Bloggle

After 240 years of absolute monarchy, Nepal has ousted its royal autocrat and declared itself a republic, thus condemning themselves to an altogether new sort of political strife: shifty-eyed scoundrels who’ve been elected to their highest office, rather than merely inheriting it.

Good on them.

Some words of advice as the Nepali people draw up a new constitution:

• Habeus Corpus is a Good Idea.
• Executive Orders are a Bad Idea.
• Ban lobbyists from the get go. Trust me on this.

To mark the occasion, I’ve roasted up some Nepali coffee that I picked up at the recent SCAA expo. This is the first Himalayan coffee I’ve sampled, and I found some surprises along the way…

The Coffee

This green sample comes from Himalayan Java, and is described as organic, shade-grown on farms above 1100 meters, and fully wash-processed. I suspect at least two of these claims are overstated. The beans appear to be semi-washed, which isn’t a problem, really, nor is it unexpected; Nepal does not have a long history of wash processed coffee, and this may be about as washed as this coffee gets.

Further, the roast characteristics of the coffee really don’t jive with the 1100 meter claim. Mind you, I don’t doubt that there’s plenty of high ground to be found where the coffee’s sourced (c’mon, it’s in the frickin’ Himalayas!) but this just doesn’t roast-up like an especially dense bean, nor does it cup like one. (More on that in a moment.) I suspect the coffee is an amalgam of a number of farms, from a number of elevations, some likely quite high up, others much less so.

Perhaps most remarkable attribute of this coffee is its fragrance. Unroasted, the green coffee effuses jasmine and sweet tobacco notes. (Stunningly so. I actually stepped away from the roaster to track down my better half, and thrust a mess of green coffee in her face saying, “Here… smell this!” After being assured this wasn’t some kind of “pull my finger” trick she acquiesced, and agreed that the fragrance was qute remarkable, and would I mind if she might now finish the dishes, thank-you-very-much.)

Much of this aroma remains through the roast, muted somewhat, and muddied, too, by some subtle ashy notes, despite my applying the heat rather gingerly. In the cup were notes of chocolate, subtle spice (cardamom, in particular) and some rustic fruit and earth flavors, all wrapped in a fairly mild body, and with virtually no acidity at all (which — rightly or wrongly — I take to be another sign that this coffee wasn’t grown at particularly great altitude.) It cups, in short, much like an Indian Mysore, as much as any origin I’ve tasted.

All in all, an interesting bean, with some distinctive attributes (that aroma!) that with some nurturing, some winnowing and some care might make a name for itself some day.

Much like Nepal, itself, this coffee’s story is still being written.

No Comments »

Or, how I spent my time at the 2008 SCAA conference and expo.

Day 1. Depart Burlington International and arrive at LaGuardia. Hike between terminals to change airlines. Send a prayer winging to the airline gods that my luggage makes the same trek. It does, but at a cost… as I pick up my luggage in Minneapolis my back makes a *twoing* sound. [Oh, crap.]

Arrive at hotel and am shuffled immediately into a lovely cocktail reception with many familiar faces — and some soon to become familiar — from Green Mountain Coffee, Transfair USA, Sustainable Harvest, Grounds for Health, and Root Capital, as well as friends from origin: Peru, Colombia, and Kenya. Have exceptionally productive conversations about content sharing, and the like. Eventually I have to make my apologies, take a muscle relaxer, order coffee from room service and fall asleep before I can drink it.

Day 2. Do the registration shuffle. Am impressed that SCAA is *really* taking the “green conference” thing to heart… it’s the first time in a long time I’m not saddled with a worthless bag of swag and paper I don’t need.

Begin the day with a press conference featuring Green Mountain’s Lindsey Bolger and Dr. Jane Goodall. Save the day (or at least make the presser go more smoothly) by solving a potentially devastating A/V issue. Why yes, that is a spiffy way for a geek to start his day… I nearly forget that my back is out. By the way, Dr. Jane is just about the sweetest, most present person that I think I’ve ever met. [I’ve mentioned before that I’m a fan.]

Briefly visit the ongoing competition at the U.S. Barista Chamionship. Wow… the USBC has become quite the hot number: stadium seating, cheering crowds and a video crew catching every moment, and webcasting it live. Chat with Doug Zell who is hyper excited about the chances of Intelligentia’s barista team. [As well he should be… eventually Intelly’s Kyle Glanville will take home the top spot in the USBC.]

I ponder Kenneth Davids‘ questioning the practice of using a coffee’s origin as a primary key in the tangled taxonomy that is coffee’s sensory vocabulary. Determine that I disagree with him on many points. [There’s a blog entry in my future, here.]  Fail to see Don Holly’s well-reviewed A Brief History of Coffee because I’m stretched out on my bed in my hotel room with an aching back, shaking my fist at vindictive airline gods.

Dinner with Lindsey Bolger, Don Holly and Carl Staub got cancelled. Bummer. Briefly do the evening cocktail reception, sans cocktail… I’ve taken another little pill for my back. Sample a little Ethiopian food and a lot of Ethiopian coffee, while visiting with fellow [former] altie Marshall Fuss. Spend some time with Bill Fishbein, congratulate him on his “retirement.” I pass on Intelly’s shindig at the Mill City Museum to make an early night of it. Brew a cup of hotel coffee in my room. By the smell — somewhere between wet cardboard and wet dog — the hotel coffee is crap; fortunately I fall asleep before I have to actually drink any of it.

To be continued…

No Comments »

There was new-fallen snow on the summit of Hunger Mountain today — I think it’s Hunger Mountain… I can’t be sure; we flatlanders are notoriously peak-challenged — and flurries in the air, still, on my drive home through the greens this evening. Here we are, the cusp of May, and old man winter still won’t let loose his grip. Mean ol’ bastard. It must be time to take a break, and search for warmer climes.

How about… Minnesota?

It’s time for that once-a-year caffeinated spectacle — the Specialty Coffee Association of America’s conference and expo, this year in sunny [please?] Minneapolis. Maybe I’ll see you there… somewhere between the barista jam and the hotdish.

2 Comments »

In the wake of the Starbucks’ public makeover, and with the SCAA show rapidly approaching, there’s a bevy of coffee-centric ink (’lectronic and otherwise) flowing at the moment. Lots of publications are taking a look at their local coffee scene, trying to figure out who the players are — and discovering that the coffee shop just ain’t what it used to be. (Hoorah.)

Here’s a take on the Pittsburgh coffee scene (featuring the fine folks at Aldo Coffee, among others.)

“Our goal,” offers Rich Westerfield, genial co-owner with wife Melanie Westerfield, of Aldo Coffee on Mt. Lebanon’s Washington Road, “is to raise the level of conversation and appreciation of what coffee can be.”

You go, Rich!

Locally, upper-end coffee shops “have become a central place,” Westerfield says, for many the magical Third Place – after home and work. Priming the French press, Aldo, for example, brings in ska bands and steel drums. One church actually meets there monthly. “Coffee houses bring people together,” he says. “They’re oases of community in a city.”

Ska, steel drums and church groups. Nice.

2 Comments »