Every once in a while she can't help but remind me that I'm completely mad...
...but she does it with such elegance and grace...
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...but she does it with such elegance and grace...
And eloquence and class......but she does it with such elegance and grace...
Every once in a while she can't help but remind me that I'm completely mad...
This morning, Other Brother (there is no pre-ground coffee in the house, a deficiency I must remedy) had an encounter with the OE Lido 2 grinder, as he made himself a coffee while I was in the shower (and the carers were attending to Mother).
Needless to say, the settings were out of synch when I emerged from my steamy heaven.
Now, that is not entirely Other Brother's fault. He confessed that while trying to separate - or detach, or unscrew - the glass jar (for the coffee grounds) from the rest of the OE Lido machine, he feared he would break it, or drop it - as it is heavy and he is a very non-macho artist. To be honest, I don't think it is possible to break the thing, (apart, perhaps, from the glass jar).
However, the OE Lido - while a magnificently engineered piece of equipment - think steam punk - (and I love that terminology) - meets outsized chessman, meets indestructible tank and you have got some idea of what this thing looks like and feels like, does have one or two drawbacks.
The first is the energy needed. Elbow grease. For the purists who whisper (infuriatingly) about perfection and a time limit of 15 seconds, know that (I mentioned these dialogues to Other Brother, and he told me that freshly squeezed citrus juice - I had prepared juice for the the pair of us - is supposed to be judged under a similarly insane rule of cosmic seconds before quality deteriorates) it takes me minutes - and yes, I mean minutes - to grind the beans. Seconds can be achieved by muscular young men as they briskly grind the beans, the handle spun energetically. That is not my default setting.
Other Brother viewed this sympathetically this morning (reminding me he had struggled with the machine earlier when preparing his own coffee), and speculated as to whether I would be open to the idea of purchasing an electric grinder. However, with a smothered grin, he agreed that this activity could be counted as 'good exercise'.
Giggling, he suggested some grinders from the former East Germany (his wife's parents came from the East before the Wall went up), adding that 'they have that retro look you seem to like so much, and they are built to last forever'. He has one, a gift from his in-laws, - his wife is German, they married two years ago having been together for 25 years - built in Germany sometime in the 50s or 60s. (I got him into grinding beans, so, even here, I am having an influence....)
The second issue, and I have mentioned this before, about the OE Lido is that the settings, or stops, on the two rings, are not numbered off. I have the sort of memory that would recall - effortlessly - that, say a setting of '8' is great for French press, whereas one of '10' might be better for a dripper.
But this thing is not numbered, and I don't fancy having to run to my computer every time in order to ask it whether I need to adjust the rings to the right or to the left to obtain a coarser or a finer grind. Anyway, this thing requires you to play around - especially if other sticky thumbs and fingers have adjusted things inadvertently in the meantime - to find the correct setting.
Sometimes (and the reviews get this right) the rings move even as you are grinding, requiring an adjustment - or-readjustment - of a setting you have already forgotten. Me, I examine what is being ground; occasionally, for one or two twists, I find that it is not quite the size I desire, which means that further re-adjustments are in order.
Do I reject it? No. Perfection is for politics (in my dreams, or in my youth when 100% in terms of the purity of the political position was the only sought or desirable outcome) or negotiations (an equally challenging outcome) but less so, for my coffee.
And, I want things laid out for me in the morning (I fully get President Obama's idea of navy or grey suits laid out and ready in advance - I do that, too when I am working); anyway, I don't want to have to think about the adjusting the settings to make coffee in the morning; I usually have other - far more pressing - things to think about.
The third thing with the OE Lido is the monumental effort necessary to grind the beans to the degree of fineness desired and required for espresso. This is the real reason I have more or less stopped drinking espresso at home; the effort and exhausting energy required for this are excessive. (I did it once, and swore never again - at least I can grind beans to a French Press or Hario dripper degree of desired consistency without collapsing in an exhausted stupor).
Anyway, I am now drinking (freshly ground) coffee from my Le Creuset mug that was made in my Le Creuset French Press.
