ass!

Hollandaise sauce is eggs and butter. Well a cappuccino is coffee and milk! I bet you mucho dinero that if I took a bunch of eggs and some butter and put them together without knowing what I was doing I would end up with something distinctly not hollandaise sauce. It’s the same when making a cappuccino, for the untrained. I enjoy drinking lattes and cappuccinos, but I also love making people the most delicious creations with coffee.

Everything in the coffee world is timing and ratios. Subtleties keep people searching for the perfect cup. The elusive “perfect shot” of espresso should taste like this: melted chocolate pouring as molasses, caramel velvet cream, and a luscious butter finish. All of this is possible, my friends! I can see it, smell it and watch the color as it pulls. I can taste it with my nose! When the blanket of flavor coats my tongue its viscosity is present and warming. Disappointment after disappointment is what keeps me going all day I suppose. When the planets line up, meaning you get the right day, the right weather, a quality roast, a clean machine, proper tamp, good water temperature, a hot group head, (not too hot, just right!), there you have it: your perfect shot of espresso! How often does that happen you might wonder? Infrequently, of course, but one can only hope....

The rich diversities of coffee tastes and aromas, from Bolivia to Papua New Guinea to Ethiopia and beyond make for a world of possible combinations for an espresso blend. We try to keep our secrets in this little world of coffee, but I will tell you that ours is a blend of organic, Fair Trade coffees formulated for rich deep flavors, an intoxicating aroma, and a full body. This blend will also make a great everyday coffee for French press or other means of preparation as well.

Enjoy,
Joe

New Espresso Machine for the Summer

2008-04-22T09:40:00.000-07:00

As summer quickly approaches, Joe and I thought it would be nice to get an espresso machine plumbed into our office, so that we can enjoy the fruit of our labors more easily (and maybe show off a little bit too!). I dug around in my shed, and found a 10-foot chunk of the old bar from Higher Ground's "good ole days" and Joe went to work fitting it up for our new warehouse.

We traded some equipment with Matt from Three Squares Cafe in Vergennes, one of my good friends that happens to also serve some of the best damn food (and coffee!) in Vermont, and wound up with his 2-group La Cimballi espresso machine. As of today, the bar is built and the electricity is wired, all we need is to get the machine plumbed in.

I will let everyone know when we get it up and running, so that anyone in the area can swing by the warehouse and have an espresso or iced latte with us.

Speaking of our espresso, we just found out that both The Inn at Shelb urne Farms, and Hunger Mountain Co-Op will begin serving our Organic Espresso Blend in their cafes in a few weeks. That is pretty exciting, as it's something we don't sell to often. I think that might change as summer becomes a reality. If you are a "foodie" take a peek @ Shelburne Farm's 07 menu: reading it alone could cause you to salivate!

'Till next time,
Matt

VII

2008-04-19T12:04:00.000-07:00

There is a new addition to the Fresh Coffee Now family! His name is VII (Seven!) and he is an English Bulldog. Joe got him about a week ago, and he has since move into our office, and spends much of his life curled up, sleeping under my desk. My fiance has been trying to convince me to get a puppy, and I've held out until now. VII might just put me over the edge, however, as he is pretty much the cutest and coolest thing I've seen in a long time.

It's looking like it will be a good spring and summer here. We've got a new employee (Julia) and a puppy, and finally it's warm and sunny. I can't complain one bit!

In coffee news: we're looking forward to doing some major advertising on the FCN website starting in May. We might put Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee on sale for a couple weeks, and do some discounts on select gift packages.

Locally, City Market and Hunger Mtn. Coop are both serving our Mexico coffee as their Ice Coffee in their deli section. We will begin selling coffee in bulk bins at Fresh Market on Pine Street this Monday, and Outer Space, across the street from our warehouse, is now serving a couple coffees by the pump pot. I will post more about them next week...

Enjoy the weekend!
Matt

Happy Tax Day!

2008-04-15T09:16:00.000-07:00

Hooray for Tax Day!

To help keep everyone's mind off of taxes, here's a couple pictures of our Organic Mexico coffee, first in green bean state, and then cooling off in the roaster's agitator. Now all you need to do is brew some and drink it!!

It looks like spring is here today, and supposedly for the rest of the week (and month?). We were able to open the doors of the warehouse today, and let the sun in!

Have a great week...
Matt

Free coffee for the masses!

2008-04-14T10:54:00.000-07:00

For the past few weeks I've been training a new demo co-ordinator, and I'm now happy to report that Julia Cerbone (of Pure Pop fame) is going to be our newest employee. Julia and I gave out coffee samples to a bunch of nice people at City Market and Hunger Mountain for past few weekends. Next week we have demos at the same places, Friday and Saturday respectively, and I'm going to go to North Country Coop in Plattsburgh Saturday as well.

In other news, Bodum products are on sale for 15% off, as promised, on the website. People, if you buy ground coffee from us, please think about picking up an Antigua Grinder and switching to whole bean coffee!

City Market has started serving our Mexico and Peru Decaf coffees in their Deli as Ice Coffee. Make sure and have a cup if you shop there! The Mexico will also be at Taste of Burlington, by the cup and the French Press, starting this week.

And last but not least, Joe has turned 1/2 of my office in to a motorcycle repair shop. Here's his bike, out front of the shop during a nice 70 degree day last week. After his finishes his newest moped project he'll be revamping a couple espresso machines we have on hand, one of which is going to be plumbed into the shop so we can pull espresso shots ALL DAY LONG!!

A new season for Fresh Coffee Now!

2008-04-03T10:12:00.000-07:00

As time goes on, we take for granted the gifts we have and lose the enthusiasm we once had at the goodness we’re blessed with everyday. I've been listening to the positive messages in my life and have looked at my gifts. Indeed, the darkness of routine masks the excitement we once had when things were new. It's not easy to realize what we live for every day.

