The Tamper - Part One

Coffee snobs/geeks love a good tamper, and I'm not talking about fooling around with our machines.

A tamper is a tool used by baristas to press the coffee into the portafilter, or handle, of the coffee machine.

There are very good reasons to use a tamper, and while many baristas might loudly promote their favourite technique, there are some basics that anyone should know.

First of all you need a tamper that fits your espresso machine's baskets. Often the tamper supplied with the machine is undersized. This means you tamp unevenly across the surface of the coffee 'puck' which allows the water under pressure an easy path through any fractures or pressure points - meaning your espresso is really only brown water as it missed most of the coffee on its way through.

Firm, even tamping with a proper sized tamper means that the water has to flow through all of the coffee in the filter, extracting the sugars, aromatics and caffeine that make coffee what it is.

So you need to find a tamper that fits - and this can be a challenge. The big range of domestic espresso machines has resulted in a variation of filter sizes ranging from around 45mm through to 60mm. 53 and 58mm are the most common, but there is often variation in these in that while the filter basket may officially be 58mm the physical size may well be a millimetre or so either side of this.

The most effective way to ensure a perfect fit is to have a Tamper custom made - Pullman Tampers in Adelaide are experts at this and the lovely timber handles ensure that any coffee snob would love one as a present. For many people, the custom tamper is probably an extravagance, at least at first.

I'd recommend that if the tamper supplied does not fit well that you try a few others out for size - this may mean taking the little filter basket out shopping with you. Some kitchen stores stock tampers but you'll more likely find a suitable one for sale in a store that specialises in espresso machines.

Below is an example of what I am talking about.

The first tamper is a double ended 53/58mm tamper - around $8 but not a great tamper to use.



The second is supplied with the machine, and is OK but still leaves a ridge of coffee around the outside of the prtafilter. This can disrupt to flow of water and 'channel' it around the puck rather than an even flow through the puck.



Finally we have the custom made tamper with a very neat fit, almost no grains of coffee escape this beauty.



The heavy base also makes it much easier to use as the mass of the tamper does much of the work for you.




The basic techniques that you end up adopting need to be consistent. Tamping is one of several variables that can significantly effect the final result in the cup - and while you tweak one variable you need to keep the others as stable as possible.

I'll go into some more detail about this in part two of this Domestic Coffee post, but part two will have continue in a day or so. It will involve me taking photos while grinding and using the machine and right now both the Junior Grendels have just gone nighty-nights, and I really don't want them waking up and asking for coffee!

Woollypics

I did promise to go back to WoollyLattes - and spend some more time enjoying Melanie and Michelle's handiwork, and indeed I did. I took Mrs Grendel with me (oh what have I done - it is a whole corner of craft shops. . .) and the big camera which was only operative for long enough to snap a small number of shots before the batteries (both of them) decided to take a holiday.

Below are the few shots I got before both batteries carked it.




Once again the coffee was great with the Rubra Jazz blend cutting nicely through the milk. The cakes were as good as they look in the photos - and then a bit better than that.

Mrs Grendel and I shared each one - an Apricot Crunch Cake and a Tiramisu tart which I would have to declare as my favourite.

Its a great little shop and there is nothing nearby on Grantham Street to suggest a rationale for its existence. The concept works reall well and the cafe is perfectly placed to fill a gap and just goes to show that you can put a great cafe with another business in a suburban street and succeed.

Who: Woollylattes
What: Great coffee and cakes - and knitting
Where: 48 Grantham Street Wembley
When: Thursday, 24 April 2008
Coffee: Rubra
Accessibility: Adequate inside - but a small (5-6cm) step at the front door.

Don't Forget

Gerard Barrios is coming to town - full story here and details for booking as well!

Totally Awesome

This will bore many Cafe Grendel readers to tears so I promise to post only once with one of these.

For those who are into coffee roasting however, here is a real treat - the 1880 patent diagram for one of Jabez Burns famous coffee roasters:



COFFEE-ROASTER Entin

Designing the Future

Sam and I share a morning coffee as often as we can. A fellow home roaster we are always seeking the "Bigger, Better, Stronger" roaster.