...but she does it with such elegance and grace...
And eloquence and class...
Aw.........
Perhaps an attempt at a becoming blush is in order......
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I have immensely enjoyed your narrative of the beginning of your day with family… and grinder.
Just a few minutes ago I finished my own first cup of the day coffee. As I am running out of beans, I had to mix some Intelligentsia dark roast with some Blue Bottle medium roast.
As our wonderful friend @Scepticalscribe often suggests… one does what one must under difficult circumstances.
So, we sat with our juices and our coffee at the table, already laid with a nice Turkish table cloth, and with solid leather coasters and place mats (not that the latter were sold as such, but I use them as such) from the US company, Saddleback.
Sod the tyranny of cosmic seconds; it is nice (as I said to Other Brother, and he agreed) to take mugs of fresh coffee, and elegant glasses of freshly squeezed juice, and sit and chat and savour them.
Part of our chat this morning - over freshly squeezed (but not quite freshly enough) fruit juice (two blood oranges, a lemon and a grapefruit for me, and three oranges for him), and freshly ground coffee (but not freshly ground enough for the purists, that coffee took minutes, - minutes of checking rings, adjusting them, and twisting the handle in the desired direction, rather than seconds to grind, - and then spent around five minutes in the French Press steeping away and mulling over the meaning of life to itself while it blended beautifully with the water), with yes, (ah, well, how far we fall short of purist perfection) some organic (full fat) milk......
Anyway, we were discussing coffee. And coffee shops. And grinding and grinders, that sort of thing.
Other Brother nodded in the direction of the Le Creuset French Press and prefaced his remarks with the comment 'I know you like your koala caressed beans' before discussing what he thinks can be the somewhat disquieting experience of frequenting what we agreed are the fashionable, hipster coffee shops.
"You know these places where the customers work in someplace like Facebook, or Google, and are disgustingly fashionably dressed even at weekends when they are supposed to be off, you know, a good looking, slightly tanned, young" (he managed to lengthen the adjective 'young' giving it an edgy emphasis) 'but very cool clientele'. He thought a minute, and added, "All tapping away, on their devices. Not talking to anyone. Just being cool. And tapping away." He mimed that motion.
I nodded. "I think what we feel is demographic alienation," he added, as he stirred his coffee. "And, you know, we didn't even know the word 'demographic' when we were young." I burst out laughing. (But, yes, of course, we knew the word 'alienation'. Naturally, we did. We had read Samuel Beckett and Albert Camus, after all.)
Demographic alienation? Yes, I think I like the sound of that, and told him so. "Yeah," he said, leaning back, legs crossed, "Demographic alienation. All the young people, they look really - effortlessly - fashionable and cool and detached. And we are middle aged. And you go into one of these cafés, and you know, you sort of get the feeling that you just don't belong there."
Well, there you have it. Demographic alienation. But I reminded him that I was alienated demographically from my own demographic even when I was a teenager; I just didn't 'get it', and I was the sort of youngster who was really bad at being young, as I was someone on whom youth was utterly wasted. Basically, I was born middle aged. So were we all, both brothers and self.
Other Brother was also pretty alienated; he liked black and white movies as a teenager, - and still loves them, and has acquired an encyclopaedic knowledge of old movies - and used to watch them, entranced, in darkened rooms, while his peers would call to ask whether he would join them to play soccer.
Fortunately, my mother, an avowed liberal on such matters (she had immersed herself in the writings of Dr Spock) took the sensible and enlightened view that unusual hobbies and interests should be encouraged and cultivated, rather than suppressed, if children showed an interest in them.
Besides, she liked the idea that she could have interesting conversations on intellectual and cultural and historical and political matters with her kids when they got old enough to want to be able to want to do this.
So, we sipped our coffee and reminisced and discussed detestable fashionable hipsters, and their coffee shops, and alienation, which - we agreed - is not the solely preserve of the young (and do remember to elongate that adjective with a curled lip) when discussing this topic.
