Espresso.

Just the word can drag up thoughts of feeling jittery and super caffeinated. My foot is jiggling right now. Caffeine comes in most specialty coffees that you purchase. Personally, I never really bothered to understand what it was or how it was brewed and processed, I just knew there was something about that coffee I was putting down four dollars for that made me happy.

It wasn’t until it took like an extra five minutes to get my morning cup after ordering an extra shot that I really started to wonder (and yes, I ordered an extra shot of something that I didn’t know what it was. It sounded cosmopolitan). The first time I heard about it was during the 1991 film Hudson Hawk staring Bruce Willis as Eddie ‘Hudson Hawk’ Hawkins, where he goes on a very kooky trek over Europe in search of priceless Leonardo Da Vinci artifacts and a very coveted cappuccino.

Espresso was developed in Italy in the late 20th century and is produced with steam pressure. Espresso machines are like tiny little car engines with pistons that force hot water through ground beans. It’s a very delicate process where the water temperature can affect the flavor - cold water causes a sour taste, while hot water causes a bitter taste. Professional espresso machines can regulate the water temperature to ensure the perfect shot for each shot brewed. The brewing process creates a rich flavor of a thick texture and they are often “pulled” into shot glasses to maintain the best temperature possible. The process creates a concentrated liquid that is used as a base for most lattes, cappuccino, macchiato, and mochas and backs a punch with three times the caffeine content of regular brewed coffee.

Espresso based drinks have become increasingly popular in the United State since the 1990’s with the growth of companies like Starbucks and Dunn Bros Coffee. It has always been the coffee of choice in Europe, including Italy, France, Portugal, and Spain. In Australia and New Zealand, espresso is the heart and soul of the café and coffee house business.

In the United States, Seattle and the North Beach have often been at the forefront of espresso drinking in this part of the world. Seattle is considered to be the backer of the growing interest in the espresso movement. Larger US cities have been consuming espresso for years but it wasn’t until the growth of the chain coffee shop that main stream, blue collar America got latched on.

Now we’re hooked. Most of us didn’t even know what it was until about twenty years ago and we didn’t realize that it was the base in a lot of the enjoyable coffee drinks we have right now.

By the way, in case you were curious, in the end, Eddie got his cappuccino.

Bookmark It

This time of year starts to roll in the questions that come with the holiday season and brings into stark reality all the things you still have yet to do before it is family time around the house. Whose house? Who knows? Who’s making the turkey? Who’s making the ham? What about sides? And the pie! Who’s making the pie? Beyond that, how are you supposed to occupy these people after the football games are over and everyone wakes up from their tryptophan-induced naps? Breathe, I promise it’s all going to be okay. Relax a little this year because below is a list of five different coffees, their tastes, complexion, and best of all, what they go good with. So serve them up a cup, get them something to eat, (because I’m sure they didn’t eat enough when it was dinner time), and have a relaxing holiday season this year.

1. Brazilian
   The flavor of Brazilian coffee is mild and has a dry and spicy flavor to it. The aroma of Brazilian coffee is very complex, much like it’s taste. Buttery shortbreads or biscotti will compliment this coffee well. Don’t over doctor Brazilian coffee with sugar and cream, as its natural flavor is just as good, if not better, than all the sugar you can pour into a cup.
   Brands: Brazil Bahi “Conquista”
   Brew With: Buttery Shortbread Cookies
2. Sumatran
   Sumatran coffee is very heavy and full flavored. It’s probably best for the long-time coffee drinker rather than the first time consumer. It has an earthy aroma and is definitely considered an exotic coffee. Believe it or not, Sumatran coffee is best paired against salty dishes like roast beef or sautéed mushrooms.
   Brew With: Roast Beef
3. Java
   Java is another exotic coffee that is just a touch more mellow and smooth than Sumatran. This makes it a little easier to stomach as a first time drinker, but be wary of its high acidity. It has a very spicy fragrance and should be paired with soft cheeses (like mozzarella) and French bread.
   Brew With: Homemade French Bread
4. Mexican
   Mexican has a smooth complexion mixed with a delicate flavor. It goes down easy and is tweakable to your individual tastes without loosing too much of the coffee’s natural integrity and flavor. Mexican coffee helps to bring out the flavors of citrus. Things like oranges and apricots, whether in muffins, scones, or cookies are going to pop in your mouth when pairing them with a Mexican coffee.
   Brand: Mexican Chaipas “Kabuk”
   Brew With: Apricot Scones
5. Columbian