Sam has the absolute good fortune to have a sparky in the family who has obligingly modified several former bread makers for each of us which makes 'Corretto' roasting much easier.

Over the weekend Sam acquired a double paddle breakmaker and this, now in its modified state and fired with two Bosch heat guns can roast up to 1.2 kilos of green beans.

All up the setup costs less than $250. A commercially produced sample roaster to roast about the same amount of coffee costs $6000 or more so we think we are doing OK in those stakes.

I do believe though that it is possible to build a drum roaster of 2-3 kilo capacity for under $500 and this is my ultimate goal.

In compiling my final design I have been able to go back to some very early patents for coffee roasters and it is astounding how much they new about the chemical processes of coffee roasting even as far back as the 1820s.

They did get a few of the chemicals wrong - but given the state of the periodic table at that time this is hardly surprising(it didn't exist! In fact it was only in 1829 that German chemist Johann Döbereiner described the occurence of like elements in triads).

What had been determined is that in order the develop the best flavours during roasting, the gases released in roasting needed to be removed from the beans. That is not allow the beans to stew in their own juices.

The first roasting design to be patented with this goal in mind would not seem unfamiliar today - a drum, heated from below with diagonal ridges to turn the beans over during roasting.

Essentially this is what I will be striving for - If I have the time I may even try to recreate the roaster for which I found the patent and see how the roaster of 1820 compares to today.

Much fun awaits the coffee geek in me.

Whither go thou reviewer?

The recent spate of "Best Of's" listed in the Sunday times sparked a bit of debate online.

One thing I did notice however was the fairly limited area in which the "best" places seemed to occur.

There is a certain logic to finding a concentration of cafes and eating places closer to the urban centre, but are these necessarily the "Best"?

One of two things seems to have happened - the reviewers did not have time to get beyond a narrow review area - or the places listed as "The Best" just happened to fall within those narrow areas. The review areas can be characterised as being firstly an elongated coastal triangle with points at Fremantle, Waterman and and Claremont and an secondly an inner urban enclave within a 5km radius of the CBD.

If I had the time I could use the ABS census data to calculate the population (within my generous shapes) as a proportion of the total population of Perth. I suspect however that the answer will be that the area in which the places reviewed were found represents a small proportion of the residents of Perth.

It also probably is not representative of the readership of the Sunday Times, the newspaper that published the reviews.

How many ST readers get down to Cottesloe for breakfast on a Sunday I wonder?

Worse still is that if the reviewers did not go outside these narrow areas they may have missed some of Perth's real gems across all dining categories.

Here's my mapping of the Fish and Chips, Coffee, Italian and Indian reviews. I chose these four as they are the most likely to have potential "Bests" outside the CBD. For example I was surprised that there was no mention of any spots in Stirling for great pizza and pasta.


View Larger Map

Quakers on coffee (1856)

I've been using google books as a research tool and over the weekend I looked at a number of texts on coffee.

There was a bit of an outcry when the Google Books program started but I have to say that as I would not have been able to get to most of the libraries around the world where these texts are stored it is a huge, HUGE boon to the researcher to be able to access the scans of the texts in a searchable form.

Some early material I accessed dated back to the 16th century - pretty good being able to access these works from my own home.

Some of the more recent items were just as interesting.

The clipping below is from a Quaker Newspaper known as the "Friends Intelligencer" and has some great insights into how people of the day used coffee.


Friends' Intelligencer By Friends Intelligencer Association, Friends Intelligencer Association

Now I haven't tried the yolk of an egg instead of cream, and while first thing in the morning that might turn my stomach, I will give it a go one morning after breakfast. I guess it is good to keep in mind that the people mentioned in the article were not drinking espresso but a brewed coffee into which the yolk would be stirred - it would add body I guess. . .

Aren't you glad you don't live in 1831?

