coffee?

[COLDBASS]

Originally posted by red-beard
Look at the coffee machine at work. Does it have a hot water tap off the side? If so, you are in luck!

Go to Starbucks (or Target) and buy a French Press. It's a simple device. You put coffee in the bottom, pour hot/boiling water on top, stir, wait a couple of minutes and then use the press filter to push the coffee grounds to the bottom. Bring your own fresh ground coffee in each day, or keep a bag of ground coffee in the freezer for a week. Far cheaper than buying cups of coffee and usually far fresher, than the swill served at work.

Please recommend a French Press that lasts...I dig the taste of Starbucks house blend in one of these, however, I have broken 3+ in the last 18 months...I've paid up to $40 for one and same results, they fall apart... (keeping with the theme of recent posts)...they must have been assembled by those damn illegal Aliens (Martians no doubt)

[Moses]

Originally posted by COLDBASS
...I dig the taste of Starbucks

Try Peet's Major Dickason's blend in a french press. Heaven.

[COLDBASS]

...Well I will once someone recommends a Mil-spec French Press.
This forum is my last hope for finding a high quality unit, If not, the old coffee in a sock dipped in boiling water method will have to do...

[Moses]

Originally posted by COLDBASS
...Well I will once someone recommends a Mil-spec French Press.
This forum is my last hope for finding a high quality unit, If not, the old coffee in a sock dipped in boiling water method will have to do...

Go to www.wholelattelove.com Shown are the Bodum Columbia press and the BonJour Triomphe. Both are stainless. If you can wreck these, the problem is with the operator.

[tabs]

Originally posted by Mule

As to the "gourmet" beans, the coffee business works like this. The buyer goes down to Columbia (where most top quality coffee is grown) & negtiates with the farmer for certain fields or maybe his entire crop. The next time the buyer sees the coffee it is at his dock. He goes throughout the ship getting samples. He roasts, & tastes all the samples. He then decides wether to accept the coffee & release payment or not. Next year he goes back to the same farmers he delt with this hear. Now what all these "gourmet" brands want us to believe is this: the farmer who has fed his family dealing with a particular guy for years is selling him the bunk. We go down there & buy 20 sacks of "the good stuff" that he only sells to us. BOOWLSHEEET

This ALSO TRUE of the CA Wine Industry....I once atteneded several Cigar Smokers held at Don Gallieno's Winery. Don's main buisness is wholesaleing grapes...his passion are his Sherrys and Ports..they continually win Gold Medals....What does he personally drink....his Jug Red Wines....why because they are as good as anything you pay the big bux for....

Late in the evening, Don deep in the cups took us through the winery with a flashlight....opening this cask and that cask, climbing up in the rafters to sample this and that..some he said weren't quiet ready....some we just drank straight from the cask through a plactic tube....and other he would crafe....nobody left that place walking a straight line....and the cigars were good to.. by the way....

[COLDBASS]

Moses,

Awesome, thanks. I am currently looking at the "unbreakable" model...

Yeah

[CamB]

Originally posted by Mule
Stuart, NO has great coffee. It is not an expresso town, but the coffee is great. Having spent several years working for a top notch coffe company I will say this about expresso. The alkaloids that cause coffee to be bitter tend to be relased in high volumes when the brewing temperature exceeds 180 degrees. This is why Bunn (the standard) and all other quality brewers operate at slightly less than 180 degrees. The brewing temberature of expresso (steam) is 212 dergees. This and the extra fine grind of the beans makes expresso significantly more bitter than coffee. If the little old man (or anybody else) makes un-bitter expresso he is indeed a wizard.

That's not my understanding of how proper espresso machines operate (although some espresso machines and stove tops operate this way).

Best info I could find quickly is this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Espresso

From the machine I used above (which is set to about that temperature), I can tell you that as the temp is correct, and if you get the grind/tamping right (and 8-10 bar pressure) then the coffee that comes out is far better than anything I've ever had from any other method. Its not bitter at all, unless over or under-extracted (too fine grind, tamped too hard, extracted too long - lots of things can go wrong).

However, if it comes from Starbucks while it may not be bitter, its still burnt (what do they do to those poor beans? it tastes like charcoal).