Sod the tyranny of cosmic seconds; it is nice (as I said to Other Brother, and he agreed) to take mugs of fresh coffee, and elegant glasses of freshly squeezed juice, and sit and chat and savour them.
Part of our chat this morning - over freshly squeezed (but not quite freshly enough) fruit juice (two blood oranges, a lemon and a grapefruit for me, and three oranges for him), and freshly ground coffee (but not freshly ground enough for the purists, that coffee took minutes, - minutes of checking rings, adjusting them, and twisting the handle in the desired direction, rather than seconds to grind, - and then spent around five minutes in the French Press steeping away and mulling over the meaning of life to itself while it blended beautifully with the water), with yes, (ah, well, how far we fall short of purist perfection) some organic (full fat) milk......
Anyway, we were discussing coffee. And coffee shops. And grinding and grinders, that sort of thing.
Other Brother nodded in the direction of the Le Creuset French Press and prefaced his remarks with the comment 'I know you like your koala caressed beans' before discussing what he thinks can be the somewhat disquieting experience of frequenting what we agreed are the fashionable, hipster coffee shops.
"You know these places where the customers work in someplace like Facebook, or Google, and are disgustingly fashionably dressed even at weekends when they are supposed to be off, you know, a good looking, slightly tanned, young" (he managed to lengthen the adjective 'young' giving it an edgy emphasis) 'but very cool clientele'. He thought a minute, and added, "All tapping away, on their devices. Not talking to anyone. Just being cool. And tapping away." He mimed that motion.
I nodded. "I think what we feel is demographic alienation," he added, as he stirred his coffee. "And, you know, we didn't even know the word 'demographic' when we were young." I burst out laughing. (But, yes, of course, we knew the word 'alienation'. Naturally, we did. We had read Samuel Beckett and Albert Camus, after all.)
Demographic alienation? Yes, I think I like the sound of that, and told him so. "Yeah," he said, leaning back, legs crossed, "Demographic alienation. All the young people, they look really - effortlessly - fashionable and cool and detached. And we are middle aged. And you go into one of these cafés, and you know, you sort of get the feeling that you just don't belong there."
Well, there you have it. Demographic alienation. But I reminded him that I was alienated demographically from my own demographic even when I was a teenager; I just didn't 'get it', and I was the sort of youngster who was really bad at being young, as I was someone on whom youth was utterly wasted. Basically, I was born middle aged. So were we all, both brothers and self.
Other Brother was also pretty alienated; he liked black and white movies as a teenager, - and still loves them, and has acquired an encyclopaedic knowledge of old movies - and used to watch them, entranced, in darkened rooms, while his peers would call to ask whether he would join them to play soccer.
Fortunately, my mother, an avowed liberal on such matters (she had immersed herself in the writings of Dr Spock) took the sensible and enlightened view that unusual hobbies and interests should be encouraged and cultivated, rather than suppressed, if children showed an interest in them.
Besides, she liked the idea that she could have interesting conversations on intellectual and cultural and historical and political matters with her kids when they got old enough to want to be able to want to do this.
So, we sipped our coffee and reminisced and discussed detestable fashionable hipsters, and their coffee shops, and alienation, which - we agreed - is not the solely preserve of the young (and do remember to elongate that adjective with a curled lip) when discussing this topic.
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I have eyed Kenya for a while but never grab any. Thanks to you I had Starbucks do a
pour-over using it, tastes equally as good as its aroma. Will be on my rotation now!
Thank you!
I like your mother's view on hobbies. Also, monkey caressed coffee beans? Is he talking about kopi luwak? Granted a monkey doesn't consume the fruits...
