Espresso Enthusiasts

[Shrink]

Ah, the coffee, of course. The coffee is what she described as 'gorgeous'. Ethiopian, freshly made, nice and hot.

The mug is the mug it was served in, the Le Ceuset, (along with the various adjectives some individuals have chosen to bestow on such a handsome piece of equipment), is the mug (I have a few of them) I usually serve coffee in, so the substitute care is well used to it.

This is what I generally serve coffee in. Unless, that is, someone requests the Stalin mugs, (navy, very solid, and rather striking) bought in the Stalin museum, in Gori, Georgia, which happens more often than ought to be good for our peace of mind.

Inexplicably, everyone seems to overlook the truly gorgeous, tasteful, and exceedingly elegant navy mugs I brought back from Stockholm a few years ago, which I bought in the Vasa museum, with Vasa 1628 and a small picture of the eponymous ship on the side.

When I offered her coffee, she accepted, saying that she 'had missed' the coffee she often receives at my house while I had been away.

I'd love to see the navy mugs if you can put up a picture.

Now that, I'm sure, is a real mug!

And, as always, dear friend, I am so happy that you are home and out of harms way. Enjoy your Ethiopian coffee in whatever mug pleases you and enjoy your time at home.

 

[Scepticalscribe]

I'd love to see the navy mugs if you can put up a picture.

Now that, I'm sure, is a real mug!

And, as always, dear friend, I am so happy that you are home and out of harms way. Enjoy your Ethiopian coffee in whatever mug pleases you and enjoy your time at home.

Thank you.

Stalin, or the Vasa?

Both are stunning, but in different ways.

The Stalin mugs (I had the wit to get two - it seems for some strange reason that they are no longer being produced) leave those who see them positively gobsmacked.

German friends - and colleagues - have shuddered, staring with mingled fascination, revulsion and pure horror, blurting out a sentence that is never completed but which invariably starts along the lines of: "But can you imagine the reaction if we had such a museum...which sold such things....for....."

They are exceptionally solidly built, balanced, chunky and grounded - as mugs - in a way that makes using them a surprising pleasure, have a pleasing heft - and are beautifully glazed - a sort of midnight navy - with a white etching of the monster (and his name spelt in white Latin letters - not, note Cyrillic - and white Georgian letters, the latter a truly incomprehensible, and impenetrable language and alphabet) on one side.

Meanwhile, the Vasa mugs, are, as one might expect, given that they have been made in Sweden, and hail from their very best museum - the Vasa museum is simply stunning, I cannot recommend it highly enough, six years ago, I spent a full day there and was kicked out half an hour after closing time - are attractively made, beautiful, graceful, elegant and downright lovely.

They are coloured an attractive and tasteful shade of navy.

Subdued gold lettering (and a small picture etched in gold of the eponymous ship and the date 1628, which is when the disaster occurred, the ship - the most expensive in history at that point - toppling over and sinking in Stockholm harbour on its maiden voyage in a completely becalmed sea to the stupefied horror of the crowds of onlookers, including the King and his court, who had come to witness the maiden voyage of the vessel) decorate one side.

Anyway, my phone is an antique Nokia, and my camera a Leica (the Leica M6 - airport detectors don't like it, - they quiver as it is made from metal - and you should see the faces of the security officials when they realise that this is a rather old camera rather than something more sinister; German security officials in particular, handle it with an awestruck reverence once they realise just exactly what it is) that uses film. So, no pictures will be posted online until I have the means (and have mastered the methods) with which to take them.

I did have an encounter with a smartphone - which was issued to me just before the election and which I used as a phone - and was surprised at how good it actually was.

Thus, I may have to contemplate the purchase of such a thing.

 

[S.B.G]

I ordered some beans from Whole Latte Love and used my reward points from the purchase of the Expobar towards it. My out of pocket total was $1.60 for this order.

The beans are "Maromas Orphea" and WLL seems to recommend them a lot, as noted in the video below, and they make an insane amount of crema too. So I'll give them a try and see how they are.

 

[mobilehaathi]

Came to work to find the electric kettle on the fritz. Frantic searching and a bit of covert action secured usage of another one in another part of the building. Coffee brewed. Crisis averted. Reverting to DEFCON 5.

 

[S.B.G]

Came to work to find the electric kettle on the fritz. Frantic searching and a bit of covert action secured usage of another one in another part of the building. Coffee brewed. Crisis averted. Reverting to DEFCON 5.

Whew! Glad you were able to sort that out; no ability to brew coffee is not good.

BTW, that scale has been working well so far, thanks for the recommendation!

 

[mobilehaathi]

Whew! Glad you were able to sort that out; no ability to brew coffee is not good.