When I started working with coffee, I remember how beautiful the aroma was and how to use the shiny espresso machine was a goal for me. As I continued my quest for knowledge through effort and interest, I conquered my goal, became an expert in my craft, and began to make people happy. The gift I have wasn't so I could make myself the most beautiful cappuccino, it was the knowledge I had of my craft that made me able to give people the best I could.
At some point, I got interested in roasting coffee. I took advantage of the opportunity I had to improve my knowledge and had to take gradual steps through time, bit by bit, and eventually I was able to do it myself. I had several teachers over the years and assembled a body of understanding that helped me do the best I can now. I have been blessed with the opportunity to put to work all the knowledge I've amassed and enjoy the rewards. I don't have to search out the best coffee roaster or the most skilled barista around to show the people I love what is available. I can make the work I have done available to people every day. I am thankful for that!

As the seasons change, so do our aspirations, and sometimes it seems we have to move on and start a new chapter. Our roasting company was at home in the basement of a café/restaurant for nearly two years and, with all the focus on the café, it was difficult at times to stay excited. It made me want to so something drastic to change the reality of the situation. I did my best to work through and now have the opportunity to reinvigorate my interest in coffee with a change for the better. I wouldn't want to give up my life's passion for a break from hardship.

Fresh Coffee Now has turned to a new chapter in its development, starting with our move to a more user-friendly venue. Gone are the days of huffing burlap sacks of coffee down stairs. Our commitment to quality is growing stronger daily, and with this our standards are growing also. We will be offering more organic, fair trade coffees then ever before, as well as our Jamaican coffee that stands alone in quality. Delicious standards like Guatemala Antigua, Yemen Mocha, and Indian Malabar, among others, will remain great sellers. I hope our loyal customers will spread the word among friends. Tell them how to get Fresh Coffee Now!

Joe

A lot going on @ FCN!

2008-03-26T19:45:00.000-07:00

I've been slacking with posting to the blog while Joe has been away. There's been a lot going on and not a lot of time to do it...

Here's some FCN news: We had a fun demo @ Shelburne Supermarket last weekend. As usual both the staff and the customers I met were very nice, and a lot of people were really into the coffee. Our Colombia Reserva is slowly taking over as our biggest seller there, which is nice as it's "the best."

I'm proud to report that Stone Soup in downtown Burlington will be serving our coffee starting Friday morning. We are being served in a lot of restaurants now, but Stone Soup is special to me as it's my favorite lunch place in town, and has been for years. Hopefully you will all get a chance to get in and try some of their great food, and coffee soon!

In other news, we have a huge shipment of Bodum produ cts coming in, so I'm going to try and kick April off with a little sale, and sell some grinders to all you people that order ground coffee!! Also, we have a new demo team training this week. There are many demos coming up, including 6 at City Market, a few at Hunger Mountain, and several at Healthy Living. The first one is this Saturday at City Market, from 10:30 Am through 2pm. Come down and say hi if you're around!

Until the weekend, stay warm!
Matt

Shelburne Supermarket demo this weekend

2008-03-18T14:20:00.001-07:00

Ahh back to the cold Vermont winter. Isn't spring right around the corner? Hopefully so!

Joe is in Mexico riding around on a giant power boat, so now it's my turn to watch the shop while he's gone.

We have a bunch of demos coming up in the next few weeks, the first of which is this Saturday, 10am, at Shelburne Supermarket in Shelburne, VT. I'll be giving out samples of our Organic French Roast, and Organic Colombia Reserva for about 4 hours or so. Please come down and say hi! After that I'll be moving in to City Market for 4 weeks in a row, and also doing demos at Hunger Mountain Co-Op, Rutland Area Food Co-Op, Middlebury Natural Food Co-Op and the North Country Co-Op over in Plattsburgh, NY.

In other news, the Customer Favorites gift package is 20% off on the store, here. That's a pretty good deal so if you need to send someone some fresh Vermont coffee, you know where to click!

Hope to see some of you at the demo....

Matt

Where do you find coffee in the Bahamas?

2008-03-06T10:23:00.001-08:00

There comes a point in January or February where everyone in Vermont freaks out and starts buying plane tickets to "anywhere that's not so damn cold." In my case, I bought a ticket to the island of Eleuthera, in the Bahamas, to join my fiance and her family for their yearly winter vacay.

The Bahamas are beautiful, especially Eleuthera which is not built up and developed like so many of the bigger islands. We have an old, fun house, right on the beach!

Here is the view out of our bedroom:

So the one problem the family, who arrived a few days before us, ran into was "where do get coffee in the Bahamas?" Most of the stores around here have Maxwell House, and Foldgers and that is about it. This does NOT do the trick for the fam, who are all tried and true coffee addicts, since shortly after birth. So, I got the phone call: "Matt, help!"

Now, we are all set to go with 10 pounds of Organic Colombia Reserva , a bodum grinder, and a French press to boot. Waking up here this morning with a fresh French press was about the best thing I could ask for. I want to give a special shout out to Joe for roasting such awesome coffee, and for watching the shop while I'm gone. Thanks mon frere! (Readers: don't feel TOO bad for him: he is going to Mexico the day I get back!)

The moral of this story: next time you are in the Bahamas and need to find coffee, call us up and we'll mail some down to ya!

Have a great week, to anyone that's reading this. Joe is going to take over for a couple days on the blog front, and I'll cya when we're back in town.

Matt

New Places to get Fresh Coffee Now!

2008-03-04T08:59:00.001-08:00

Today we started selling coffee at some new places, and I wanted to let people know where they can get our coffee:

Middlebury Natural Food Co-Op in Middlebury, VT: offering our Organic Mexico.

Rutland Area Food Co-Op in Rutland, VT: offering our Organic Colombia Reserva, Organic Nicaragua and Organic Peru.

Coffee Gourmet Cafe in Kennebunk, ME: offering our Organic French Roast, Organic Peru and Organic Nicaragua.

Big Chile Republic, the Tex/Mex fusion restaurant in Colchester, VT: offering our Organic French Roast, Organic Nicaragua, and Organic Peru Decaf.

We will also be serving 6 organic coffees by the cup, and selling them in bulk and by the retail bag at Fresh Market/Cheese Outlet on Pine Street in Burlington, VT.