If anyone is interested, my local roaster, Dessert Oasis, is running a 20% off sale in honor of them placing second at 'America's Best Espresso Competition' which was held in Dallas over the weekend. They have online ordering and only a few choices to choose from, but they are great choices.
https://squareup.com/store/DOCR
Use the code DOCR20 at checkout to get the discount. They're still offering the Kenya Gatina flavor which is what I've just about finished up and it is absolutely wonderful. I'm thinking about ordering another batch. The sale is good through Monday.https://squareup.com/store/DOCR/item/kenya-gatina?square_lead=item_embed
https://squareup.com/store/DOCR
Use the code DOCR20 at checkout to get the discount. They're still offering the Kenya Gatina flavor which is what I've just about finished up and it is absolutely wonderful. I'm thinking about ordering another batch. The sale is good through Monday.https://squareup.com/store/DOCR/item/kenya-gatina?square_lead=item_embed
Thanks for the heads up.
Is the Kenya Gatina a medium or dark roast? And with what production method are you using it?
I'm using the French Press and this is a "Light/Medium roast. Tasting notes of rainier cherry, apricot, and grapefruit".Thanks for the heads up.
Is the Kenya Gatina a medium or dark roast? And with what production method are you using it?
You may be interested in "ESPRESSO- Colombia Huila Bellavista -- LIMITED, Competition Espresso" as a darker roast. That's the one they used to place second in the competition.
Thanks for the recommendation. I'll put into my rotation.
Actually, I believe that he referred to 'koala caressed beans' to which I burst out laughing.
Yes, Mother was well ahead of her era in a great many things.
Thanks for the heads up.
Is the Kenya Gatina a medium or dark roast? And with what production method are you using it?
I assume that it is a light or medium roast; I have never had a Kenyan dark roast.
Sounds interesting.
Just now, I am sipping a mug of Ethiopian coffee, the beans ground by my own fair hand using that steampunk coffee grinder, the OE Lido 2.
As I am now done to my last (bag of) coffee, it is time to order some fresh coffee. A quick perusal of some sites shows a sad lack of Ethiopian coffee (though Los Inmortales from Intelligentsia do seem interesting, it is a gorgeous coffee I have had before, but not for two years).
Actually, I rather like the coffees from Intelligentsia - I have had some really rather lovely coffees from them; my only issue with them is not the coffee but the shocking cost of transportation.......to get said coffee to me.
Sigh. A phone call to the Ethiopian Coffee Company in London seems in order.
[doublepost=1465999845][/doublepost]Got through to the Ethiopian Coffee Company - by phone, I do like to be able to speak with a real, live, human being when doing this sort of thing - and ordered two different versions of Yirgacheffe.
And, on their recommendation, I also ordered one packet of what they described as their 'espresso' blend, which was changed only this very day (their website hasn't yet caught up) and which, I am reliably informed, seems to be comprised of three different Ethiopian coffees, a Harrar, a Sidamo, and a Yirgacheffe.
Actually, I rather like the coffees from Intelligentsia - I have had some really rather lovely coffees from them; my only issue with them is not the coffee but the shocking cost of transportation.......to get said coffee to me.
Sigh. A phone call to the Ethiopian Coffee Company in London seems in order.
[doublepost=1465999845][/doublepost]Got through to the Ethiopian Coffee Company - by phone, I do like to be able to speak with a real, live, human being when doing this sort of thing - and ordered two different versions of Yirgacheffe.
And, on their recommendation, I also ordered one packet of what they described as their 'espresso' blend, which was changed only this very day (their website hasn't yet caught up) and which, I am reliably informed, seems to be comprised of three different Ethiopian coffees, a Harrar, a Sidamo, and a Yirgacheffe.
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i just finished my afternoon cup of coffee. I had just received my order of Highwire Bauhaus blend, and tried it.
For those who enjoy a dark roast in their pour over or press, I would highly recommend this blend. It is not a very dark espresso roast but it is a very nice dark roast. As I never learned the vocabulary of describing all the subtleties of flavor (" apricot, gooseberry, potato, and just a hint of donkey hoof"), I will simply say it has a nice full body and a strong, declarative, flavor.
http://www.highwirecoffee.com/collections/coffee/products/french-roast
For those who enjoy a dark roast in their pour over or press, I would highly recommend this blend. It is not a very dark espresso roast but it is a very nice dark roast. As I never learned the vocabulary of describing all the subtleties of flavor (" apricot, gooseberry, potato, and just a hint of donkey hoof"), I will simply say it has a nice full body and a strong, declarative, flavor.
http://www.highwirecoffee.com/collections/coffee/products/french-roast
You forgot 'koala caressed beans' which is my new favourite.
