Archive for the ‘Featured’ Category

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]

Posted on October 8, 2008 - by deCadmus

It’s All Over But the Voting

If you watched the “town-hall” version of the presidential debates last night, you saw the next President of the United States, and a tired old man trying gamely to keep up with him.

While there was nothing especially new introduced into the contest — save for a$300B mortgage buyout idea floated by Sen. McCain that hearkened more to Franklin Roosevelt than McCain’s professed hero, Teddy — it was Obama’s bearing, stature and honest pragmatism that won the event.

Confronted with the question of how each candidates’ priorities would be shaped by the clear signal that our economy is deeply troubled, McCain pressed ahead with the jingoistic meme that, as Americans, we can do anything we set our minds to. Obama’s answer was more considered — and more grounded in reality — suggesting that we’ll have to set priorities, just as American families do ’round their own kitchen tables.

McCain didn’t use the opportunity of the debate to level those accusations against Obama in person that he and his campaign have been making on the campaign trail… whether he’s got second thoughts about slinging mud in general — or just in person — remains to be seen.

Me, I’d like to think Senator McCain got a brief glimpse at the future last night, as we did at home, and realized — finally — it’s all over but the voting.

Posted on October 6, 2008 - by deCadmus

Groupthink by Any Other Name

I’ll admit it: the usability geek in me is smitten with the coolest doodad of the political season, CNN’s live dial-testing of a focus group during the debates. There it is in real-time — the collective response of a group of undecided and presumably impressionable voters — swinging up and down with the pitch and inflection of the arguments being made by our would-be leaders on-screen. Powerful stuff. And terrible, too.

Powerful — and meaningful — if you’re a student of debates, or a political flack who wants nothing more than to slice and dice every mood-altering phrase, every cringe-induced twitch of the dial. Dial-testing gives you access to immediate, emotional, visceral feedback, without any of those messy social and psychological filters.

Terrible — awful, even — if you’re an undecided voter who’s watching the debates at home and trying to come to your own conclusions. Those wandering lines on the screen tend to suggest not only what other folks may be thinking, but what you should be thinking, too, even if you have nothing in common with the folks cranking the meters in their hands.

It’s not a question of whether voters should have access to every bit of information possible to make their decisions, but of whether the information they use to make those decisions is reliable and free from bias… especially from bias that they have no way to discern.

By way of example, this video captures CNN’s dial-testers scoring Joe Biden off the charts during a surprisingly emotional moment of the Vice Presidential debate. It’s hard not to be moved by the double whammy of Joe Biden getting a bit choked up, and the metered results of folks’ reactions to it.

Do you agree with the folks who’s feedback is measured in this example? Doesn’t matter… you’re likely to be influenced by it, regardless. Which is… problematic, at best.

Posted on September 30, 2008 - by deCadmus

A Schism at the Church of Wall Street

I’m not an economist. And, despite all evidence to the contrary – my mailbox stuffed with offers of shiny new credit cards and cutthroat rates for refinancing my home, the glossy ads in the newspaper begging me to buy a shiny HDTV today and wait two years to pay for it – I’m not a financial Luddite, either. I can take it as an article of faith that, just because I see offers for credit every day doesn’t mean that there isn’t a global credit crunch, or that our financial system isn’t near meltdown. After all, who am I supposed to believe… Wall Street, or my lying eyes?

Wall Street has become, by most measures, a religion, so taking high finance as an act of faith seems appropriate, if a bit absurd. At the Church of Wall Street, worshipers embrace the doctrine that any stock – any asset — is worth precisely as much, or as little as the collective belief of the faithful, despite empirical evidence to the contrary. This willing suspension of disbelief has served the faithful well. It’s allowed them to create trillions of dollars of wealth, not out of thin air — not even out of water, or loaves — but out of debt. By golly, that’s a miracle, it is.

Now the high priests of Wall Street – Paulson and Bernanke, Greenspan and Gramm – have failed their faithful. The gods of finance are angry and demand a sacrifice – of $700 billion. No sacrifice? Financial Apocalypse!

I don’t know about you, but I’m not buying what they’re selling.

Of course good banks are holding onto their money and refusing credit to bad borrowers — especially when those borrowers are other banks who didn’t just swallow the poison pill of sub-prime loans — they gobbled them up like there was no tomorrow. And guess what? For them, there isn’t. Let them go bankrupt, and good banks — those with real assets — will buy whatever’s worth having at the fire sale. That’s how markets work, right?

Me, I’m going to go enjoy the autumn leaves. If you see the horsemen, send me an email.

Postscript: True to my word, I *did* go out and see some lovely foliage. Flickr photos have been updated, and you can catch the Autumn 2008 slideshow here.

Posted on September 28, 2008 - by deCadmus

Solsticity

If Autumn weren’t so lovely, we’d complain bitterly about her theft of Summer’s golden days.