A treatise on coffee; its properties; and the best mode of keeping and preparing it [by R. Nicol]. By Robert Nicol


However, while browsing Google Books further I found the following from 1829 - it just goes to show that some things never change. The "French Method" of brewing (as the above was known) had been utterly discredited by the scientific journals of the day but was still being repeated in the popular press.


The Monthly Review By Ralph Griffiths

Gunfire Breakfast

To the end of his life my grandfather enjoyed each morning a small glass of milk with a tot of rum in it.

This was his version of the Gunfire Breakfast that first commenced as an ANZAC tradition in the trenches of Gallipoli.

The original Gunfire Breakfast was whatever you could get to start the day - and was consumed to the sound of the early shots as the fighting grew in intensity with the rising sun.

Coffee laced with rum was the most common, but any small scraps of bread or hardtack - and later, ANZAC biscuits.

By the time World War Two came around and my Grandfather flew off to New Guinea and the South Pacific, both coffee and condensed milk were staples of the digger's diet and the addition of rum to the coffee a carry over of the tradition of the first ANZACs.

We owe a debt to the ANZACs, not just for their willingness to defend their country, but also for enduring what was undoubtedly really, really bad coffee in the process.

Lest we forget.

Excellent!

In a little over a month Certified Cup of Excellence judge Gerard Barrios is heading back over to Perth.




Gerard is a member of a 7th Generation coffee growing family from Marcala in Honduras and supplies coffee directly to Fiori Coffee roasters.

He is coming over to Perth to run an advanced coffee cupping session teaching the techniques used at the international level.

Louise from Fiori Coffee has sent me the details of the event, and it looks like an absolute must for any Perth coffee lovers:

"Gerard is going to guide us through the science of professional coffee cupping. We will be exploring four different coffees and learning to recognise the subtle nuances of each origin. Gerard will be bringing his years of experience as a certified judge and coffee grower and teaching us the industry standard for tasting coffees. This is definitely an event not to be missed by the coffee enthusiast and all proceeds from the event are being donated to buy library books for children of the plantation workers on the Barrios Estate in Honduras. Places are strictly limited so bookings are essential."

It is always great to get exposure to a cupping expert and having already experienced Gerard's knowledge first hand I recommend attending the session - no matter how good your cupping technique might be, there is always something more to learn.

I also love the idea of the continuing relationship between Fiori and Barrios estate, and the concept of buying books for the children of plantation workers sits very comfortably with me.

Where: Entendre Café, Shafto, Lane Perth
When: 1st June 2008 at 4pm
Cost: $20.00

To make a booking please contact Louise from Fiori Coffee on 0412 223 614.

Fierce!

Gail Williams of the Sunday Times does a good job covering Perth's wine and food scene. She has however managed to spark a furore with her latest foray in the competitive world of specialty coffee.

Apparently Gail had the temerity to name her favourite cafes - and then she established a poll and asked whether readers agreed or disagreed with her choices.

Now, while I haven't been to all the cafe's on Gail's list, I have been to three of them and know the other two via reputable coffee snobs. All of them would make any list of where to get a great cup of coffee. The real issue for most commenters to the story is whether or not these venues serve the BEST cup of coffee in Perth.

I suspect that like me, most people haven't made it around to all the cafes on the list. I also firmly believe that coffee is a subjective experience. I know some people who say they love great coffee - and are regulars at Gloria Jeans. To me this is anathema, but to them it is enjoyment.

When you get to the sharp end of specialty coffee though the stakes seems so much higher - after all, at this end of the market all the cafe owners and baristas have some idea of what really great coffee is and ALL of them are striving to be the best.

In one sense they are already intensely competitive, but not so much with each other as within their own business - each day they struggle against the vicissitudes of weather and the bean pushing the limits on what can be extracted from an espresso machine.

So, who's the best?

Who is the best cafe in Perth?

Gail actually didn't ask that question - she just listed her five favourites - and managed to spark an online riot as the loyal fans of the various specialty coffee venues stood forth.

You might as well have asked a crowd which is the best footy team!

