Archive for the ‘Featured’ Category

Posted on November 11, 2008 - by deCadmus

A Taste of Things to Come

Arrived home to find a care package waiting for me. Which is always nice.

A parcel from Jeff Taylor at PT’s Coffee in Topeka (you probably remember Jeff; his crew were recently awarded Roast Magazine’s Roaster of the Year) was sitting on my doorstep and — while I wouldn’t have time to do any serious tasting today — I had to take a peek to see what was inside.

Long story short — ’cause I don’t have a lot of time, really — just opening the box I was wowed with the aroma. Sweet, very sweet aromas; think rich molasses, or dark maple syrup. The culprit — the bean responsible for this just outrageous aroma — was PT’s Reserva del Mandador - Finca Los Planes Pacamara, a Direct Trade bean from the Ticas family’s Los Planes farm in El Salvador. All peaberry. All Pacamara.

Again, not time enough for full-on sensorial effort here, but this bean is sweet, warm and juicy. Very clean, nicely balanced. Did I mention sweet? Caramel, maple sugar… a bit of mandarin orange. Nice. Very nice.

Go get you some now… I’ll have more — and write more — when I get a chance.

Posted on November 5, 2008 - by deCadmus

Joy

Allow me to savor this moment a little bit.

It would be a mistake to think this is anything but the beginning of a long road that will be filled with every obstacle that an opposing party — and some very evil people — can think to put in our path.

Oh my, but what a beginning.

Morning After Update: See John Scalzi’s Reality Check for a bit more grounding than I can offer at the moment, myself.

Posted on November 4, 2008 - by deCadmus

Get Your Vote On

This started out as a lengthy post. But honestly, I bet you’ve heard every argument for — and against — both presidential candidates, and every other candidate down-ticket by now. And if you’re in possession of a spinal column I’d feel pretty certain you’ve come to one conclusion or another.

Whatever your conclusion — and whomever your candidate — please exercise the rights that were won for us all.

Vote.

Update:

I voted today.

No line to speak of in Williston, Vermont, ‘cept for a flock of white-headed old-timers getting chatted up by some of the local candidates over their thermoses of coffee (white, two sugars.)

No silly electronics to trip up the unwary, either… just fill in the oval with the felt-tip pen and drop your card in the tabulator. Sure, somebody could rewire the tabulator and make it count electric blue sheep instead, but there’s still all those cards with ovals on them… so no worries.

Oh, and on the way out, make a selection from the vast array of baked goods made fresh by your neighbors.

Ah, Vermont.

Posted on November 1, 2008 - by deCadmus

Hey… Nice pumpkins!

In the nearly twenty seasons that my wife and I have lured a parade of diminutive ghosts and goblins to our door with the telltale porchlight and a jack-o-lantern or two — not counting the smallish number of years that we were flat broke and could barely afford dinner, much less candy… or the time we simply forgot, and so shuttered the windows and hid inside in the dark — never before have I heard:

Hey! Nice pumpkins!

Let’s be clear… we talking about carved gourds here, okay?

Tonight I heard it from *all* the folks who were walkin’ their little ones down the candy gauntlet. All of them. Every. Single. One.

Even some of the kids thought they were pretty cool. The three-foot-high guy dressed up in a Tron costume — I suspect a parent who’s a major geek… what’s a kid that age know from Tron? — even spelled ‘em out…

V-O-T-E. Vote!

C-H-A-N-G-E. Change!

Hey… Candy!

That’s right, buddy. Keep things in perspective.

It begs the question, though: is it wrong to wedge a political message in between the cracks of a seasonal celebration? Is it crass to politicize an otherwise strictly non-partisan festival?

Maybe… but not this year.

This year there’s too much at stake. Too much at risk. And too little time to *not* get the message out there, to let folks know where you stand, and that you think it’s time for a change.

Posted on October 25, 2008 - by deCadmus

Ten thousand thousand fruit

The first time I really tasted apple cider…

…was in Hannibal, Missouri, in a park perched on the bluff of the Mississippi River. I was thirteen, and my freshman class had just trounced the sophomores in the annual October flag-football tradition known as the Turkey Bowl. Despite the flags, this was a grudge match: a hard-hitting battle that left most everyone nursing a few bruises, and the sophomore class nursing their egos for, oh… the next three years.

To celebrate we frosh toasted each other with plastic cups of cold, fresh-pressed cider from an orchard a stone’s throw down the road. I still think the sky has never been as blue, the air as clear, the oak leaves more golden than on that glorious day. And certainly the cider never so sweet and refreshing.