BTW, that scale has been working well so far, thanks for the recommendation!

Excellent, I'm glad it's working out!

 

[Scepticalscribe]

The more normal routine of my life seems to be slipping back into place.

Today saw a few nurses and other carers call out to see Mother; yes, I could have avoided them, but thought it better to be brought 'up to speed' and so I lingered until the last of them had departed. This meant my escape from the house had been delayed by several hours.

After a haircut (needed), and browsing the iPhone SE and asking questions about it in an Apple store, I spent some time in a gorgeous coffee shop this afternoon, - my young wine manager yesterday had instructed me to 'pay them a visit'.

Anyway, while in the coffee shop, I was advised - by the owner - to head upstairs 'to take a look and see if you like what we have'. This is the kind of place that ditched Hario copper drippers, "because they weren't good enough", replacing them with Kalita (a Japanese company) copper drippers instead. Stunning.

They sell artistic postcards, and Moleskine notebooks. And coffee. Some seriously good coffee. And chocolates - the sort of chocolates made by small high quality, experimental, chocolatiers.

Japanese kettles - with sinuous, swan-neck-like, slim, spouts - have replaced the Hario copper kettles that I had been lusting after before I headed east on my travels.

The owner explained that experiments he and his staff had conducted had led them to the conclusion that the Hario copper kettles poured water that bit too quickly, - taking a little over a minute - whereas the exquisite Japanese kettles manage to take two minutes - allowing the time for the correct 'blooming' - and allowing the time so that one can do this perfectly.

"What we have" is the sort of gorgeous coffee shop that lies in a 16th century building, and has a wonderful actual shop in the first floor (second story) up a flight of uneven, aged, winding spiral stairs, and a gallery - an art gallery - on the second floor, up a further flight of winding spiral stairs.

The shop has Dutch espresso cups, Danish egg holders, German brass pencil sharpeners (did you ever think a pencil sharpener could be an object of irresistible beauty with an enviable heft?), French floor lamps (sublime), an ancient (in the minds of millennials) - but top of the range - Grundig stereo turntable, and speakers - (once owned by the grandfather of the owner, I was informed by the owner) which was kept supplied by a large collection of classic LPs in alcoves on either side of this technological marvel; "Beatles For Sale" was playing on the turntable as I entered. Wonderful.

Anyway, I was subsequently informed that I was free to have (that is, buy) an espresso (or whatever else took my fancy), sit on the sixteenth century windowsill (or a chair), and play whatever album called out to me; Sgt Pepper's was winking at me, but the young Scot who had commandeered a place on the windowsill mournfully informed me that Revolver was inexplicably missing from its sleeve, and that the White album was nowhere to be found, having escaped its sleeve, too. But Rubber Soul was there, begging for attention.

Downstairs, various freshly roasted Ethiopian coffees fought for shelf space with Kenyan and Colombian coffees.

A place of rare taste and an absolute delight.

 

[Scepticalscribe]

And did any of you think that I escaped from that delightful, seductive coffee shop - a shop which plays The Beatles on a turntable inviting customers to play what takes their fancy? - without a purchase?

So: There was Ethiopian coffee - naturally - with the sort of roasting dates that would meet with the approval of the most exacting members of this very thread.

A Moleskine notebook.

Cough. A Japanese - quite tiny, actually, but enough to be able to attend to the needs of a Le Creuset 'fancy, schmancey, orangey schmorangey' mug - copper dripper. (But, oh, so gorgeous; it took special filter paper, I was instructed. Cue a further purchase).

The Japanese, sinuous, swan-necked kettle was waved slowly at me - 'the Rolls Royce of kettles' I was informed, - but the owner kindly advised that I could 'add' to my purchases in 'easy stages'.

We discussed grinding, after he wondered what I had; I mentioned my OE Lido grinder, and he approved, but while it is excellent for French Press and dripper coffee, I have found that it is a real pain to try to use for espresso, and, frankly, not worth the hassle, or brute force required for that sort of grinding.

However, the denizens on this thread would love this guy; when I admired his La Marzocco machine (a hefty grinder sits alongside it), he remarked that the grinder is much more important than the coffee machine, that it is possible to produce decent coffee with an excellent grinder and a mediocre machine, but not if the equation is 'the other way around'.

He plans to have roasters - and other specialists - come in to do tastings and talks, asking if I would still be around in late October when he plans to host one such talk 'for free' because he said he 'liked to do such things', asking only that I recommend it if I liked it on FB.

By way of reply, I told him I don't do Facebook, and am not on FB, and never plan to be, but that I am on Twitter, where - apart from self imposed silences when I am abroad for professional reasons - I will readily tweet about politics, books, food and similar stuff, and will happily lavish praise on anything that I like.