If there is anywhere that you would like to see our coffee, please let me know, and thanks for your support!

Matt

Leap Year Sale!

2008-02-28T12:13:00.000-08:00

Leap Year only happens once every 4 years, and we've decided to do some deep discounts to celebrate the occasion. Visit www.freshcoffeenow.com for the remainder of the month: Jamaican Blue Mountain Moy Hall is on sale, and we are taking 29% off of all our organic coffees.

Enjoy!
Matt

Coffee Profile: Organic Colombia Reserva

2008-02-28T05:48:00.000-08:00

We are starting to profile a different coffee that we sell at freshcoffeenow.com every couple weeks. I'm going to try and get info and pictures of the farms, and Joe will cup the coffee and give us the low down. Our first coffee profile is on the Organic Colombia R eserva, a coffee we started selling about 6 months ago. In that time it's become one of our best sellers, and it is now being sold in several stores in Vermont.

The coffee is grown in Bucaramanga, Colombia, at Hacienda el Roble. The companies owner, Oswaldo, is shown here checking his crops. The coffee is actually named after the founder of the estate, Don Telmo, who passed away in 1932. This estate grows it's coffee under shade, is certified organic, and has to date built a church and a school on it's site, for the families that live and work there. Their socially conscious approach to farming, combined with a deep respect for the environment, makes them someone we enjoy promoting.

Joe, after cupping the coffee, had this to say: "The Reserva has an intensely rich chocolaty aroma. It's medium to full bodied, with a smooth, complex caramelly mouthful. There is a rich and balanced finish."

If you've had the Colombia, please let us know what you think. We think it's one of the best values on the site! It's on sale for a couple more days, here. We are going to have a Leap Year sale on the 29th, with a lot of coffees getting a deep discount, and the Jamaican Moy Hall is already discounted (for 2 more days!).

Enjoy,
Matt

FCN is on Facebook!

2008-02-20T08:26:00.001-08:00

For any of our friends and clients that are members of Facebook, please join our Facebook group by clicking here. We will be posting a lot more pictures of the roasting facility and the farms we get our coffee from there.

Joe has been cupping coffees in the office and our next blog will be a review of our Organic Colombia Reserva coffee. This is one of our favorites, and we are excited to post a bunch of pictures from our friend Richard @ Royal Coffee, that visited the estate last month.

In other news, www.freshcoffeenow.com has a couple of our premium coffees on sale, (Yemen, Colombia) as well as 20% off the Peaberry Sampler Package, which is a great gift idea.

Dont forget to come see us at City Market this Friday, at 11:30 AM..

Matt

Weekend demo's are a success!

2008-02-18T10:02:00.000-08:00

This weekend's demos @ Hunger Mountain and Shelburne Supermarket were a success. Thanks so much to everyone that came out and drank coffee with us. We demoed our Organic Nicaragua coffee, our Organic French Roast, and the Organic Colombia Reserva.

Our next demo will be this Friday at City Market in downtown Burlington during lunch time. Come see us! We're signing everyone that visits our demo station up for a drawing to win a free pound of coffee. We're also going to start giving away coupons to use on the website to people that come to the demos.

Here's a couple pics from Hunger Mountain on Saturday:

Here's Joe hamming it up with some coffee nerds about the difference between our French Roast, and your average burnt coffee that the competition labels "French Roast."

Now a crowd begins to grow as people smell freshly brewed coffee!

Cya soon!
Matt

Demos in VT this weekend!

2008-02-15T08:17:00.001-08:00

To all Vermont coffee fans, I'll be doing 2 in-store demos this weekend and you are invited to come meet Joe and I and try some of our coffee. Saturday, we'll be at Hunger Mountain Co-Op in Montpelier from 10am through 2pm. Sunday we'll be at Shelburne Supermarket in Shelburne also from 10am through 2pm. We'd really like to start meeting more of our Vermont customers, so if you live near the area please come say hi! We are going to start giving away coffee at our demos so if you do stop by, make sure and sign up to win.

Next week we're going to start posting info about each of our coffees on the blog, and also start offering coupons online which you can use at freshcoffeenow.com! Hope to see you over the weekend...
Matt

Game On: The Move is Complete

2008-01-23T11:04:00.000-08:00

As of yesterday, the roaster has been wired, gassed and vented in our new facility. We also finally got our grinder over to the new space. My apologies to any of our customers that were waiting on orders to be ground! We had to have an electrician come wire a special outlet just for the grinder (it uses a lot of juice!).

Now it's back to roasting coffee! We will begin a series of demos at all of our supermarket locations in mid-February and I will post the details and times so any of our local customers can come try some free coffee!

Joe recommends that our customers try the new Organic/Fair Trade Ethiopian coffee, and still thinks that the Organic Colombian is the best tasting coffee for under $20 that he's ever seen. Give them a try and lets us know what you think.

Best,
Matt

The Move: Part 2

2008-01-16T07:13:00.000-08:00

As of yesterday, we are all moved in to the new spot (with the exception of computer and computer desk for the office).

Here are some shots of the uhaul on one of our trips over, us moving about 7000 pounds of coffee in, and the roaster installed in it's new home.

We're hoping to be up and roasting by Thursday night. We'll keep you posted!

Cheers,
Matt

The Move: Part 1

2008-01-14T14:10:00.000-08:00

Today we moved the roaster from it's home in the bowels of Winooski, to it's new spot in Burlington. Here are some of the pictures from the move. My favorite is the first one, with Joe faking tears as they cart up the roaster...

More pictures and news soon!!

We're Moving!

2008-01-08T08:15:00.000-08:00

Happy 2008 to all of our loyal customers! Freshcoffeenow.com is excited to announce that next Monday we are moving our roasting center to Burlington! For those of you from far away places, Burlington is the town that is next door to Winooski, our current location. It is the largest town in our small state, and it will be a great place for us to operate in. For starters, we have about twice as much room to warehouse coffee. We also wont have to walk down 25 steep stairs when getting coffee to and from our roaster.