Her touch is, however, so subtle… and besides, she brings such an endearing dowry — jewel-ripe, gold and ruby apples; crimson sugar maples, drunk on their own sweet sap; the pungent fragrance of woodsmoke and smoldering leaves — it’s easy to forgive Winter’s blushing, youthful bride her trespass.

Which is all a florid way to note that I’ve started posting my Autumn 2008 photos on Flickr.

Posted on August 14, 2008 - by deCadmus

Inconstant as a November Sky

It’s fascinating the things folks search for… and confounding. There are search phrases in Bloggle’s referrer logs that are truly head-scratchers: cyphers, bits of blank verse, and the odd, indelicate phrase that could make Bob Saget blush.

Then there are phrases that are extraordinarily specific… those that, when I Google ‘em myself, offer a result set of one. Take for example, the phrase, “a stray cat is inconstant as a November sky.” Now that’s specific. It’s rather a nice turn of phrase, too…  I’d forgotten having written it. But here it is, in this review for a less-than-stellar coffee:

The trouble with a stray cat is, that cat’s never really gonna be your friend. A stray cat’s got no boss, no loyalties and no apologies — ever. Oh sure, you might think that cat’s your buddy… but you’re kidding yourself. If a better deal comes along it’s outta here and gone, and don’t you go making the mistake of getting in its way. No sir, a stray cat is inconstant as a November sky.

Hmm. How about, “muscular, musky and oozes?”  Surprise… it’s not cheesy porn, it’s another coffee review, albeit one with enough purple prose to read like cheesy porn.

In the cup this is a deep, dark mysterious liquor. It’s muscular, musky and oozes languidly on the tongue. Its deeper tones are bitter chocolate, its high notes ripe fruit… very ripe. It’s slightly wild, rich, fat and funky. Not the fuzzy stuff of a monsooned Malabar–it’s far too smooth for that–but still it’s earthy and intense. The Bugisu has got the body of a Java, and while its finish is long and syrupy, it is decidedly not sweet.

As to the rest… maybe it’s Cuil’s quantum pr0n. If not, I can’t for the life of me figure out what landed them here.

Posted on August 5, 2008 - by deCadmus

Starbucks Stumbles, We Eat Schadenfreude Pie

It’s enough to make even Motley Fool cheerleader Alyce Lomax choke on her coffee.

Consider –

• 600 store closings (or 12,000 job cuts)
• 1000 additional job cuts at the home office
• a first ever quarterly corporate loss, and
• diminished expectations for the rest of the fiscal year.

But wait, there’s more! Remember Starbucks’ purchase of the Clover brewing system? How they’ve made this innovative brewing system unavailable to every other coffee shop on the planet so they can have it all to themselves? Yeah… well, there’s a little problem:

“…I’m standing in line at a hilltop Starbucks in Seattle’s Queen Anne neighborhood — one of Clover’s beta sites. I do a taste test: a cup of Clover coffee versus brewed coffee. A young barista tells me they’re out of the first two specialty coffees I request and suggests instead Starbucks’ everyday blend, called Pike Place. During brewing, the barista stirs the grounds into the Clover with a clunky rubber spatula — not a metal whisk — and pours the concoction into a crummy paper cup. I smell, I sip, I inhale. I can’t tell which cup of coffee is which — and neither is anything special. Is it the beans? My palate? After a few minutes, I finally pick it out: This coffee tastes a little bit like hype.”

Thus, even while we empathize with folks who’ve been cast loose from their paychecks (sorry, really… and best of luck) witness our collective grim delight in watching the coffee giant get its comeuppance.

Let me offer two cautionary notes…

Firstly, Starbucks’ rising tide lifted with it the status and visibility of a thousand mom n’ pop coffee shop and indie coffee bars. That tide may now be rushing out to the deep blue sea. Consider this a small craft advisory: those same economic factors that gouged a hole in the good ship Starbucks may prove rocky shoals for the indie retailer, too.

Secondly, some perspective is in order. About the same time that Starbucks was reporting its first ever quarterly loss, Exxon reported quarterly profits in excess of Starbucks’ entire market capitalization. Woof.

So, enjoy your slice of Schadenfreude Pie. It’s tasty… but have too big a helping and you’ll be sorry.

Posted on July 21, 2008 - by deCadmus

Coffee, Climate Change and Canaries

What’s the impact of global climate change on coffee?

I’ve had conversations with a number of coffee farmers — particularly folks in South and Central America — about what they’re experiencing on their farms. The stories they tell are of seasons off kilter: of too much rain at the wrong time of the year, not enough when they need it; of coffee trees flowering and coffee cherries ripening in increasingly staggered spans — especially among farms at varying altitudes –  making harvest more challenging. But still, they are simple anecdotes, these stories farmers tell… and every year has such stories. They are not, themselves, a body of evidence of climate change.