Anyway, delighted that you have enjoyed your most recent 'dark roast', as you like rich and darkly roasted coffees.
Thanks...it was a lovely treat.
I just noticed that in the link it says French roast.
http://www.highwirecoffee.com/collections/coffee/products/french-roast
I don't really think that it's a French roast. During my home roasting days a French roast was considerably darker than this. I would say this is a Full City+, or perhaps just a tiny shade darker… but not a full French roast.
I just noticed that in the link it says French roast.
http://www.highwirecoffee.com/collections/coffee/products/french-roast
I don't really think that it's a French roast. During my home roasting days a French roast was considerably darker than this. I would say this is a Full City+, or perhaps just a tiny shade darker… but not a full French roast.
You see.....you are more than well able to offer detailed and descriptive tasting notes.
Some of the best stuff from Intelligentsia - the Los Inmortales, for example, and the 'Sugar Glider' espresso - had a lovely, luscious rich, sweet and balanced taste.
The Ethiopians I have come to appreciate have a clean, clear, 'bright' note that I really like.
However, I have come to realise that I don't like excessively dark roasts, especially those bitter, 'muddy' tasting coffees.
Nevertheless, it is a journey. If someone had said to me four years ago that my coffee of choice would be relatively lightly roasted Ethiopian varietals, (especially when my marked preferences were some of the coffees from Central & south America), I would have dismissed them completely as deluded and possibly deranged.
But, yet, for all of that, I am more than happy to swoop on a tin of LavAzza - with boundless gratitude - in some of the crazy places in which I work and have worked; context is everything.....
Sugar Gilder sounds fine and all, but I'd love me some gooseberry-potato-donkey-hoof coffee.
I think that the point is that Intelligentsia offer coffees that are strong, and smooth and sweet.....a combination I really rather like.
Some of the more tannic, 'muddy', over-roasted, bitter coffees - to be frank - require sugar to make them, um, a bit more palatable. I liked the 'smoothness' of the stuff that Intelligentsia offered - and the strength and sweetness were both an added bonus.
Ah, yes. Kopi Luwak. Hm.
Let us try not to go there.....although Decent Brother did get me some, oh, ages ago.....
Now, to something entirely different, a matter which I earnestly hope may prod the 'coffee curiosity' centre of the caffeine addict's brain - a query, which, most unfairly, I tossed in the direction of @JamesMike - who deserves better - in a different thread (Let's Have A Drink! What Are You Having?) and, indeed, different sub-forum, earlier this evening:
So, now, my next challenge is to find a coffee bean that will blend well with my Ethiopians (we are entering into that part of the year when Ethiopian coffee becomes just that bit harder to obtain).
While I have tried blends of Brazilian and Ethiopian (overpowering - that is, the Brazilian assassinates the Ethiopian), and while I do like some of the less aggressive Central & South Americans, - such as coffees from Costa Rica, or Colombia, or El Salvador, my gut - and palate - suggests that Africa would pair better with African.
What do you think, or have you any suggestions you might like to offer? You are familiar with coffees from the region. Would Kenyan, or Rwandan blend well with Ethiopian?
While I have played with blending experiments, the best I have managed to date (Ethiopian is pretty lightly roasted) have tended to be a blend of two thirds Ethiopian (sometimes, two different Ethiopians) to one third something else.
So, fellow coffee maniacs, what thoughts, ideas, suggestions might some of you have as to what coffees might blend well (as in support, enhance, lend strength to, but not overpower, suppress or annihilate) Ethiopian coffees.....
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HEY! HEY!
Great to see you back!
You are greatly missed, good friend.
Please accept my sincerest wishes that you are doing well.
Great to see you back!
You are greatly missed, good friend.
Please accept my sincerest wishes that you are doing well.