   This coffee has a strong flavor and a caramel-y sort of texture. It’s a very smooth coffee, rich, and a bit on the sweet side. It has a full aroma and is the most popular coffee choice in the world. This is the smell you need in the morning to drag you out of bed. It’s the taste you crave after a long day at work or a long night out. Two words: Juan Valdez. It was Columbian coffee that his face helped to promote. It’s best paired with less sweet treats, like carrot cake, so as not to overpower the subtle sweetness already hidden in the cup itself.
   Brand: Columbian Supremo
   Brew With: Carrot cake

Bookmark It

Here’s something I bet you didn’t know. According to Wikipedia, "caffeine is the worlds most widely consumed psychoactive substance" but it’s completely legal and unregulated. It stimulates your central nervous system increasing your alertness and can help fight against certain types of diseases, but is there a different between good caffeine and bad? What’s really the difference between drinking a cup of coffee and having yourself an energy drink?

On the base of things coffee isn’t really all that different from energy drinks as far as caffeine content. A regular cup of coffee has about the same makeup as a standard can of an energy drink. The biggest difference is the sugar content. Energy drinks typically come with about 30-50 grams of sugar per serving which can attribute to some weight gain and it comes out to be around the same servings if you doctor your coffee up with sugar.

Energy drinks have developed a huge following and grown exponentially in the previous years in popularity. Their popularity is not wrought without some drawbacks. According to a Texas A&M study, mixing energy drinks with alcohol can be dangerous because the stimulants in energy drinks often counter act the "downing" effect of the liquor. Doing slow allows your body to ignore your blood alcohol content levels. This means that the "feeling tired" part of drinking doesn’t come and you can drink more before feeling the effects.

Energy drinks also include the chemical guarana that when mixed with ephedrine or diet pills can be dangerous to your central nervous. The FDA has admitted that many of the ingredients in energy drinks have not been tested for their safety. Researchers at John Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD have recommended that warning labels be put onto energy drinks because of their high content of caffeine. Chad Reissig, one of the JHU researchers, made note that over the counter caffeine pills require these warning labels but energy drinks do not.

The most important thing about caffeine? Drink in moderation. Sure, there are benefits to consuming caffeinated beverages but in excess caffeine can cause serious health issues like osteoporosis and, in rare cases, fertility issues. Both drinks can give you that extra boost to get going in the morning or to get you through the rest of your afternoon at work, and remember to always drink in moderation.

Bookmark It

Stephen Morrissey from Ireland can make the best cup of coffee in the world. No, seriously, I’m not playing around. Stephen Morrissey is the 2008 World Barista Champion. No, he’s not a heavyweight or lightweight, just the best darn barista in the world. Since 2000, the Specialty Coffee Association of America and Europe has hosted the World Barista Championship, and has held annual competitions that have literally spanned the globe. The first was held in Monte Carlo and they have since been held in places like Miami, Tokyo, and Oslo, just to name a few.

Stephen Morrissey’s stage was set in Copenhagen, Denmark and he was only twelve drinks away from being named the world’s best barista. Competing against 51 other national champions, each of whom were set to prepare four espressos, four cappuccinos, and four personal creations to be judged by the seven- person panel of WBC certified critics. The twelve drinks are made in WBC machines like the La Marzocco GS/3 espresso machine.

Judging is based on on taste, cleanliness, creativity, skill, and presentation. Judges are certified by the WBC and approach their task with constructive and supportive attitudes, committed to the promotion of the Barista craft, and have two prior years in WBC sanctioned events.

Next years Word Barista Championship will be held in Atlanta, GA, April 16-19th. Competitors will come from all over the world, vying to be crowned the Worlds Best Barista.

Bookmark It

It is becoming a more accepted understanding that organically grown food is better than the conventionally grown stuff. Organic simply means that the particular food, vegetable, or bean is grown without using synthetic chemicals, like herbicides, and focuses on raising and growing the soil quality of the land where the food is being cultivated. According to the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardner’s Association current conventional principals of agriculture allows only air, water, and sunlight to be received by plant life and everything else is distributed by farmers to the plants, including fertilizer. This causes the plants to become very dependant on the farmers and makes them very susceptible to naturally occurring challenges like drought and disease.