I’ve tasted lots of ciders since. And while none has ever matched the perfect, sweet cold essence of ten thousand thousand apples of that autumn victory — just between you and me, I can’t really expect any ever would — there are two that have come close.

In Kansas City, Stephenson’s was more than an apple orchard, it was a more than a restaurant, it was a tradition. It was where our family went to celebrate, where we took friends for an unforgettable experience, and where we only ever manage to save room for dessert once… and that was by cheating. Their roasted chicken was incredible, the beef brisket divine, the apple fritters addictive. But maybe the best part of Stephenson’s was waiting to be seated in one of the restaurant’s crazy, tangled knot of rooms, ’cause waiting meant helping yourself to the barrel of apple cider while you perched on a bench and marveled at the ancient farm implements and curiosities from ages gone by that filled the labyrinthine foyer of the old place. Sure, you could buy Stephenson’s cider most anywhere in Kansas City… but wherever you might buy it, it was never as good as the stuff that came out of that barrel.

Sadly, it appears that Stephenson’s is no more… at least the restaurant. I hear the orchard is still there, so maybe they’re pressing cider, still.

But I said two… and the second is maybe the more remarkable, for a number of reasons. The first is that Adam’s Apple Orchard is just a mile down the road from my home in Vermont. That’s handy in all sorts of ways… in summer months they’re our go-to place for fresh produce, much of it grown right there.

The orchard itself is sited on one of the prettiest pieces of land this side of the green mountains — you can see Camel’s Hump in one direction, the Mansfield range in another — it’s especially nice in the spring when the apple blossoms are blooming.

But it’s the cider — fresh-pressed, unpasteurized, unfiltered, unmessed with –  that’s the remarkable thing. It’s got that taste… of gold and russet autumns, blue skies and the oh-so-sweet, crisp, tart essence of ten thousand thousand fruit.

After Apple-picking

by Robert Frost

My long two-pointed ladder’s sticking through a tree

Toward heaven still.

And there’s a barrel that I didn’t fill

Beside it, and there may be two or three

Apples I didnt pick upon some bough.

But I am done with apple-picking now.

Essence of winter sleep is on the night,

The scent of apples; I am drowsing off.

I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight

I got from looking through a pane of glass

I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough

And held against the world of hoary grass.

It melted, and I let it fall and break.

But I was well

Upon my way to sleep before it fell,

And I could tell

What form my dreaming was about to take.

Magnified apples appear and disappear,

Stem-end and blossom-end.

And every fleck of russet showing clear.

My instep arch not only keeps the ache,

It keeps the pressure of a ladder-round.

I feel the ladder sway as the boughs bend.

And I keep hearing from the cellar bin

The rumbling sound

Of load on load of apples coming in.

For I have had too much

Of apple-picking; I am overtired

Of the great harvest I myself desired.

There were ten thousand fruit to touch,

Cherish in hand, lift down, and not let fall.

For all

That struck the earth,

No matter if not bruised or spiked with stubble,

Went surely to the cider-apple heap

As of no worth.

One can see what will trouble

This sleep of mine, whatever sleep it is.

Were he not gone,

The woodchuck could say whether it’s like his

Long sleep, as I describe its coming on,

Or just some human sleep.

Posted on October 21, 2008 - by deCadmus

Yes, Santa Claus, There is a Virginia.

Dear Editor—

Some of my little friends say there is no Virginia… or that there is a Virginia but it’s not real. Mama Claus says, “If you see it on the Internet, it’s so.” Please tell me the truth, is there a real Virginia?

~Santa Claus

Santa, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Santa, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Santa Claus, there is a Virginia. It exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Virginia! It would be as dreary as if there were no Santa Claus.

P.S. Maybe you should put naughty little Nancy Pfotenhauer on that other list.

Posted on October 19, 2008 - by deCadmus

Autumn 2008 Image Gallery

Posted on October 17, 2008 - by deCadmus

Joe the Speed-Bump

“Do you believe in the American Dream?”

That’s what Sam “Joe” Wurzelbacher — Joe the Plumber, to his legion of fans — asked Barack Obama on the campaign trail in Ohio. The story goes that Joe, an uncommitted voter, quizzed Obama on his tax plans, adding that, he wanted to buy the plumbing business he was working for, but… “I’m being taxed more and more for fulfilling the American dream.”

Meh. Not so much.

