Daniel of Arabica

The temperature debate is going on at Twitter right now

Nicholas Cho (@NickCho)
8/31/10 9:54 AM
@TimStyles @barismo @Tonx Oh yeah?!?

Tim Styles (@TimStyles)
8/31/10 9:50 AM
@barismo @Tonx busted this one wide open a few days ago. Temperature doesn't matter.

Jaime van Schyndel (@barismo)
8/31/10 9:43 AM
Why do we simply ignore temperature when all this discussion rages on about v60?

Posted 1 day ago by Daniel Markham

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The view from the back at @remedyoakland

Posted 2 days ago by Daniel Markham

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26 grams – panic in the morning

INT. BEDROOM - EARLY MORNING

The silence of the early morning is pierced by the sound of an alarm clock.

DAN sluggishly begins to move. He rolls his body toward the sound of the alarm, reaches out and with an experienced, well-aimed but still blunt and fumbling paw at the darkness, brings his hand down hard on the source of the alarm, activating the snooze.

NINE MINUTES LATER

BEEP, BEEP, BEEP – BEEP, BEEP, BEEP. The alarm goes off again and, with the same lumbering swing DAN again hits his target, temporarily disabling the alarm.

NINE MORE MINUTES PASS

BEEP, BEEP, BEEP – BEEP, BEEP, BEEP. Once again the alarm sounds and DAN, reluctant to awaken, snoozes the alarm yet again.

ANOTHER NINE MINUTES...

BEEP, BEEP, BEEP – BEEP, BEEP, BEEP.

DAN lies motionless on his back in the darkness as the alarm continues to sound over and over again.

BEEP, BEEP, BEEP – BEEP, BEEP, BEEP.

Nothing else on his body moves – not his arm ... not his foot ... not his head – nothing except his eyelids. His eyelids, in fact, shoot open, seemingly by force and remain wide open as he attempts to force himself awake.

BEEP, BEEP, BEEP – BEEP, BEEP, BEEP.

DAN rolls over and definitively shuts the alarm off. Now he's awake.

DAN (TO HIMSELF)

Shit. I was going to hit up Modern for a cup of coffee. It's a no-go now. Why can't I just wake up with the damn alarm?

DAN Sighs. He sits on the edge of the bed in the darkness and in a small fit of self-loathing, initially laments his lack of discipline and the various and sundry negative effects it has on his life. Soon, though, his mood brightens.

DAN (TO HIMSELF)

Well. I guess I'll just take this opportunity to make a cup myself. I'll mess with the V60. I did, after all, want to try that long pre-infusion technique I read about on Twitter. And I still have some of the El Salvador I got from Flying Goat left. This'll be good.

DAN fondly recalls the his trip to Santa Rosa – his nephew'a fifth birthday party, his happening upon an old coworker at Flying Goat and the recommendation he received for the El Sal.

He gladly recalls the crisp acidity of the "Siberia" El Salvador that he has noticed on other occasions. He remembers the distinct nuttiness he found in the aroma, the heavy jamminess in both the body and the aroma and the refreshingly dry finish. He does this sort of thing often with other coffees and other memories. The anticipation of the aesthetic and sensory experience of brewing good coffee and the joy of experimentation ib trying new brewing techniques is often what gets him up in the morning.

With that, DAN rises from the bed, turns on the light, puts on his clothes and heads out to the kitchen.

INT. KITCHEN

It's still early morning. The light isn't yet peeking out over the horizon but the sky is beginning to lighten, slowly transitioning from an inky black flecked with bright pins of light, to a flat, dark blue.

DAN walks to the cupboard and pulls the bag of El Salvador out of the cupboard.

Surprised, he marks its lightness.

A twinge of panic swells inside him.

DAN (TO HIMSELF)

Do I not have enough? Wait-wait-wait, how much do I need again?

DAN's formerly brightened mood is on the wane as he fumbles through the interface on his iPhone looking for the note where he has recorded all of his brewing information. He was really looking forward to messing with the long pre-infusion technique and now...

He finds the note and frantically scans the document for the information he needs.

He finds it.

DAN (TO HIMSELF)

26 grams! Alright.

He grabs a bowl, places it on the scale, tares the weight, opens the bag and begins to pour the beans.

As the beans fall into the bowl – TINK ... TINK ... TINK, TINK, TINK ... TACK, TACK, TACK-TACK – DAN is like a man addicted to betting at a horse track, the one with the his betting tickets crumpled into his fist, with the beads of sweat rolling down his face, with the arms set level at his sides, fists pumping the air, attempting to will his horse to victory with the sheer force of his voice.