For the customer, the biggest difference is that we won't run out of coffee as often (although certain Fair Trade co operatives, and Jamaican coffees will still be hard to find). We also won't be bothered with the restaurant that was above the old roasting facility, allowing us to focus more on coffee, our website and the wholesale business. This should make everything a bit smoother, and our jobs a bit more fun.

Here's some "before" pics of the new space. Look for more pictures next week as we install the roaster and bring over some coffee!

New Coffee Club and Gift Packages Launched!

2007-12-06T09:55:00.000-08:00

Good news for the holidays: We’re launching our new coffee clubs and gift packages today! I’m glad to be getting a coffee club up and running, as our customers have been requesting it as a holiday gift idea for a few months now. The Blue Mountain Club will actually reserve our customers Jamaican coffee, which we will hold when we start running low on stock. The Organic/Fair Trade Coffee Club will be a two pound a month club, Joe’s choice, of our favorite organic and Fair Trade coffees.

The gift packages range in price and style; from 4 pounds of organic coffees and a peaberry sampler package, up to a premium gift package that includes several of our high end coffees and premium Bodum coffee grinders. There are also some starter and accessory packages that come with small grinders, storage jars and French presses. Most of the packages come in a nice wicker tray, with a personalized card. If not, they are easily added (in fact you can add a gift basket or card to ANY order you place on the website now!).

Please take a look at the new items (click here) and let me know what you think!

Thanks,
Matt

Joe is Back!

2007-12-01T08:00:00.000-08:00

Blasting through the airport I can’t resist squeezing my bag of coffee! Don’t be alarmed! It’s early in the morning and I am itching for a French press of a high quality coffee called Colombia Reserva. I have to wait ‘til I get to my destination, but this rich and scrumptious coffee stirs notes of rich caramel and sweet dark chocolate liquor.

Sitting among others, I watch stressed out moms, aloof dads and their quiet, curious youth; hungry and waiting. They watch the cold through airport windows anticipating a destination away from the comfortable corners of their homes.
I move against my travel bag and squeeze a little air out of the one-way valve, which has become the “aroma hole.” The lofty essence of my coffee permeates the immediate vicinity and I start getting looks and quiet smiles. A random eyebrow lifts from the daily post behind rimmed glasses.
Of course the attention is being given to the pleasant aroma of coffee, and not my good looks. I can’t help imagining how maybe in my own world, a random scent changing the cloudiness of a gloomy hour waiting in the crowd, would be brightened by just a few moments of volatile aromatic accolade.

Love,
Joe

The Blog is Back!

2007-11-10T08:31:00.000-08:00

Hello fans of Fresh Coffee! I realized last week that neither Joe nor I had made a post to the blog in over a month, so I decided to post an update on what’s been going on here in Vermont. Rest assured we didn’t forget about you, we have just been busy trying to make changes to our website.

I guess the most important (and evident) thing we’ve been working on is the new website, www.freshcoffeenow.com. With the help of our web development team, EpikOne, we’ve built a new website, which we feel looks a lot better, and is easier to use for both our clients, and Joe and I. The site launched about 6 weeks ago, and has been going through a testing phase. We think we have worked out all the glitches, and recommend that everyone tries the site!

Some other things we’ve been working on are holiday gift options. We’ve always sold gift packages, but this year at the request of some of our customers, we are in the process of adding some new features. The gift packages will now come in nice, round wicker trays, and a gift card, making them a better looking present. Also, we will allow the addition of the wicker tray and gift card to any order, not just a gift package. We will have electronic gift certificates, and two coffee clubs (Jamaican, and the regular Fresh Coffee Club) available as well. We expect all three of these changes to take place on 12/1/8, and are really excited to launch them.

Last but not least, the biggest change for us is that we are preparing to move to a new roasting facility shortly after the new year. We’ve finally outgrown our basement hideout in Winooski, and we’re moving back to Burlington! Our new facility is about four times as big, and will allow us to warehouse more coffees, take deliveries easier and ship packages for handily. Most importantly to Joe and I: we won’t be in a windowless basement!! I’ll post some pictures of the new spot as soon as we begin to fit it up.

Speaking of the basement, it’s time to go back and pack some orders. Please let us know what you think about the new website, and have a great Thanksgiving!

Fair Trade 101

2007-09-11T14:33:00.000-07:00

At Fresh Coffee Now we have a serious commitment to Fair Trade practices, and we are slowly moving our website towards offering more and more Fair Trade coffees . As I was describing some of the symbols and terms used on coffee bags in my last blog post, I realized that Fair Trade is so important that it deserves its own page, to help educate our customers so that they can make more informed decisions when purchasing coffee.

What is Fair Trade?

Fair-trade coffee is coffee that is purchased from farmer cooperatives as opposed to large coffee plantations. Farmers are ensured at least $1.26 per pound of coffee – a rate at which a farmer can support a family of five with adequate nutrition, health care, and education. In the current coffee market, because of speculation and flooding of the market by cheap coffee grown on industrial-sized plantations, the price that most farmers receive has fallen below $0.50/lb, which is not enough to cover the cost of production.

Although the outspoken motive of fair-trade is to support individual farmers and communities, also embedded in its philosophy is environmental conservation and sustainable agriculture. Eighty-five percent of fair-trade coffee is organic, in contrast to regular coffee, which uses pesticides and fertilizers, including DDT, that then contaminate local watersheds and can harm the health of workers. Regular coffee is usually grown on large plantations with methods that cause erosion, deforestation, and loss of biodiversity.

What are the goals of Fair Trade?

To improve the livelihoods and well-being of producers by improving market access, strengthening producer organizations, paying a fair price and providing continuity in the trading relationship.
To promote development opportunities for disadvantaged producers, especially women and indigenous people, and to protect children from exploitation in the production process.
To raise awareness among consumers about the negative effects on producers of international trade so that they exercise their purchasing power positively.
To set an example of partnership in trade through dialogue, transparency and respect.
To campaign for changes in the rules and practice of conventional international trade.
To protect human rights by promoting social justice, sound environmental practices and economic security.

How does Fair Trade help farmers?