The truth is that coffee is a subjective experiences, and many people don't even rate on the coffee alone when they consider their favourite cafe.

I have my favourites - and each for different reasons. One is the ristretto shots, another in the homey comforts, another the food and still another the amazing man behind the coffee machine playing his caffeinated overture to a tough crowd.

The best cafe in Perth?

That is the cafe you are in when you have that moment of warm coffee bliss.

The Grind

Most of us who are trying to make good coffee at home carefully select good fresh coffee beans to use in our espresso machines. Unfortunately, while you may not be able to make good coffee without fresh, good quality beans, you can certainly make bad coffee with fresh, good quality beans.

It is hard to overstate the importance of the coffee grinder in preparing coffee. Many people make the mistake of spending thousands of dollars on their coffee making equipment but neglecting the grinder.

Pre-ground coffee does not make great coffee – you need to grind the coffee immediately before using it and you need to do this with a grinder that gives a consistent particle size.

There are two types of grinder in common use, the burr grinder that grinds the beans into small particles between two surfaces and the rotary blade grinder that uses blades to chop the coffee beans into pieces.

Without question, a burr grinder is the best device for grinding coffee. A burr grinder crushes the coffee beans between two sets of ‘burrs’ or cogs that can be moved to vary the particle size at the end of the grind. The biggest advantage of the burr grinder is the consistent size of the final particles.

In contrast the rotary blade grinder chops the beans and throws the heavier particles to the top while the fine particles clump against the walls of the grinder. The result of this uneven grind is that the different sized particles have different surface areas and this can dramatically change the way the coffee tastes.

The effect is different for each method of coffee making. If you are making the coffee with an espresso machine the varied grind will alter the way in which the water flows inside the espresso machine’s portafilter. The water finds the easiest path. If the grind is even, the water is more likely to flow evenly through the portafilter extracting all the best fractions from the coffee for your espresso.

If the grind is uneven, the water will flow around the larger grains, extracting less of the sugars, acids and solids that contribute to the flavour of coffee.

A good grinder is crucial for all forms of coffee preparation and so should really be the first purchase, although it is recommended that if you are buying an espresso machine that you seek unbiased advice about which grinder pairs well with the machine.

As with any tool, coffee grinders come complete with a lexicon of jargon, and two terms you will likely hear are ‘stepped’ and ‘stepless’. They refer to the mechanism that moves the burrs closer together for finer grinds or apart for coarser grind.

A Stepped grinder has pre-set ‘steps’ that click down or up a specific distance. If you are buying a stepped grinder you need to make sure that it has a good range of steps and that the top end of the range is not too coarse, and that the lower end is fine enough to make Turkish or Greek style coffee – if it can go this far then it should cope with most coffee making methods you will use.

A Stepless grinder uses what is known as a ‘worm drive’, basically a spiral that can move the burrs to any adjustment at all. These are generally considered better for making espresso as you can adjust the grind by very small amounts. If you are switching often between coarse and fine adjustments you may find that a stepless grinder is a lot of work.

Stepped grinders are generally cheaper to buy, and in Australia you can purchase a small stepped grinder like the Sunbeam EM480 for around $150-$200. The cheapest stepless grinders such as the Iberital Challenge are around $300-$350.

Using your grinder can take practice - The first advice I would give would be to have a play with the grinder and test the upper, lower and middle settings to see the difference in coarse to fine at each end of the range of steps.

Next, try a pour using each of these - you may want to use stale or cheap coffee for this bit!

When you have the espresso pour coming out at around the speed that honey drips you have the grind and tamp about right.

Introduce your good fresh coffee and make any minor adjustments required.

You may need to vary the grind slightly as the coffee ages each day and factors like temperature and humidity can alter the grind required as well.

Experimentation is the key, you really have to take the time to figure out what grind your espresso machine works best with. Unfortunately some coffee wastage in unavoidable but with practice you can minimises this.

A Wii Coffee

Via WBC champ James Hoffman's blog I found this:

European Foods

European Foods in Northbridge is an Aladdin's Cave of treats.

