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barismo.com : Coffee, tea, and espresso

A focus on the barista from different perspectives. Looking at the future of coffee, tea, and espresso from a practical as well as a technical view point.

Espresso Notes: Poker Face and the EspressothonToday

Saturday, the 13th of December will be Espressothon at Taste in Newton. All day at Taste, there will be two espresso offered up. Noteworthy in that it will be the only place in town you can get both our L. St. and the new blend Poker Face pulled on a Synesso on the same bar. Mark your calendar.

Poker Face is a creation I came up with in cooperation with Nik Krankl, owner of Taste and a serious poker player. Nik was an avid poker player and a published author for Magazines like All In until his new coffee career began. It was from this influence that the name Poker Face came about for this blend. A mix of two vacuum packed coffees, our Kiandu(20%) and our Cardenas (80%).

In one way, it was a throw back to his father's success in the wine industry. An acknowledgment of his father's influence and deference to an exceptional wine his father created, of the same name. Much like the Syrah, this espresso has notes of berries, vanilla, and fruit but with a creamy texture and excellent mouth feel. Looking back before you go forward is something we respect a lot in our choosing names for blends and this is no exception.

Nik now takes this name a bit more literally. As a former barista myself, I understand how difficult it can be to read the espresso drinker. They rarely

Up and coming in ArlingtonNovember 30

Tommorrow afternoon, the 29th, from 2-4pm we will have an open house. Granted we are in shop 5 days a week, this one has a sampling of several coffees and espresso for the public to try.

Assuming the weather permits, the upcoming events are:

Espresso Dec. 6th 2-4pm
We will demo our two current blends, a SoE, and talk about methods for getting better results at home. The new espresso blend with the big story will be on sale during this event.

Hand Pour Dec. 13th 2-4pm
Pour over kettles, cloth filters, paper, the how's and why in methodology. Bags of the Pastoral will be on sale during this event.

Third Thursdays @ Capitol Sq. Open House Dec 18th 6-8pm
Cupping, brewing, and casual coffee banter. What more could you want?

No Flash, Thank You Very MuchNovember 26

Barismo Linnaean St. Espresso blend, originally uploaded by kuban111.

I am not a self promoter. I will not have a big photo poster of myself up on the wall in a cafe. I will never be associated with marketing blitzes or advertising eyed at reshaping the message. I will not try to trade mark quality terms or have slick websites geared at shaping the view of quality so it fits comfortably into our business model.

This is something I have heard recently from several clients. A surprise in our approach. We don't make it about us. We do our best to make it about the coffee, the preparation, and the resulting cup at every step.

I think it shows up best with our labels. The simplicity of which took a long time to achieve. A lot of back and forth about style points and functionality resulted in something I am very happy with. A sparse but very transparent label. Short on the slick stuff yet heavy on content and still clean.

Before I pat myself on the back for being all spartan, there is a direction to this post.

I want to say thanks for all the support we have received in the last two months. Nay, tha

Skelton Hand MillsNovember 24

Having run out of these, we just restocked the Hand Mills and they are available online as well as at the shop once we get back from Thanksgiving revelry.

For cafes looking to carry these, let us know. We have had good interest from cafes about these and we think it's about time we got more home users off using the bulk grinder and instead fresh grinding coffee at home.

The utility blendNovember 22

I never believed as a barista that you could really have a great espresso that was good as a shot and in copious amounts of milk. To expect this feeling to change when I started roasting would be a bit presumptuous.

At one point or another, I have worked with many different espresso blends. There were those that made good shots, others made acceptable shots and good short milk drinks, still others only seemed geared at cutting through a 16oz latte.

It has been my feeling that espresso should be purposeful not utilitarian. Roast for purpose. If we are roasting our estate coffees and refining them each for specific brew methods, why wouldn't the same apply for espresso?

To that end, the L St. is a straight shot. It never occurred to me to work with it in milk. The current version is coming out really nice as a straight shot but all the complexity and sweetness is lost in a lot of milk. It just isn't tested in milk and I wouldn't take offense if someone didn't like it in milk.

We have done more milk geared espresso before. Rudiments being one, which also briefly doubled as 'You're beautiful'. It's just a matter of a good match.

The reason this is worth posting is not a defense or even about an explanation. It occurs to me that all too often we approach coffee from the lowest common denominator. We, the professionals, ask ourselves how it will taste in milk with sugar instead o