Fair Trade guarantees producers a fair price for their product (at least $1.26 per pound) that enables farmers to cover the costs of production, reinvest in their farms and meet their families basic needs including health care and education. Fair Trade creates direct links between producers and importers, bypassing various intermediaries who take a share of the profits. Fair Trade is not charity—it is a market-based approach to increasing small farmer self-sufficiency and generating more resources for community development and environmental conservation.

In contrast, conventionally traded coffee is part of the larger “free trade” system, favoring larger producers and multinational corporations, often at the expense of local communities and the environment. Under conventional trade, coffee prices are determined by a volatile international market. The world market price often falls below a farmer’s cost of production and leaves farm families in a struggle for survival. Even when the world market price is relatively high, family farmers get a small fraction of that price, with the lion’s share of profits going to intermediaries.

In summary, Fair Trade coffee is an amazing thing. It allows you the consumer to actually impact the life of someone growing your coffee thousands of miles away. I strongly urge you to spread this information around to friends, family and co workers. Help make a difference in the world, while enjoying coffee of the finest quality!

Thanks,
Matt

Coffee Bag Symbols: What do they mean?

2007-08-22T12:15:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago, I received some nice comments thanking me for the info on Jamaican coffee, and I’ve decided to devote a series of blog posts to other frequently wondered, if not asked, questions regarding coffee, and related subjects.

One question I hear a lot while doing coffee demos in supermarkets is “what do those symbols mean on the coffee bags?” This is an easy one to answer, and might be informative for our readers!

The first and easiest to explain symbol is the “Certified Organic” symbol.

If a coffee has been certified organic, it guarantees that the coffee is grown without chemicals, which poison people and the environment. The land the coffee is grown on, in fact, must be chemical free for at least three years. To gain the right to use this logo, the land and coffee must be inspected by an independent, 3rd party company. The certifying entities have begun to include criteria regarding sustainable farming techniques, making higher and new standards for organic certification.

The next, and in my opinion most important symbol on a coffee bag is “Fair Trade Certified.”

Fair Trade is a trading partnership between coffee purchasers, and producers, which guarantees economic justice for the often impoverished producer by setting a floor price at which coffee is purchased for. The details in this social and economic partnership are complex, and I will devote my entire blog next week to try and explain it. Suffice to say for now that at FCN, we only drink Fair Trade coffee, and are trying to slowly convert our catalog over to Fair Trade as quickly as possible.

The last symbol I will go over today is “Bird Friendly” (also known as “Shade Grown.”)

Simply put, “Bird Friendly” coffee is coffee that comes from farms in Latin America that provide good, forest-like habitat for birds. Rather than being grown on land that has been cleared of all other vegetation, “Bird Friendly” coffees are planted under a canopy of trees. Because of the shaded, forest-like setting created by these canopy trees, coffee produced this way is called shade-grown. Not only are “Bird Friendly” coffees shade-grown, they are also organic.

“Bird Friendly” coffees are the only coffees on the market that are certified as shade-grown and organic by an independent third-party inspector using criteria established by the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center of the National Zoo. These criteria are based on years of scientific research.

If you have any questions or comments please feel free to chime in. Look for my next post which will be all about Fairly Traded coffee.

Matt

The Price of Excellence, Part II

2007-07-30T11:04:00.000-07:00

Why is Jamaican coffee so rare and expensive?

Jamaican Coffee is often known to be the “rarest, most expensive” coffee in the world. Both the high price and rarity stem from the low-yield farms that are growing beans in the region. In the mid-fifties with the introduction of the Industry Board, farming for quality, not quantity, became the priority. That being said, the thing that hurts Jamaican coffee consumers the most is Japan.

That’s right, the little island that is the same size as California consumes more Jamaican coffee than everywhere in the world - combined. To be specific, Japan buys 90% of all coffee grown in the Blue Mountain region. The US, in comparison, buys 2% of the coffee, with the remaining 8% taken mainly by the UK and Europe. Why does Japan get so much you might ask? Because they are willing to pay for it! In America prices are now between $35 and $50 a pound for Jamaican coffee; in Japan try $60 to $75 per pound!

Another rumor is that in the early 60’s when Jamaica was almost wiped out by a hurricane (perhaps Hurricane Flora on 10/5/63?), Jamaica sold out the futures on a certain percentage of coffee in return for financial aid from Japan. This is total coffee conspiracy theory and I can’t back it up with facts. I have one friend that owns a farm in the Moy Hall co-op, which is how we source our coffee, and he’s never mentioned the hurricane. Until we get some evidence, it will just be something Joe and I talk about at the office, but it seems a likely story to me.

So, the moral of the story here is this: Jamaican coffee is amazing, but it comes in small quantities. If you like it, you’ve got to be willing to pay for it! The prices are going up steadily as word gets out and demand increases, but the farms yield the same amount of coffee (or less if they are damaged by hurricanes like 2 years ago with Hurricane Rita).

How to try Jamaican coffee: We offer Blue Mountain Mavis Bank coffee as of now, and are working hard to get some from the Moy Hall co-op. Give it a try and tell us what you think. I’d love to hear some feedback (hopefully positive) so I can convince Joe to let me post another blog sometime soon.

Cheers,
Matt

The Price of Excellence, Part I

2007-07-24T15:17:00.000-07:00

Please excuse this interruption of the usually scheduled blog: Joe has been on vacation in Alaska for a couple weeks, and while I am down here roasting beans in his place I figured I could simultaneously hijack his blog and see what happens. Shhhh! Don’t tell him, and he might not notice…

As you can imagine while selling coffee for living, I field all kinds of questions about coffee every day. If they are technical questions about roasting, making espresso or the specific qualities of any particular bean, I immediately refer the person asking to Joe. He knows a lot more about that stuff than I do! I find that when I try and quote him, much of it gets lost in translation. More and more often though, and especially lately, people want to know about Jamaican coffee. Some questions include, but are not limited to, “is it really the best coffee money can buy?”, “why do you run out so often?” and “why is it so damn expensive?” So while I’m here “borrowing” Joe’s blog, I figured I could give a brief history of Jamaican coffee, and at the same time try and answer some of everyone’s questions.