I could literally spend an entire afternoon wandering through the 'trade only' warehouse wishing for an ABN.

European Foods are also the Grandparents of Perth Coffee and have been roasting in Perth since 1932.

I spent yesterday afternoon at European Foods taking photos for a project I am working on and was privileged to meet Anne Ferrari, matriarch of the Ferrari family, one of Perth's original female business leaders and a woman who has had a profound and lasting impact on coffee in Perth.

Anne has a great collection of coffee making paraphernalia and while I don't want to reveal all the photos just yet I will give you a sneak peak at the original European foods coffee roaster, purchased by her father from the Uno Company of Coffee Machinery Engineers.

In London.

Yup, London, England, the United Kingdom. It struck me as odd that a coffee roaster would be made in Britain as today we are so used to European and American made roasters dominating the market.

To add to that the design is pretty innovative and capable of roasting up to 2.5 kilos of coffee. It's a drum roaster with the heat from inside - I am going to have to go back and take some more detailed photos as I obviously didn't have me head screwed on right yesterday but the roaster is a spectacularly interesting piece of equipment and an authentic part of Perth's coffee history.





Thank you to Catherine, Anne and Tom of European foods for the tour and information, and the opportunity to learn.

More coffee photos from the lost collection

Some mornings one coffee is never enough





I had to take a photo of the stopwatch right after Vanessa of Epic's WABC session - you get 15 minutes competition time - how close was this!

A very small latte please

From the archives of my lost coffee photos that I recovered yesterday I found these photos from earlier in April.

With the cost of milk rising, many cafes are considering raising the prices of their coffees. Some cafes have found a different solution - downsizing the drinks.

And so it is I introduce to you the microlatte, served in a child's play tea set, complete with a very small but perfect rosetta.



to give it some scale I added a 50 cent piece to the shot:





Unfortunately I missed April 1 for this one - still it would have been a nice Epic April Fools Day announcement.

Kulcha

By far the best food in Joondalup is to be found in a humble eatery on Boas Avenue.

Kulcha is an institution in the Northern suburbs and regularly outshine any similar Asian restaurants with their authentic dishes, friendly service and amazing prices.

Our family has been there many time and our return for lunch on Saturday with friends was a reaffirmation of how a really great casual dining venue is an essential pleasure.

Each dish is spiced and sauced to perfection and eight of us stuffed ourselves silly for less than $80.

I understand the chef is a 'supertaster' and can determine an amazing array of flavours - this would go a long way to explaining why the dishes are so good.

Again - another meal without the good camera to do the dishes justice!

Also a good excuse for returning!








Who: Kulcha
What: Casual dining with great dishes from across Asia
Where: Boas Avenue, Joondalup
When: Saturday, 19 April 2008
Coffee: Not sure!
Accessibility: Average inside but good outside.

Woolly Lattes

Saturday was a wild day - an early start at Floreat forum where I tried an espresso which was all brightness (very acidic) and no body, followed by a lovely half hour browsing in Barker and Hale (formerly Crave Provedore).

More on them later when I can get down to the Cottesloe store with the big camera.

On the way home I spotted Woollylattes - I had seen their barista compete at the state barista championships and had heard about their hand knitted latte warmers but never had the chance to stop by. So I did!

They use Rubra's Jazz Blend, which is a good choice to match the absolute riot of colour from the balls of woll that line the non-cafe section of the shop. Woolylattes is a knitting and coffee shop - and seemed to have a lot of people coming in and out while I was there.

I really wanted to take a photo of the tough guy with tatts and a leather jacket walking out of the knitting shop, but I like my face in its current arrangement - or at least leaving it as is represents the less painful option.

The truly annoying thing is I took some photos with my phone's camera, but somewhere along the way the memory card had what can only be described as a shiftfit (or something sounding vaguely like that) and has dumped stuff - randomly too. There are photos from later that day, but not that morning. However, I can just use that as an excuse to go back with the good camera.