Turns out that Joe the Plumber… isn’t. He’s not a plumber: he has no plumbing license, never finished his plumbing courses, and hasn’t apprenticed as a plumber. His income of about $40,000 today is unlikely to put him in a position to buy that $280,000 plumbing business, and certainly today’s tight credit markets — largely the result of Republican political and regulatory malfeasance — won’t find him getting a loan any time soon. More, it seems that Joe already has a tax lien against him for about $1200 bucks.

Oh, and he’s actually a registered Republican, who voted in this spring’s primary. You betcha.

Despite the fact that in one day he talked to more folks in the press than Sarah Palin has since her VP nomination, Joe will soon be just another speed-bump under McCain’s Straight Talk Express, ’cause when pressed by CBS news, he admitted that, yeah, Obama’s tax plan would probably save him money after all.

So, Joe — now that your fifteen minutes of fame are tick-tick-ticking down, now that your bank account and your tax status and your failings as a wannabe plumber have been… well, thoroughly plumbed, and now that you’ve been tossed aside by your candidate, having served your purpose as a ready and willing stage prop in a debate — I have only one question.

Do you believe in the American Dream?

Oh! And also…

Last night, Sarah Palin said she didn’t want to talk about Wurzelbacher. “I begged our speechwriters, ‘Don’t make me say Joe the Plumber, please, in any speeches,” she said. After failing to properly vet Wurzelbacher’s situation, the McCain campaign is apparently now throwing him overboard and moving on.

Posted on October 12, 2008 - by deCadmus

Tasting Square Mile Coffees

Let’s face it. Right now the folks at Square Mile — Stephen Morrissey, James Hoffmann and Annette Moldvaer  — could phone it in. They could source dubious coffees, call them edgy, describe them cryptically while lavishing them with praise… and they would sell. A lot. At least until the hype subsided.

Happily, our world champion baristas and coffee tasters are doing no such thing. They’re sourcing coffees of great character — juried award winners and coffees from small, family-run farms — roasting them light to remain faithful to the beans’ origins, and letting the coffee speak for itself. Well done.

Costa Rica El Portillo C.O.E.

I admit to having a love / hate affair with Costa Rican coffee the last year or two. From where I sit, Costas have lurched in one of two directions, each at opposite ends of my bell curve of happiness: at the one end, bright, shrill, efferfrickinvescant acidity at the expense of all other character; at the other extreme, big, beefy and dumb-as-a-cow bullion flavors with no dynamic to the cup at all. The exceptions to these extremes can be found far from the big coffee estates on small, family farms… and — happily enough — the Square Mile El Portillo is just such an exception.

Balanced and round, with flavors of honeysuckle and buttery caramel. I find a burst of citrus on the front, and a dark cocoa surprise as the cup cools, and that honeyed sweetness and syrupy body throughout. This is a complex, many-layered cup, and immensely rewarding.

Rating:

Kenya Muchoki Peaberry

Tremendously bright, crisp, and dry with flavors of tart cherry, and strawberries with fresh-ground black pepper.  Its finish is dry, somewhat distilled and yet — somehow — suggests a candied sweetness. I’m reminded of a top-quality Muscato D’Asti.

The very light roast on this coffee makes for a cup that’s faithful to its origins, but the roaster in me can’t help but wonder if a bit more fire wouldn’t further develop the sweetness that dwells in this bean.

Rating:

Both of these coffees are highly recommended, and available now, at Square Mile Coffee Roasters.

P.S. It’s worth noting… this is two coffees down, and two to go. More soon.

P.P.S. Sorry about the marginal photography. It was a bit of a rush job.

Posted on October 10, 2008 - by deCadmus

The Reason for the Season

Caught a snatch of this on our local public radio station… and was delighted to find that Phil has posted the whole schmear at VDB:

…once we’ve scammed everything conceivable from everybody conceivable, we return home, the girls dump their bags of individually-wrapped emulsified chocolate out on the floor, and then, after fighting over any full-sized candy bars, they eat enough to feel queasy and go to bed early.

Which gives my wife and me a chance to graze their half-melted candy piles, fight over any Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, eat enough to feel queasy and go to bed early ourselves.

It’s a beautiful thing.

But the last few years, something about it has begun to bother me. It’s come to feel like something crucial is missing. Maybe it’s the fact that the candy and the plastic pumpkins appear so early in the stores.

Whatever the reason, it’s begun to seem to me that in our rush to buy and sell and hype Halloween, we’ve forgotten what I call the reason for the season.

And the true reason for the Halloween season is not to fatten our kids with Gummy Worms or to dress them up like My Little Pony – it’s to scare the living bejeebers out of them.

[Image: Troy B. Thompson]