The report released by Oxfam this month — Turning up the heat, Climate Change and Poverty in Uganda — now that’s evidence of the impact of climate change on coffee production. And the evidence does not bode well:

“The outlook is bleak. If the average global temperatures rise by two degrees or more, then most of Uganda is likely to cease to be suitable for coffee..this may happen in 40 years or perhaps as little as 30.”

Keep in mind that the figures that Oxfam cites are for coffee production in all of Uganda. It’s more than possible — it’s likely — that coffees from premiere origins within Uganda could succumb to the devastating effects of a changing climate in only just a few years as they lose those unique microclimates that contributed to their coffee’s character. Coffees like Bugisu, the bluesy, saturated cup from Mbale that I profiled here a short seven years ago:

In the cup this is a deep, dark mysterious liquor. It’s muscular, musky and oozes languidly on the tongue. Its deeper tones are bitter chocolate, its high notes ripe fruit… very ripe. It’s slightly wild, rich, fat and funky. Not the fuzzy stuff of a monsooned Malabar–it’s far too smooth for that–but still it’s earthy and intense. The Bugisu has got the body of a Java, and while its finish is long and syrupy, it is decidedly not sweet.

From an utterly selfish point of view, I don’t want to lose this coffee. But you don’t have to be self-serving to worry about the devastating impact of climate change on coffee, because it’s the very same impact that will be affecting the wider food supply. All the world’s food supply. Crops like coffee that thrive only in superbly balanced ecosystems and rarefied microclimes are likely harbingers of the greater threat of climate change. Where coffee fails, tea may follow. Where tea fails, rice may follow. Where rice fails, well… two thirds of the world’s population may follow.

Like canaries in the coal mine, specialty coffee — and the farming families who produce it — may prove among the first to succumb to the hazards of a warming world. And if that doesn’t worry you just a little bit, it damn well should.

Posted on July 8, 2008 - by deCadmus

Can Howie Get His Groove Back?

If you’re a Wall Street analyst, you might note that year over year, Starbucks’ valuation has slipped about 40%. If you’re one of several thousand Starbucks employees you may soon find a pink slip in your pay envelope, as the company moves to close 600 stores, eliminating some 12,000 jobs. If you’re an independent coffee house owner, you may be sitting there with your jaw hanging slack, just trying to wrap your head around the idea that, when Starbucks closes 600 frickin’ coffee shops, the move shrinks its overall footprint by a mere 8 points. And maybe if you’re a Starbucks customer you’re just so over that whole Starbucks thing. Sure, Starbucks was the epitome of hip for a while, but then they became, well… McDonalds:

Twenty years ago, it was love at first sip. Like every prisoner of love, I went from downing one cup a day to three or more. How, I wondered, had I gone more than 40 years without a midafternoon break or even a “for no reason” indulgence?

Today those memories are like bitter, stale grounds. These days the breaks aren’t fewer but are often enjoyed somewhere else. That early Starbucks mojo is no more. My disillusionment set in about three years ago, but the company’s ballyhooed “Starbucks experience” died even earlier, killed by a growing bureaucratic culture.

Ouch.

Maybe it *is* about the bureaucracy. There is, of course, a very real danger when you grow to the scale of Starbucks — or McDonalds — and your stores light up every other street corner, shopping mall and airport concourse. At some ill-defined point on your meteoric growth chart you may cease to become the sum of whatever got you there — whether that was a curiously strong cup of brewed coffee, a made-to-order espresso milkshake or  a Happy Meal — and instead morph into a massive real estate holding company that also brews coffee by the gallon pot.

Or maybe it’s something else. What with mortgage meltdowns and gas prices at four bucks and change, a spiraling economy has customers feeling the pinch, caught between guzzling a latte or putting another gallon of fuel in the family hauler. Call it — as financial self-help author David Bach has — the latte factor:

The Latte Factor® is based on the simple idea that all you need to do to finish rich is to look at the small things you spend your money on every day and see whether you could redirect that spending to yourself. Putting aside as little as a few dollars a day for your future rather than spending it on little purchases such as lattes, fancy coffees, bottled water, fast food, cigarettes, magazines and so on, can really make a difference between accumulating wealth and living paycheck to paycheck.

Oh sure… financial gurus have been offering like-minded advice for decades… but those were years that lacked the incentive of four dollar gasoline and upside-down mortgages, too. Maybe folks are actually heeding the collective wisdom of the financial set. Maybe they don’t have a choice.

More likely what’s got Starbucks on the rocks is a bit — or a lot — of both factors. Which isn’t to say that Howard won’t be able to right the good ship Starbucks… but I’d wager the course corrections are far from over.

And while Starbucks is thrashing, other shops –small chains and indies alike — may be able to carve out some new opportunities for themselves, provided they’re able to keep their focus on the fundamentals: making great coffee and satisfied customers, one cup at a time.