A Brief History of Jamaican Coffee

Coffee was brought to Jamaica way back in 1728, while it was a British colony. The first governor, Sir Lewis Hawes, brought this addictive little bean over to see if it would take on the newly conquered island. Suffice to say that it did! For the next 200 years, coffee grew on the island and wasn’t considered anything special, although they did import quite a bit of it and it was the favorite of the Queen of England (the current Queen, Elizabeth II, only drinks Blue Mountain coffee).

By the early 1900’s Jamaican coffee was becoming recognized as some of the best coffee you could get into your cup. They started producing more and more coffee, and at some point after World War II the sheer volume they were producing was leading to poor quality as not enough attention was being paid to the important details of growing the crops. This led to the English government forming the “Coffee Industry Board of Jamaica” in 1953.

Jamaica would shortly thereafter become independent of the UK, but adopt the Industry Board into its’ fledgling constitution. From there, the current system quickly developed. The government created five co-operatives that every farmer in the region had to sell their beans to: Moy Hall, Wallenford, Mavis Bank, Langley and Silver Hill. The board started grading the beans on their shape, size and texture, creating 4 categories for the coffees: #1, #2, #3 and triage, from highest to lowest quality. After the farmers sold the beans to the co-ops, the co-ops would then process them, barrel them and sell them.

Why “Blue Mountain?”

The coffee is called “Jamaican Blue Mountain” because it is grown in the Blue Mountain Region of Jamaica. The Blue Mountain range gets its name from its’ low lying cloud cover, which forms a mist that often makes the trees on the mountain look green. Coffee grown in the region is required by law to be grown between 2000 and 5500 feet above sea level. The mountains reach 7500 feet in height, but the area between 5501 and 7500 feet is recognized as “preserved forest” by government law. The growing conditions in the Blue Mountain range are considered ideal by coffee growers world wide. Between the rich soil, heavy rainfall and easy drainage off the sides of the mountains, this coffee is basically perfect.

Why it is so rare, and expensive?
Click here for Part II...

Cheers,
Matt

Tampering with the Tamper

2007-06-21T14:52:00.000-07:00

I heart Tamping.

Tamping is the process of securing the coffee in the portafilter basket to ensure a flat surface for water to flow evenly through the coffee grounds. Water will find the easiest path through the coffee. Knocking the side of the portafilter to mid-tamp loosens the grounds in the filter basket. By knocking it, you'll have quality tamp without disturbing the "puck" when jossling it around.

The owner of a café in Denver I used to work for showed me this tamping method. I learned to tamp in four directions: north, west, east, south, with a center push to smooth the top surface. This is the best method because it pushes the coffee into the sides and bottom creating a solidly packed puck.

The LaMarzocco Swift grinder uses volumetric dosing and tamping to provide consistent and reliable service through shift changes and thousands of pounds of coffee. The screw-like tamper uses only 8 lbs of pressure opposed to the 30lbs recommended by hand. The Swift tamps along with the grinding so that it tamps all the way through with even 8lbs. The result is layers of perfectly tamped coffee forming the puck.

The Art of Espresso

2007-06-07T07:29:00.000-07:00

To attain the best espresso shot - achieving that sweet, viscous, balanced espresso - is only possible with CLEAN equipment, proper grind, tamping (this is a whole chapter) and water temperature. Experience will also make you more comfortable with the machine. When I first tried using the machine, I remember how loud and daunting it was. Once you get used to it, it gets easier, although mastering the details can take years.

Extraction mostly depends on water pressure, water temperature grind, and tamp. Ideally, it should take 18-28 seconds to pour 1.5-2oz. Its appearance should be a cinnamon brown and uniform in color. If it's bubbly and has dark spots, this indicates that the water is too hot. If it only shoots .5oz the grind is too fine. If it could fill a 12oz cup, the grind is too coarse.

The caffeine content of a two ounce espresso is roughly 80mg. An 8oz cup of drip coffee has around 100mg. This figure varies depending on brew method. Espresso consists of three parts. In a cup, it would be the bottom, middle, and top. The base is the bottom and the “heart” of the espresso. It contains soluble particles suspended as viscous liquid. The moving part, called the suspension, settles like a Guinness beer. The top, called crema, is created by the dispersion of gasses, air, and carbon dioxide into liquid at high pressure. The emulsified oils form a foamy texture on the surface.

Espresso blends differ depending which coffee house you visit. At FreshCoffeeNow, I try to keep ours mellow and rich. I've played around with a bunch of different coffees blended in different ways. Now I have a simple blend which I think best suits my taste. Our espresso blend is very full-bodied and syrupy with a smooth bourbon and chocolate flavor.

Time for Another Espresso

2007-05-23T14:16:00.000-07:00

Some days are a cloud aloft in transition, slowly creeping towards the next distant horizon. A vague point appears peering like a faint beacon. This is your goal. Munch on a little snack. Have an espresso. Talk about how tired you feel. Get some support. Be one with the countertop. Rest, fart, moan and distress on and on about how it’s unfair of the rain, and oh, the rain.

Perfect time in my opinion for another espresso. I look at the machine, shiny and familiar, sitting, watching, and waiting. The hopper is full. The coffee smells like caramel dirt.

“Push it Joe. Push the button.” I push the button. Screeching, numbing, pulsing, radiating, aching balding head. I dose, skimming the excess grounds off the top. I tamp; north, south east, west, center. Appropriate water temperature, correct grind, suitable tamp, acceptable cup, proper time criteria. The golden brown color of the cream works. The body is syrupy, the taste sweet and nutty. The aroma, deep and intoxicating. The day…a little better.

My Brother Larry

2007-05-14T08:54:00.000-07:00

My brother’s name is Larry Greene. Woodworking and cabinetry are his trade. He said to me one time that he was thinking of changing his name to Lorenzo Verde. Something with more flair as to augment his businesses image to attract more clients. He started going over this in a deep Spanish/Italian/muddled fake accent. “bon journo, ima Lorenzo Verde! I mova da wooda with a sharpa toola.”