DAN (TO HIMSELF, THE SCALE AND THE BEANS)

Cuuuuummmmm-awwwwwnnnnnnn 26!

DAN's eyes dart quickly from the volume of beans growing in the bowl to the scale's readout – which is slowly climbing up – and back again, and to the beans, to the scale, beans, scale, beans, scale...

It's a race between the emptying bag and the slowly rising number on the scale's readout.

TACK, TACK, TACK-TACK...

...TACK, TACK, TACK-TACK.

TACK.

The sound of the beans falling into the bowl abruptly ends as the bag falls empty.

All of the beans that were in the bag are now sitting in the bowl.

There is a distinct silence. Everything seems to slow as DAN's eyes slowly fall, for a final time, toward the scale's digital readout.

He needs just 26 grams...

DAN pumps his fist in the air.

DAN (TO HIMSELF ... THE SCALE AND THE BEANS)

Yes!

His mood restored, DAN brews up a batch of the El Salvador, using the long pre-infusion method to great effect – it deepens the nuttiness and the jammy notes in the aroma and the body, leaving the crispness intact.

The sun rises, victoriously vanquishing the darkness from the sky.

Posted 3 days ago by Daniel Markham

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@eatsdrinks and @danielofarabica sittin' in a tree...

I have a split Internet personality. It's for good reason. There's nothing I hate more when I am looking for something to read on the 'tubes than a blog that can't decide what it is or what it wants to talk about. I'm definitely interetsed in your latest food escapade or coffee find. Not so much with your roommate troubles or how depressed you've been feeling lately. Or should I say, it's not that each those things couldn't make for interesting reading — it really just matters how well you present it and the quality of the writing — but I'm not interested in seeing them all jumbled together in the same space.

Let me ask you this: what if you're favorite coffee bar started selling bags of potpourri and boxes of Nag Champa or what if that crazy-awesome inventive cocktail joint you found last weekend decided it would be a good idea to hold, say, a prayer meeting a couple days a week as well (not that I have anything against religion, mind you) and then what if they thought it might be lucrative, now that the've got you there, to sell you memberships to say ... I don't know ... a health club. Over the bar. Every time they took your order. Would you go back? Does it sound like they respect you as a customer? How would your respect for them and what they did change in the face of so many disparate offerings? I think I know the answer. At least, I know how I would answer.

What can I say, I appreciate focus.

Read the rest of this post »

Posted 4 days ago by Daniel Markham

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Ecco's Kenya Kangocho — @moderncoffee reserve

Kenyas are so good this year. This is one of the special ones. So much concentrated fruit. Full report later.

Posted 5 days ago by Daniel Markham

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@moderncoffee tasting — @templecoffee & @Sightglass

My favorite? Temple's Guatemala Hunapú.

Posted 5 days ago by Daniel Markham

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5 shops to remember next time we take another coffee-flavored vacation to Portland

The last time m'lady and I took a trip to Portland the coffee scene was all about one company: Stumptown. Stumptown downtown, the Stumptown annex and it's conjoined café and birthed shortly after we left, the Stumptown Ace Hotel.

Well there's much more to Portland now. Portland Monthly highlights just a fraction of the stellar coffee PDX has to offer in its piece highlighting some of the smaller, exceedingly boutique roasters that have sprung up to offer a bit of "friendly competition" to ol' Stumpy.

Posted 6 days ago by Daniel Markham

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Iced Hario & the DJ cone spin

Thanks to Mr. Bradley Allen for linking – à la his Twitter – to Barefoot Coffee's method of brewing up single-serving cups of iced coffee off the Hario V60. I have a soft-spot for anyone who gives iced coffee its due as a respectable and delicious way to imbibe high quality coffee on a hot summer day.

Brewed properly and using the right coffee it's absolutely delicious and certainly pays respect to the bean. It's the "brewed properly" part of the equation that I expect will be debated between the various purveyors and fans of good coffee. As expected. May the best method win. I've been a fan of cold-brew but I'm open.

I have yet to attempt Barefoot's method but when I do I'll make every attempt at divulging the details of my experience either here and/or via my Twitter-stream.

Now if I could only find out what a "DJ cone spin" is, then my life might be complete.

Posted 7 days ago by Daniel Markham

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