Organic alternatives are available for everything from milk, cheese, and coffee beans. The Organic Trade Association reports that the US organic coffee imports increased 24% from 2005 to 2006 (about $110 million). The US is not the only country that is continuing to increase their organic coffee consumption; globally, increases are somewhere around 56 percent.

So what is the difference between organic coffee and regular coffee?

Organic coffee is grown in over forty different countries including Madagascar, India, and Bolivia. The leading exporters are Peru, Ethiopia, and Mexico. Organic coffees are certified by free standing organizations that make sure farmers are abiding by organic laws. The coffee beans are planted beneath the forest brush and allowed to grow the way that they would without conventional farming. Being grown organically also means that the plants are rotated in order to prevent the soil from eroding and all the nutrients sucked up. Organic certification means that it can be sold in different countries sealed and stamped "100% Organic." Third-party monitors come in and ensure that the organic companies are meeting all standards.

Organic also means that it falls under fare trade policies. Fare trade policies guarantee that the individuals working on these farms are being paid in accordance with the laws of each country. Organic also means that the beans are shade grown, because the best quality beans come from plants that are slowly grown beneath the trees.

A truly organic bag of coffee beans at the grocery store will have a seal on it that certifies how it was grown. When stopping for your morning cup of Joe, ask the barista if they sell organic coffee, and request a cup of that instead.

Give it a shot. If you don’t like it, don’t drink it again. If you love it…well, you’re just another step closer to coffee Nirvana.

Bookmark It

In 1475 Kiva Han opened up. It was the first coffee shop ever, and was located in the city of Constantinople (now Istanbul) in Turkey. There wasn’t any kitschy folk music, no college students on their laptops, and certainly no WiFi netwoks. In 1475 people were still learning how to eat with a fork and knife. In this day and age you can’t go anywhere without seeing a Starbucks or Coffee Beanery, and little coffee kiosks are scattered across large office complexes and universities.

It was nearly a hundred years later before the first coffee house was set up in Europe. Turkish armies invaded Vienna and left behind coffee when they exited the country. Franz Georg Kolschitzky had lived in Turkey previously, understood the value of the bean, and claimed them as his war prize. He also was the person who introduced the idea of filtering the coffee for a less bitter taste and adding cream and sugar.

Coffee houses really exploded in popularity once they started serving sweet pastries and treats to their consumers. In Britain, the first coffee house opened in 1652 and it was here that the word "tips" actually came to be. The people who would be considered coffee baristas put up signs that stated "to ensure prompt service". If you dropped a coin into the bucket your coffee would be ready sooner than the consumer who did not. Coffee houses were not the teenager and young-adult hot spot that they are now. It was a place for upper class businessmen, being called "penny universities" in England.

In 1688, Lloyd’s of London insurance company was born in Edward Lloyd’s coffee shop. It still operates there today though they aren’t brewing up the coffee anymore.

From Turkey, to Vienna, to Britain, then to Italy, Paris, and Germany in the late 17th century the coffee shop phenomenon grew by leaps and bounds. The British took it to their American colonies, and it had the same success of business as did the ones back across the Atlantic. The Tontine Coffee House was established post-Revolution (1792 to be exact) and was the original location for the New York Stock Exchange.

From there, coffee shops continued to grow. With the discovery of espresso came the invention of fast drip coffee machines and espresso machines., Coffee makers could serve more elaborate and addictive forms of the hot beverage that has been around for hundreds of years. Starbucks expanded the menu options by offering a variety of sizes, warm and cold drinks, as well as mulitple food options. Some coffee houses have expanded into offering full menus including alcoholic beverages with the hope that customers will come by for breakfast, get their afternoon cup of java, and stop by for lunch.

And there’s no telling-the next great minds could be sitting across from you, downloading music to their iPods and working on term papers.

As an extra treat, here are a couple of famous coffee houses from around the world.