I am better at making fun of the French accent. Do French people drink coffee? They must. French press. French roast. French vanilla. Café au lait. Oui oui!

I have had a few compliments on the French roast I roast. It’s an organic blend balancing heavy, robust body with even, smooth acidity. I try not to burn out all of the flavor from my coffee so I set a desired temperature which exposes oils on the beans but not so much that they become saturated and sticky with oil. I guess you could say my French roast is a full city + with a robust characteristic. Giving the impression of a dark roasted coffee with hints of carbonization but retaining the complex, taste profile of the coffee. Give it a try, and let me know what you think. I'd love to hear your feedback.

Steamed Milk

2007-05-07T12:49:00.000-07:00

Milk comes from a lot of different animals; goats, monkeys... even pigs and giraffes. But here at the Blue Star Café, and many other cafés around the country and the world, we use milk that comes from an animal called the “cow”. These are large cumbersome animals who mope around grassy areas eating and chewing. They produce copious amounts of milk which we procure to use for many things including coffee drinks. Steaming milk can be done right and wrong. I believe foam belongs in the ocean and not in your latte or cappuccino. Textured milk is the consistency of paint, thick and creamy. What you don’t want is foamy milk with huge tasteless bubbles.

To make textured milk, you begin by plunging the steam wand into the milk and turning it on. Introduce air into the milk for the first few seconds of steaming, then use the rest of the time to incorporate the bubbles you made in a cyclone of milk to get velvet texture. You end the process by turning off the steam when you reach the desired temperature which is between 140 and 160 degrees. I spin the milk in the pitcher to make it shiny. I usually have time to make a “rosetta” atop my lattes and cappuccinos. I rock the pitcher side to side and it lies out across the mug and I give a stem by swiping through the top. If I have the time, I make butterflies, people, logos... you name it, I make it.

What would you like to see at your café? I make a delicious Earl Grey Latte. Earl Grey in a tea bag steeped in a little water to get the flavor moving and to warm up the cup. I introduce Vanilla flavor and a dash of cinnamon before pouring my perfectly textured milk. I would be interested to hear new recipes or ideas, so please feel free to post.

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Never a Bad Monday

2007-04-25T14:08:00.000-07:00

It’s easy to see what all the fuss is about coffee. Wouldn’t you be aroused in the morning once you smelled the caramel aroma of organic Bolivian coffee? I roast and brew coffee for a living so I get to smell it all the time.

It’s one of those beautiful things no one thinks of, but coffee never has a bad Monday. Coffee can be bad – but no matter how bad it is, it makes the most terrible days a little better.

You look at your horse standing there in the morning light, its breath pluming, the glistening frost on its back. Bluffs and plateaus loom in the distance…it could be worse. You’re out in the middle of nowhere – You have nothing but a fire, a pot of boiling water, and some fresh coffee in your Bodum. Your handy, travel French press suits you well dosed with Nicaragua Segovia fair trade.

Keeping the tradition of the wild, you toss your cushy travel chair aside and sit on the rocks…

The Roast Master

2007-04-10T10:24:00.000-07:00

I loved my little, red 1979 Volvo 242 - her two doors and wool seats and lack of air conditioning - she was always dependable; an absolute joy even in 100 degree heat. On sunny days, I'd get into my car and go to the café where I worked to amp up on some double espresso shots for an hour or so. When I got back into my boiling car, I was buzzing. Everything had that 60's high-school yearbook fantasy picture fuzz on it. Driving while impaired on caffeine, I tried not to hit anyone while flying through the city in my ancient, beat-up Volvo, singing and restlessly agitated by the caffeine.

That café had an unbelievable machine from space. The agtron control system and mass spectrometer used to determine roast degree was impressive. She was dialed in, roaring, turning, and exiting. Blue, silver, chrome, brass, and coffee oil. For some, a coffee-roasting machine is like a big steam engine.... like a huge tractor when you were a kid. Some people when they see it say, "Wow, that’s a big coffee maker!" or "Hey look, a gigantic coffee grinder!"

Roast science has been evolving for a while now, and people discovered that coffee is the most aromatically diverse food or drink on the planet. There are over some 850 volatile aromatic compounds, many of which are still misunderstood. The roast master controls the induction of heat and air over a time period, and this determines how these sugars,chemicals, and compounds react with each other, and ultimately determines the quality of the roasted product.

Density and moisture content are major factors when roasting. Also, barometric pressure and humidity effect how air and temperature work with the beans in a roast chamber. Whether you are using a drum roaster or a fluid bed air roaster, this technical information can affect the quality, finish, and degree of roast.

Each coffee from its different growing region has unique properties and is analyzed, tested, tasted, graded, and so on. I take information like density and moisture content and roast the coffee to magnify its individual characteristics. I try not to dark-roast coffee because it loses a lot of delicate aromatic and taste properties due to carbonization of sugars and other factors. Many customers favor a dark roast, so I do try to make a blend of a few coffees with different taste profiles and roast them a slight degree darker then a medium roast to get a rounded full-bodied cup while still preserving the aromatic and taste properties.

If this information is useless to you - don’t worry! My French roast rocks! Try it!

Morning Routine

2007-04-05T09:03:00.000-07:00

How do you make your coffee? What role does coffee play in your life? Do you start your day in the morning by waking up early to get your cup of coffee and the morning paper? Or do you wake up in a rush, dash to the café, and grab a drip coffee to go?

I’m a lucky one, I wake up and begin the day with a cup of coffee and an article or two (usually just the weather and horriblescope). I can vary my coffee choices, since I have a couple different machines. I went on eBay and purchased a nice espresso machine for my home so I can gloat about it to my friends, saying, “My new machine makes better espresso than the machine at work”—no one cared. My other machine is one of our Bodum French presses.

I believe the French press is the best device to use. It's simple to operate, easy to clean, and small enough to fit in your cupboard. No dangling power cords, no “on” switch, free of paper basket filters and under-the-pot warmers that develop tetrahydroxycyclohexanecarboxylic acid (quinic acid - c7h12o6) in the coffee, which destroys a pot of coffee as badly as a percolator does.