And a notebook.

No excuse there - I just have a terrible memory for names.

Meanwhile - the coffee was great, worth a stop by and I will have to go back and cover it properly rather than just a flying visit with dodgy camera and brain.

UPDATE: Joy of joys, a little phone hacking later and I have retrieved my photos. In the meantime Mrs Grendel caught a glimpse of the wool and we are heading out there later this week so that she can get crotchety again.

Coffee Riots

The Australian grain industry is becoming more important than ever. The current high world prices for both feed grains and milling grains ensures that anything our farmers grow they can sell - and at prices that result in a decades income in a single year.

This has coincided with some decent rainfall in the Eastern states grain belt, as well as early falls here in Western Australia. The harvest in Queensland is already at quantities never before seen - and it is moving as fast as it can be shipped.

There has been talk of possible food riots overseas as the high cost of grain pushes it out of the reach of many people. Food is something people must have to live.

You never hear of coffee riots though.

Coffee is a luxury - for us, but a vital commodity for those that grow it. It has limited nutritional value, but a very high value as a sought-after stimulant. It can also be grown in areas with limited value for food production making it crucial for the survival of people who live in those areas and rely on the cash crop to supplement the food crops viable for the area.

So what does this have to do with Australian grain?

Sorghum, a feed grain for cattle sells for around $235 a tonne or 23.5 cents a kilo. Good quality wheat sells for around 40 cents a kilo, or $400 a tonne. Canola, used for making oil, costs $700 a tonne, or 70 cents a kilo. Naturally these are today's bulk prices and in some cases they have increased by over 100% in recent months. This rapid increase in cost is making it very difficult for people who rely on only a limited cash-crop income to survive.

Wheat has 3390 calories a kilo (14.1 kilojoules), a fairly high value for sustaining life. Coffee has about 2 calories in a 7 gram serve (standard serve of dry coffee), mostly from the oils and a little sugar in the bean. In other words, almost no nutritional value. So you can grow a tonne of coffee, but you can't eat it.

It does have a monetary value however, and if we look at it from the commodity angle we can see that its value in treasure, can be traded for a like value in food.

So say you are living in Honduras, in your little coffee plantation and you get hungry. You take a kilo of green coffee beans and you go into the market and say, here, I have a bag of green coffee beans - it is one kilo - I need to buy some flour because I am hungry, what will you give me for my beans?

The problem for our farmer is that while the price per kilo of his coffee may have fluctuated a few percentage points, the price for wheat has risen by 130%, rice by around 70% and corn by 30%. The corn in question is the type used for cattle feed.

The trading value of the coffee has not matched the value shift for the food. Does this seem wrong somehow to you? It does to me.

You could suggest that the market will take care of the problem because the farmers will just increase their prices to compensate, but in the world of coffee with very large international buying cartels, that is not how it works at all. Even attempting to break out of the buying system can see the coffee farmer assaulted, the farm burnt and worse.

Paying a reasonable amount for coffee ensures that the farmer can purchase the food that provides the energy to go out and produce more. Even better, if the farmer produces a really great product I pay more - his neighbours see that and find out what he is doing to get a higher price, they emulate this and soon they too are getting a higher price for their crop. The standard of food and living improves along with the coffee. Pretty neat eh?

Unfortunately this works only when you cut out a large chunk from the middle of the process and ensure that the roaster can deal directly with the grower. This is such a small segment of the international coffee trade as to be insignificant in financial terms.

The upside is that the small amount of direct trade that does occur is growing, and no matter how small, the outcomes for those involved are very significant.

The grower gets more for the coffee, the roaster gets the coffee at the quality they want, the consumer gets a better cup of coffee.

And all because people talked to each other - not so hard really is it?

I love coffee - therefore I must love those who grow coffee. I think I'd like to see coffee price rises pegged to grain price rises by responsible buying companies so that we can be sure that the international coffee market is responsive to the shift in food prices. At least this way our coffee producing friends won't pick those beans on an empty stomach.

