Posted by TheShot on 18 Jan 2008 | Tagged as: Restaurant Coffee
Earlier this week, the SF Chronicle ran a piece on the escalating coffee wars among area restaurants: What’s New: Restaurants brewing up gourmet blends. With the likes of the SJ Mercury News running front-page stories this week on the coffee war between McDonald’s and Starbucks, hopefully places that sell $18 hamburgers might try to outdo [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 13 Nov 2007 | Tagged as: Foreign Brew, Restaurant Coffee
This installment of our Espresso in Torino and Piemonte series comes from the very small town of Pollenzo, practically in the middle of nowhere. At least geographically speaking. But on the food map of Italy, this place is one of the country’s brightest stars.
One of the reasons is that it is home to the the [...]
Posted by TheShot on 01 Oct 2007 | Tagged as: Home Brew, Quality Issues, Restaurant Coffee
Today Bloomberg published an article about the latest generation of restaurant and home espresso machines, designed with the idiot in mind: Idiot-Proof Espresso Machines End Excuses, Target U.S. Market - Bloomberg.com: Spend.
Andrea Illy of Illycaffè has to be very careful not to speak out of both sides of his mouth. On the one hand, today [...]
Posted by TheShot on 11 Sep 2007 | Tagged as: Consumer Trends, Foreign Brew, Quality Issues, Restaurant Coffee
Today’s The Sydney Morning Herald ponders how Australia’s Italian immigrants could bring a culture of appreciation for some of the best espresso in the world, and yet New York City — no stranger to Italian immigrants — is such a puzzling espresso wasteland: Brew ha ha in city that falls short on espresso - Opinion [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 07 Aug 2007 | Tagged as: Quality Issues, Restaurant Coffee
It’s not just us — other Bay Area restaurant connoisseurs have noted the horrendous state of restaurant coffee. Today the SF Chronicle’s food editor, Michael Bauer, wrote in his blog about readers who suggested he could do more to play up the coffee quality in his restaurant reviews: Michael Bauer: Between Meals : Coffee talk [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 14 Dec 2006 | Tagged as: Foreign Brew, Local Brew, Restaurant Coffee
An espresso review for a restaurant where the cheapest item on the dinner menu is $210 may seem a bit irrelevant, but it is important for what it represents: a gold standard for food and wine. Back in September, we reviewed one of San Francisco’s most highly regarded dining establishments, Michael Mina. But to many [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 10 Nov 2006 | Tagged as: Café Society, Foreign Brew, Quality Issues
In my last post on espresso in Portugal, I reviewed a handful of notable cafés in Portugal’s capital, Lisbon. For this installment, I review notable cafés in other parts of Portugal. Namely, futher north … where I generally found the espresso to be even better than that in Lisbon.
Name
Address
City
Espresso [info]
Cafe [info]
Overall [info]
Café Nicola
[...]
Posted by TheShot on 08 Nov 2006 | Tagged as: Café Society, Foreign Brew, Restaurant Coffee
In a previous post, I noted some generalizations about the espresso in Portugal. For this post, I’ve selected a few notable cafés to review in Portugal’s political and cultural capital, Lisbon.
Name
Address
Neighborhood
Espresso [info]
Cafe [info]
Overall [info]
A Brasileira
Rua Garrett, 120
Chiado
6.60
7.00
6.800
Café Nicola
Rua 1° Dezembro, [...]
Posted by TheShot on 03 Nov 2006 | Tagged as: Beans, Café Society, Foreign Brew, Machine, Quality Issues, Restaurant Coffee, Starbucks
Despite Portugal’s prominent historical role in the development of the coffee trade (for example, they introduced coffee production to Brazil), and the degree with which coffee is “interwoven throughout Portugal’s social, literary and economic history”, I’ve found surprisingly little written about the espresso in this small-but-influential coffee nation. Last month I took advantage of some [...]
[view full post]Posted by TheShot on 20 Jul 2006 | Tagged as: Beans, Consumer Trends, Home Brew, Machine, Restaurant Coffee
An article published in yesterday’s The Wall Street Journal noted the growth of coffee pod use in the U.S. for both office and home: Wall Street Journal Notes Growth In Coffee Pod Sales @ Vending Market Watch News at AMonline.com.
Customized and convenient, coffee pods have been pushed by the industry as an alternative to the [...]