A very pleasant afternoon. And I asked about the efficient German brass pencil sharpeners, the Dutch espresso cups (exquisite), Danish egg cups, and, above all, the French floor lamps (gorgeous), not forgetting the Grundig stereo playing The Beatles, a sight - and sound - to soothe the soul.

 

[0388631]

I remember one individual who managed to get me to buy several coffee making equipment. No coffee this morning. I was in a rush. Also, dealing with some incredible heart burn at the moment and have a slightly sore throat. Likely a result of drinking many cups of ice water last night prior to bed. The Weather Gods decided to torture us mere mortals with 110* F weather yesterday.

Took off early from work. Not much to be done. On an unrelated note, I disabled the spam blocking on my phone and got a call within an hour. Had a lot of joy on the drive home tormenting the foolish scam caller on the other line. Then reenabled my spam call blocker.

 

[yaxomoxay]

Uneventful day. I woke up later than usual (6AM) with the PTSD of the traumatic presidential debate. I had no time to read the newspaper, but I had a chance to prepare my Colombian bean espresso.
I admit that if felt like a much needed medicine, for some reason I feel down.

 

[Shrink]

I remember one individual who managed to get me to buy several coffee making equipment. No coffee this morning. I was in a rush. Also, dealing with some incredible heart burn at the moment and have a slightly sore throat. Likely a result of drinking many cups of ice water last night prior to bed. The Weather Gods decided to torture us mere mortals with 110* F weather yesterday.

May indicate GERD...you may want to check with your doc.

 

[0388631]

May indicate GERD...you may want to check with your doc.

Been checked for that already. No... I still have some sore throat from the other week's minor cold. It comes and goes. Might be from snoring too.

 

[AVBeatMan]

May indicate GERD...you may want to check with your doc.

I have GERD and Barratt's Oesophagus. Can be horrible. Seem to suffer every few months for a couple of days or so.

 

[JamesMike]

Thank you.

Stalin, or the Vasa?

Both are stunning, but in different ways.

The Stalin mugs (I had the wit to get two - it seems for some strange reason that they are no longer being produced) leave those who see them positively gobsmacked.

German friends - and colleagues - have shuddered, staring in mingled fascination, revulsion and pure horror, blurting out a sentence that is never completed but which invariably starts along the lines of: "But can you imagine the reaction if we had such a museum...which sold such things....for....."

They are exceptionally solidly built, balanced, chunky and grounded - as mugs - in a way that makes using them a surprising pleasure, have a pleasing heft - and are beautifully glazed - a sort of midnight navy - with a white etching of the monster (and his name spelt in white Latin letters - not, note Cyrillic - and white Georgian letters, the latter a truly incomprehensible, and impenetrable language and alphabet) on one side.

Meanwhile, the Vasa mugs, are, as one might expect, given that they have been made in Sweden, and hail from their very best museum - the Vasa museum is simply stunning, I cannot recommend it highly enough, six years ago, I spent a full day there and was kicked out half an hour after closing time - are attractively made, beautiful, graceful, elegant and downright lovely.

They are coloured an attractive and tasteful shade of navy.

Subdued gold lettering (and a small picture etched in gold of the eponymous ship and the date 1628, which is when the disaster occurred, the ship - the most expensive in history at that point - toppling over and sinking in Stockholm harbour on its maiden voyage in a completely becalmed sea to the stupefied horror of the crowds of onlookers, including the King and his court, who had come to witness the maiden voyage of the vessel) decorate one side.

Anyway, my phone is an antique Nokia, and my camera a Leica (the Leica M6 - airport detectors don't like it, - they quiver as it is made from metal - and you should see the faces of the security officials when they realise that this is a rather old camera rather than something more sinister; German security officials in particular, handle it with an awestruck reverence once they realise just exactly what it is) that uses film. So, no pictures will be posted online until I have the means (and have mastered the methods) with which to take them.

I did have an encounter with a smartphone - which was issued to me just before the election and which I used as a phone - and was surprised at how good it actually was.

Thus, I may have to contemplate the purchase of such a thing.

I agree about Vasa museum, spent many days in it while I lived in Sweden for short time.

 

[0388631]

Well, you see, dear @Shrink has become what's known as a "mug-anista." He's far too cool for us with his snazzy toilet mug.

 

[Scepticalscribe]

I have meetings to attend today, and it is lashing rain interspersed with endless interminable drizzle.

Hence, ordering a taxi a bit earlier than usual to get to the train station, on account of rain, and anticipated and expected traffic. In turn, that meant delaying and forgoing my planned encounter with the wonderful Ethiopian coffees I bought yesterday, - time constraints - and deciding to arrive at the train station early instead - better for my peace of mind.