Very well hidden truths indeed

Nescafe just launched an advertising campaign that in my opinion is more appalling than any of their earlier efforts. As far as I can see, their new campaign has only the slimmest relationship with reality.

Their new campaign is called "Hidden Truths". Googling that phrase will take you there - I am NOT going to link to it. It draws a very thin connection between Nescafe coffee and antioxidants without providing any direct proof that Nescafe is itself rich in antioxidants.

The campaign relies on earlier research that identified antioxidant action in soluble (instant) coffee. This action was observed only in test tubes, and as far as I am aware not live trials have been conducted to demonstrate the continued presence of any antioxidants in soluble coffee. I haven't had a chance to read the study, I've merely found 3rd hand references to it in the media

Well, as far as I can determine there was actually a study into anti-oxidants in coffee - even soluble coffee. The coffee was carried out be - you guessed it - NESTLE! Right there in their luvverly Swiss research centre - and they identified that robusta beans had higher levels of anti-oxidant activity.

Yup, fair enough. The study published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry identified that robusta beans in particular have higher levels of antioxidant compounds. The study did NOT appear to suggest that these compounds were beneficial - only that they were present. It is not surprising that Nescafe would be excited about a report that identifies Robusta beans has having high levels of antioxidants because robusta beans are the main source for instant coffee.

Robusta beans are not exactly what you would call the best on the market - low growing, higher in caffeine and with less body than Arabica, even the best robusta coffees pale into comparison with a good Arabica. This is reflected in the market price of the coffee beans.

And yet, on their website Nestle state "Only the best beans are selected and make it into a NESCAFÉ coffee."

I'm not sure how they reconcile that one.

The Coffee Science Information Centre has quite a bit more information - also supported by Nestle, the centre has drawn together a more comprehensive article on antioxidants in coffee, but still doesn't provide anywhere near enough information to support this new campaign from Nestle.

More recent research from Finland also indicates up to 97mg /100g of antioxidants in coffee. . .


Does this all sound terribly repetitive and confused?

It should - the studies conducted beyond the laboratories of Nestle were attempting to determine the presence and concentration of antioxidant compounds in various dietary sources including berries, grains, fruits and beverages. So far as I can determine all of the work thus far has been in vitro (in test tubes) rather than through any epidemiological or evidence based study in humans.

So what do we know?

• Yes, there are antioxidants in coffee
• No, we don't know if these are of the type that are beneficial, just that they MIGHT be
• No, Nestle haven't made any direct evidence available on their website to their implied claim that Nescafe instant coffee are rich in beneficial antioxidants

I don't doubt that the researchers have identified antioxidant compounds in coffee, but as yet I haven't seen anything that either supports Nescafe's apparent claim that their coffee is rich in antioxidants, or that those particular antioxidants are active in elimination of free-radicals.

Until I see it, I will have to remain entirely sceptical and continue to be of the opinion that Nescafe are claiming more about their products than they really ought to.

If their is evidence of their implied claim, perhaps they could make it available to the coffee community?

Our Local

We have a local cafe - although really it should find a better name as 'cafe' implies drinkable coffee. I'm not going to name and shame the place however, because they do serve great food that somehow seems to make it out of the disorganisation they call a kitchen.

I will be writing them a letter during the week as I have long promised myself I would do. I think they can be a lot more than they are but they need to:

• Lose the Landucci. It is probably a great coffee in Italy but terribly stale here.
• Learn to love coffee. I'm not sure any of the staff are coffee drinkers - They all should start.
• Learn how to make coffee - and I mean the basics. It is not good enough to just put coffee in a portafilter, press a button and hope for the best.
• Repeat after me in a loud voice - ESPRESSO IS NOT 200ml of COFFEE. To be fair I ordered a double espresso off their menu and perhaps they had trouble doubling 30ml to 60ml, but what arrived was a 250ml glass 3/4 full.

Perhaps its just that I want somewhere local to go when we are out, or when I want someone else to make me a coffee, but there is no reason at all why any cafe can't make good coffee if they know what goes into making one.