The French press delivers a delicious cup of coffee full of natural coffee oils and particle suspension so you get the fullness of the body and crispness of acidity on your palate. Some folks don’t like the sediment in the bottom of the cup. I don’t drink the sediment. I did notice, however, that if I get a cup of drip coffee I automatically go for the sugar and cream, but this is not so with a French press coffee. With the French press, I enjoy the natural flavor characteristics much more the taste of sugar and cream. It’s laughable when a customer buys a $10 pot of Jamaican Blue Mountain and asks for some cream and a packet of Equal. But I just say, “Sure, no problem!”

New Espresso Blend

2007-03-22T11:21:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, I wear all white when I work in the café. After an hour of making lattes, I end up looking like I just replaced some brakes. Today, I have apparently made that choice. I wear topsiders. Sometimes I drink unsweetened tea. Enough about me…

It’s been a fascinating week here at FreshCoffeeNow. We have been working on a new espresso blend. Espresso is touchy because when it’s brewed in a machine all the qualities, defects, acidity and body come alive. It is easy to mistake a great coffee for a great espresso blend. Making a blend you start with a base, enriching it with coffees of various flavor profiles to reach a desired result. Trial and error, testing and re-testing will ensure a good product. I will continue to update you on the progress.

We have been trying to get rid of one of the best coffees ever this week, as well. I can’t tell you what it is because we don’t have much left, but I hate to see it go. Ok, Ok - it's Bolivian Fair Trade! Shhh!!! My choice for favorite coffee this week, however, is the Mexico Pluma. This coffee has unbelievable quality for the price. I can’t say enough positive things about it. It has a medium to full body, which supports a subtle earthiness and bakers chocolate balance that makes for a truly remarkable cup. I would choose this coffee over most because of its rich character without being over powering. Please let me know what you think about it. I’m off to work on my espresso blend, see ya next time!

Joe

My first Word!

2007-03-22T11:14:00.000-07:00

I remember my mom, each morning, in her fuscia night gown, coming down stairs into the kitchen to make coffee. She would point at the coffee jar on the counter and say “mmm, coffee…” It said COFFEE on the side of the jar in gold letters. So, at a really early age I learned to read, and my first word was coffee. My mom told me this, years ago. Being the smart lad I am I tried to prove it to one of my co-worker friends the other week. I said to her, “I’m serious, my first word was coffee, go ahead… call my mom!” I gave her the number and she called. My mom answers the phone and was asked,

“What was Joe’s first word?”

Mom says, “I don’t remember what it was.”

I grab the phone, “Mom, it was coffee, remember? You told me this a while ago!”

As it was clear I was disgruntled, she said “Joey, (she calls me Joey sometimes) I don’t think it was coffee, I could be wrong.”

“Mom, you told me it was coffee ok, so for future reference when I have someone call you and ask what my first word was, it was coffee, ok?”

I hung up the phone in disbelief and continued to tell my friend that my mom said she remembered all the sudden. The ploy was unsuccessful.

My parents must have had a hidden agenda while raising me. I was named Joe. Joe means coffee: “cup of joe” and so on. My last name is Consentino, very similar to cappuccino. It even rhymes.

Interest in coffee began early for me. I attended school for my early years, of course. When I turned 16 all that learning had become boring, so I started working at cafés’ and coffee roasteries. I was mystified by the steaming, shiny machine on the counter, which I wasn’t allowed to touch until I was trained. I am still mystified. I find myself staring at the milk as it cyclones in the pitcher. Its velvet texture, shiny when I swirl it, touches the espresso. It mixes with the cocoa and sugar and works itself under and around. I get so much pleasure making drinks for people who are exited to get something special. We try giving people a great experience here in the café, as we do with our online customers. Our coffee rocks. Try it!

Joe

Roasting Coffee

2007-03-22T10:15:00.000-07:00

Half asleep, I stumble towards my window and push the curtain aside. The blinding glare of the morning sun wakes me abruptly from my slumber. Arriving at the café by noon, I enjoy a quick shot of espresso before gearing up for my ritualistic bagel and cream cheese—free of charge, of course. These bagels are unquestionably good, but unfortunately, I have developed a deep, habitual yearning for them. The first time I tried these things; I wasn’t impressed. They were gooey in the middle and crusty and burnt on the outside and I was dumbfounded at the size of the hole in the middle. “No bagel should have a hole that big,” I said with conviction.

A solid year has passed. Many events took place during this time, and I found myself connected to these bagels by cosmic force; as if a ray of nuclear energy grabbed hold of my lymph nodes and tugged until they—I stopped and turned to witness an alarming sight. In a large, crumply, brown, innocent paper bag they sat. I could smell them, burbling with gasses omitting an odor only these…things…could produce. A smell so inviting no mortal man in his mid-twenties (who was perhaps a little chubby) could ever resist. A matter of life or death was at stake. Only one man at this hour, in this place, on this stool, wearing these tighter-then-need-be pants, could save the world from such an unforeseeable ending... I’m fond of Montreal-style bagels: honey boiled, stone hearth-wood fired, and hand rolled. When you cut into these bagels, toast them with some maple-walnut cream cheese; it’s heaven. But enough about bagels, my real passion is coffee.

Deep in my lair below the café I stand (at will) for hours roasting coffee beans while I listen to the familiar sounds of the cafe above me. Today I'm roasting Tanzanian peaberry beans. From afar these beans might look like traditional, everyday beans, but Tanzanian peaberry beans are round like cylinders and have very distinct characteristics. Unlike other beans, they take all the nutrients for themselves—so the taste is lively and exciting. Here at FreshCoffeeNow, we have peaberry beans from different farms located all over the world, which result in coffee beans with very unique attributes. For instance, a Tanzania peaberry is winy and tart with an earthy balance while a peaberry from Sulawesi might be more syrupy or woodier, but still sharp and snappy.

Comparing just these two slightly different beans, you can guess how diverse bean varieties are worldwide. Remember this on your next trip to buy coffee, and be bold enough to try some different blends because each one produces a different aroma, taste, and emotion.

Love always,

Joe