Arriving satisfyingly early at the architecturally attractive railway station, I decided to forego the very pleasant Starbuck's café in the station concourse area (yes, the coffee is horrible, but the café itself - in a nineteenth century building, basically a building constructed in that classical Victorian public style - is lovely) and treat myself to a double espresso at the small stand adjacent to the ticket office, which is where I usually buy my water, paper, and coffee if it is open.

Thus, a wonderfully robust double espresso - of the life affirming variety - the kind of thrillingly robust offering that my mother would have described as 'coffee that would put hairs on your chest' - was served. And it was far better tasting if somewhat less attractive looking as it was served in a paper cup than what I would have been served in The Other Place, namely Starbuck's, to which I added generous amounts of brown sugar. Delicious.

 

[0388631]

Yes, sometimes their robotic effort is rather good and strong. I have to admit I quite fancy their "blonde" roast, which is a very, very light but flavorful roast. And quite good at that! It has lovely botanical notes, bright but not acidic flavor and has a natural sweetness that lingers on the back of your tongue. I tend to buy a pouch of those beans if the roast date was within 3-4 days. We went through an entire pound satchel over a rainy weekend once. We read, talked and watched old films from the 1940s and 1950s. It was a month or two after they released it. Quite possibly the most miserable winter weather I'd ever born witness to in the US in the time I've resided here.

 

[S.B.G]

Good morning, afternoon or evening wherever you are.

Today in the U.S. is designated National Coffee Day. So be sure to take a moment and enjoy this great beverage for what it is.

I'm having a cup of "French Roast" right now and it's quite delicious.

 

[Shrink]

Good morning, afternoon or evening wherever you are.

Today in the U.S. is designated National Coffee Day. So be sure to take a moment and enjoy this great beverage for what it is.

I'm having a cup of "French Roast" right now and it's quite delicious.

Thanks for the heads up on National Coffee Day. Now we're really talking about a celebratory designation!

I, too, have just relished a cup of FP prepared French Roast...quite delicious says it all.

 

[S.B.G]

Thanks for the heads up on National Coffee Day. Now we're really talking about a celebratory designation!

I, too, have just relished a cup of FP prepared French Roast...quite delicious says it all.

I've found that most coffees leave an aftertaste and that the two from Atomic, the "Diesel" and the "French Roast" leave an aftertaste that I cannot get enough of. After I've had my espresso I find myself licking my lips, like a junky cat after some catnip, for any residual flavor leftover from the coffee - its that good!

 

[Scepticalscribe]

This morning, I have made a cup (actually a mug, an orange one fired in a kiln by a French company) of coffee (Ethiopian, naturally) using the dripper method.

I decided to try the new copper Japanese (Kalita) dripper, along with the new filter paper.

Very tasty, but it did take longer than usual to prepare.

 

[S.B.G]

This morning, I have made a cup (actually a mug, an orange one fired in a kiln by a French company) of coffee (Ethiopian, naturally) using the dripper method.

I decided to try the new copper Japanese (Kalita) dripper, along with the new filter paper.

Very tasty, but it did take longer than usual to prepare.

A copper Japanese dripper eh? That sounds interesting and is probably quite a nice thing to look at too.

 

[Scepticalscribe]

A copper Japanese dripper eh? That sounds interesting and is probably quite a nice thing to look at too.

Actually, it is absolutely gorgeous, which is why I bought it (and no, not cheap, but I love products that are both well designed and beautifully made).

In a post two days ago, I described the visit to the coffee shop where I bought it.

I am currently contemplating preparing a second cup.
[doublepost=1475148721][/doublepost]The lovely little Japanese copper objet d'art is - apparently - called a 'wave' dripper. And is currently playing host to some Ethiopian coffee, - over a French mug - and a slow 'blooming' as the water drips through the ground coffee, while I prepare a second cup of coffee.

 

[yaxomoxay]

Much needed 5AM espresso today. I had a very rough day yesterday. First a medical emergency for my kid (nothing too serious, already solved), then the transmission and part of the engine of my van decided to quit on me (they want $3000 minimum to repair it, car is worth $500-ish). As I called my wife to tell her that the car was ready for its demise, she answered the phone saying "Crap, the Civic just died!"
Fortunately in her case it was just a case of bad battery, but another $120 gone at autozone.

I admit, looking at the flow of espresso coming down inside the cup, with a nice crema made life immediately much better. Best things are the small things in life.

 

[Scepticalscribe]

My second cup of coffee went down rather well, and I think I can say it needed to, as silly little bureaucratic niggles (e.g. a blocked credit card when I tried to make a few purchases earlier today) meant chats with banks and so on to explain some strange travelling patterns and unusual purchases.