Posted by TheShot on 03 Dec 2010 | Tagged as: Machine
Today’s Independent (UK) published a curious article on the history of the Moka Express pot: The Secret History Of: Moka Express coffee maker – Interiors, House & Home – The Independent. Earlier this year, we noted how the original manufacturer named after its inventor, Alfonso Bialetti, was moving out of Italy. But this time we [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 16 Oct 2010 | Tagged as: Café Society, Foreign Brew, Starbucks
It had been eleven years since I last visited the Azores. A remote archipelago of Portugal, this small group of volcanic islands — isolated in the middle of the Atlantic — is the very verdant-but-austere birthplace of my in-laws. Since my last visit, Portugal converted from the escudo to the Euro, tying the country more [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 12 Jul 2010 | Tagged as: Add Milk, Barista, Café Society, Consumer Trends, Fair Trade, Foreign Brew, Quality Issues, Roasting
Among coffee aficionados in town, quality artisan coffee originates with Origin. Opening in 2006 in a more modest space, this place changed the face of coffee in Cape Town if not South Africa. Since its expansion, it is now three transparent levels of coffee, café, roasting, regional Synesso distributor, and barista training labs. If that [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 08 Apr 2010 | Tagged as: Beans, Consumer Trends, Foreign Brew, Home Brew, Machine
In today’s, er, tomorrow’s news from London’s The Independent, classic Italian stove-top/moka pot coffee manufacturer, Bialetti, announced that they are closing shop in Italy and moving their operations to Eastern Europe: Rivals too hot for Italy’s classic coffee pot – Europe, World – The Independent. In Italy — where the Bialetti has enjoyed decades of [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 27 Aug 2008 | Tagged as: Home Brew
We previously wrote of our annoyance with the old and ever-popular yarn spun by wannabe personal finance gurus who constantly tell us we can become millionaires by quitting our daily coffee habit — or by replacing it with home-brewed coffee. For the record, we have a lot of coffee both out (as evidenced by CoffeeRatings.com) [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 21 May 2008 | Tagged as: Consumer Trends, Home Brew, Machine, Quality Issues, Starbucks
Yesterday’s The Age (Melbourne, Australia) published an article on the growing business of home espresso education: Short, strong grounding in espresso – Epicure – Entertainment – theage.com.au. The author noted how cafés, roasters, and other retail locations are creating “coffee classrooms” for instructing consumers on how to “create the perfect coffee at home”. The reason [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 28 May 2007 | Tagged as: Home Brew, Machine, Quality Issues
I’ve written both here and elsewhere on how the state of home espresso has both improved and become worse at the same time. While home espresso is mostly out of the Krups Dark Ages, its future is uncertain: super-expensive, super-disappointing super-automatics are now de rigeur for high-end home kitchen designs as a new format, coffee [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 20 Mar 2007 | Tagged as: Beans, Home Brew, Machine
Consumer Reports published a home buyer’s guide to espresso makers this month: ConsumerReports.org – Buyer’s guide to espresso makers 3/07. As with a lot of things in Consumer Reports, they often lack sufficient knowledge or background to offer educated opinions beyond winging it with what’s on the surface. (Well, beyond that and Consumers Union‘s usual [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 09 Nov 2006 | Tagged as: Beans, Quality Issues, Robusta
Decaffeinated coffee was once treated a lot like robusta: as some kind of crude, faux coffee that caters to consumers with the misfortune of a biological defect. But just as high-quality, expertly prepared robusta beans started appearing on the market from places such as India (for blending into quality roasts for espresso, etc.), decaf coffee [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 06 Nov 2006 | Tagged as: Beans, Consumer Trends, Foreign Brew, Home Brew, Machine
Here’s an item in today’s news: Nestle reportedly to open luxury coffee shop in Brazil – MarketWatch. In some parts of the world, Nestlé’s Nespresso system, at least on the surface, appears to be making money hand-over-fist for them. Part of Nestlé’s strategy has been to open up Nespresso stores in places such as Geneva, [...]
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