• The Indian Coffee House is a chain of houses across India, most famous because of a revolt in the mid 50’s by workers who were put out of jobs. Now the chain is run by co-operative societies.
• On July 1789, ten days after Bastille Day, Camille Desmoulins jumped onto a table at a café of the Palais Royale and urged the mob to take up against the French aristocracy after a debate over the colors that should be used to represent the French Revolution.
• The first Starbucks Coffee opened in 1971 at Park Market Place in Seattle, Washington and now has 15,102 stores in 44 countries.

Bookmark It

Do you remember the Coffee Achiever commercials of the early 80’s? They were a short series of commercials featuring the icons of the day each enjoying a cup of coffee and being active and vital.  People like Kurt Vonnegut, Cicely Tyson, Ann Wilson of Heart, David Bowie, and Jane Curtin all moving to the driving rhythms of ELO’s Hold On Tight. They were fun commercials then and especially fun to watch now almost 30 years later. It sure beat the likes of Folgers’ Mrs. Olson or Maxwell House’s "Good to the last drop".  Perhaps this is an idea that could be revisited on a new generation of coffee drinkers.

Bookmark It

Ingredients

• 3 or 4 ripe bananas, smashed
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• 1 cup sugar (can easily reduce to 3/4 cup)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch of salt
• 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C). With a wooden spoon, mix butter into the mashed bananas in a large mixing bowl. Mix in the sugar, egg, and vanilla. Sprinkle the baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in. Add the flour last, mix. Pour mixture into a buttered 4×8 inch loaf pan. Bake for 1 hour. Cool on a rack. Remove from pan and slice to serve.

You can substitute banana extract if you want it super banana flavored. No need for a mixer for this recipe. Couldn’t be easier with less mess!

Bookmark It

Sure the top of a latte glass may not seem as daunting as the top of the Sistine chapel or drawing the rough sketch of the first tanks, but when it’s all about sticking a screwdriver in the top of some foam and swirling it around to make pretty pictures, I have to say I’m impressed.

Never once have I ordered a cup of coffee and given a second thought to what the top of it looks like but I think if I ever got a bunny or a butterfly, I would feel special. It is an extra sort of touch and a special kind of flair that goes a long way in the business world. Consumers are always looking for the company or person that will go the extra mile for them and take that next step over to make their experience really special.

Latte art begins with heavy foam described here as being thick and almost like melted marshmallows. Steamed foam isn’t thick enough to rise to the top to provide the coffee artist a canvas in which to work. It’s also all in the way the foamed is poured in on top of the coffee. From the video, it looks like there’s some shaking involved so that the heavy cream goes to the top of the cup.

From there, the artist takes what looks like a screwdriver and begins to make lines on the foam that slowly become these really nifty works of art.

Bookmark It

It’s strange to think that the holidays really are right around the corner. We’re still shaking off 100 degree temps but just around the corner come Thanksgiving and Christmas. The smell of that forever baking ham or turkey will fill the house mixing with the scents of apple and pumpkin pies. You’ll eat, then eat, and eat a little more, and after the turkey induced nap, you’ll wake up, want a little coffee to shake off the fog and something that is sweet and goes down easy with your French Roast.

And while pies and cobblers are a staple in the holiday recipe fashion here’s a little something a little different and just as delicious.

Texas Sheet Cake

Ingredients
2 c. flour
2 c. sugar
1 c. butter
1 c. water
1/4 c. cocoa
1/2 c. sour cream (or buttermilk)
2 eggs
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. vanilla

Preheat oven to 400 F. Grease and flour a 10×15x1-inch pan.

In a medium saucepan, bring cocoa, margarine and water to a boil, stirring constantly, over medium heat.

In a large bowl, stir together the sugar and flour. Pour the cocoa mixture over and blend well. Add the eggs, buttermilk, baking soda and vanilla. Spread evenly in the prepared pan and bake for 20 minutes.

Prepare the frosting.

Frosting: In a medium saucepan, bring to a boil 1/2 cup margarine, 1/4 cup cocoa and 6 tablespoons milk. Add 1 pound powdered sugar, 1 teaspoon vanilla and 1 cup chopped pecans.

When the cake is done, immediately pour the frosting over it and spread evenly.

Makes 20 servings.

Prep time: 10 minutes
Cook time: 20 minutes

Cake this wonderful has to be from Texas, right?

Bookmark It