i worked the last two days downtown. it was very cool.
two different types of shifts. yesterday was steady rocking business, today was sporadic, with the rushes being pretty insane. both were fun.
my shots seem spot on. it's always been my strength - and continues to be what i rely on.
my milk is getting better. texture is getting better (in part due to Stephen's training) and my latte art is getting much better as well. milk is hard if you're not working shifts with regularity i find - plus milk has always been my weakness. but i feel like the rosettas are getting more defined and more structured and there is more symetry in the design now.
and two different crews as well. yesterday was a cool crew, but today was a sort of all-star crew. fun fun fun.
and there were some good customers as well. Kyle and i both were pouring rosettas in macchiattos, which was fun, and then a guy came in and ordered one and Kyle poured a pretty damn amazing design for him. now... to be fair it was a single and to be fair i steamed the milk, but still it was awesome. and the guy, after drinking it, said it was the best macchiatto he's had in his life. very nice to hear.

out of the woods

i'd hardly call myself healthy yet - but at least i'm able to function again. it's a very nice feeling. i was actually able to keep down two shots of espresso this morning.

this has been a horrible cold and flu season here in Portland. i guess it's not just me.

we're starting to get geared up for the USBC and the SCAA show/WBC now. lots to plan, lots to do... kind of overwhelming really.

and a final note on the whole "machine/espresso blend/style" feedback loop thing... changing the burrs proved to be the big fix needed for my friend. it's always something...

oh... i'm home sick. i'm hoping that the sickness is cresting and not just on an ever-increasing ramp up of horribleness.
i'll spare you the details.

i've been worried for the last few years about the increasing emphasis on Latte Art. seeing things emerge like Latte Art competitions (where drinks are not even tasted) and training folks who really didn't seem to care that much about espresso or even millk flavours and just wanted to learn how to pour rosettes made me nervous that we would soon see a day where presentation became more important to baristas and more rewarded by owners and customers than drink quality.

today i saw the first sign that this is truly starting to occur. i read on an Australian coffee bulletin board a thread about the difficulties of doing good art when there is too much crema.
the solutions included:
- swirling the espresso in the cup first to break down the crema,
- working with old coffee (6 days),
- decreasing the brew pressure (despite the fact that this was noted as producing inferior espresso).

what really scared me was the fact that these suggestions were all from practical experience and were suggested as positive changes - without any noting of possibly negative "side effects."

of course... the idea that the effect is easier to pour latte art and the "side effect" is inferior tasting drinks is the whole issue in a nutshell.

what to do, what to do...

oh... i'm no longer fighting off this cold.
it's full blown now complete with fever.
i'm sick of being sick.
i know that it's just a matter of re-acclimating to the larger and tighter group of humanity here and the wetter and dirtier environment --- but it's not easy to stay positive.
sick people stay away from me.

i've been thinking a lot about the difficulties surrounding espresso.
in particular, about the inter-related complexities around creating and roasting espresso blends and signature style and taste and barista equipment, skill and technique.

let me explain...
here at Stumptown we use Mistral machines in the coffee bars. the Mistrals are fantastic machines - but they have some unique traits. these unique traits (to be fair) are in fact the reason why people choose the machines -- they're obvious improvements over the other options. in particular, their combination of La Marzocco style double boiler setup with pre-infusion results in a very different (and superior) extraction profile from what you'll get with most other machines. we run these machines at specified brew temp and brew pressure. finally, we are in Portland - which gives us high humidity and moderate temeratures most of the time.
our espresso blend (Hairbender) is forumlated to a specific flavour profile and style. it is a complicated, dense and rich espresso with nice dark chocolate notes, good fruit and a heavy mouthfeel.
the Hairbender is evaluated by traditional cupping and by production at our bars.
the other day i was chatting with a friend (a skilled barista) who was struggling to get the flavour profile he was looking for out of the Hairbender. he asked me about the brew temp, target extraction time, etc that we use. i realized that, given the equipment he was using, our settings were not going to result in a duplication of our flavour profile.
i suddenly realized that, when i was at Spellbinder, our machine setup, extraction time and volume and even dosing volume for the Hairbender was entirely different from what we're using here at Stumptown... but the end results were shockingly similar. and i remembered that it had taken me a lot of tweaking to get those results. i ended up running a brew temp that was almost 3 degrees higher than what we run here, a pressure that was about 3/4BAR lower, dosing about 2 full grams less for a double and pulling shots that were a little less volume in about 1 additional second.

all of these leaves me intrigued -- but also frustrated.
when our coffees are evaluated, even if the baristas are incredibly skilled, the results are nearly entirely unpredictable. about the only solution i can think of is to get our hands on every reasonably possible espresso machine out there and experiment to get target parameters for each one (not only machine settings but all the way down to dose, extraction time and volume, tamp, etc.).
and even then there would be no guarantees. there is a coffee expert who i really respect whose tastes in espresso run to what i would consider to be oily, over-extracted and incredibly acrid. his extraction times are regularly between 35 and 40 seconds for a double.

there is a feedback loop here.
the selection of equipment feeds the evaluation of results which affects the formulation and roast of espresso which is based on the signature style and taste which is dependent upon the equipment...
you get the idea.

oh... there is a happy ending to this tale of concern... because i'd worked with the Hairbender on La Marzocco machines, i was able to provide feedback for parameters and because the barista in question is skilled he was able to provide input about flavours. in the end things work out.

i'm fighting off another damn cold.
it's hard to move from the desert to western Oregon in winter (if you know what i mean).

worked another fun bar shift. great crew, some fun customers, minimal annoying customers. had to fight with the grind a bit at one point but it worked out.
it's interesting... i'm starting to realize just how different espresso machines are - always. all our machines are (theoretically) the same. in other words, same manufacturer and same model. they're all set up the same, calibrated the same and maintained the same (all by the same person).
but working with each one is very different. and what's in the cup with each one is very different.
where this is most obvious is with steaming milk. it's actually turning out to be very hard to switch machine to machine throughout the week and have steaming dialed. i almost have to relearn the quirks of the machine each and every time.
ahhh... the joys of espresso.

we rolled out new Rwandan coffee into the cafes. the Rwanda Karaba... really lovely. raspberry-dark chocolate truffle with some lovely vanilla in the finish. as it cools, the raspberry shifts towards cranberry and a great tropical floral note emerges as well. love it.