I gave Junior Grendel Number One a taste - the photos shall speak for themselves!

Here is the shot - by this point I'd drunk as much as I could and Junior Grendel was pressing me to finish it.

That sly smile he gets when he knows Dad is up to something.

Yup mate, that was my reaction too - although you've put it much more eloquently than I.

Now before you get clever and suggest I gave my son coffee that was boiling hot - no, it had 10 minutes cooling by this point.

So what do you reckon I should put in the letter?

The first time I did it

It was all dark and confusion as I stumbled along the icy road trying desperately to keep up with the small, heavily bearded priest.

He was leading us along streets and alleyways to a house where we could stay the night before heading to Spitak, the town that had been the epicentre of the earthquake five years earlier.

Yerevan was dark and smoky, the earthquake and years of war removing the capacity for street lighting and heating, and each year as winter came more telegraph poles had been sacrificed so that people could stay warm, eat and make coffee.

We finally arrived and staggered up several flights of stairs to arrive inside a small apartment that was home to a family of 5. They spoke no english. I spoke no Armenian.

They brought bread and food and I gave them a gift of chocolate that I had bought at the airport in Frankfurt. Somewhere in the haze I declined an offer of coffee. It went pretty quiet for a moment and I wondered what I'd done wrong. It wasn't till some time later that I found out that declining an offer of coffee is not often done.

The next time an offer of coffee was made was some weeks later in the village above the site of Spitak. At this point my total coffee experience had been a taste of Nescrappe at a friend's place. I had resolved never to drink coffee at that point.

However, given the circumstances and not wishing to offend another set of hosts I accepted one of the small, narrow and ornately glazed eastern style coffee cups and gazed thoughtfully at the thick murky coffee.

At first sip my first thought was of how sweet it was. Armenians prepare their coffee in much the same way as the Greeks and Turks - boiled in an ibrik/briki with lots of sugar.

I found the coffee not unpleasant, although the grit was a shock, and I didn't realise that you are not supposed to drink the grounds at the bottom and nearly choked as the fine gritty sediment filled my mouth.

The next 36 hours were a revelation - the effect of caffeine on the caffeine naive can be quite profound, it certainly was for me and I spent an interesting day and a half awake.

I did however understand why people could really get into coffee and I spent the time after my return looking for something as good as that which I remembered.

I'll never forget that first time though.

The New Roaster

So, I have two heat guns, two breadmakers, a cooler and a cean box, where to go from here?

Well, my dream has been to have a roaster that can roast two kilos of coffee easily. I don't really need to roast two kilos at a time but I really really want to. Unfortunately this means looking at a drum roaster and to buy a commercial drum roaster that does at least two kilos takes you in the territory of $10,000.

That's just pure insanity unless you are going into business.

So I'm going to build one - I have some plans on paper and an idea of the cost, but following some discussions with other home roasters I have come up with an intermediate design that will roast over one kilo easily and serve as a test bed for some of the concepts for the larger model.

A fellow Perth roaster is even working on a model for a de-stoner which I imagine I will need to look at as well.

I'm not going to reveal the design of the 'missing link' roaster as it is changing almost daily in some parts, but basically it will utilise heavy materials for the chamber to retain more heat than the current corretto pans.

I will however document the build so that I can blog the process - and if it ends up working well as a roaster (as opposed to just looking impressive) I'll put the plans online under a Creative Commons License.

I'm getting some very thick shots from the Presso this morning which is once again serving duty as the 'Caffeinator of Grendels'. I'd still love a way to have the Presso at work, but without a second burr grinder there is not much point - the one essential I have found with the Presso is that just like any espresso maker you only get a good result if you have a consistent grind.

Bookends

West Perth is my local area for coffee. I work in West Perth, so naturally when I get a coffee in the morning it is likely that I'll get one up here.

Hay Street in West Perth is 'bookended' by two of Perth's great cafes - Epic Espresso and Pranzo, and they couldn't be more different. As such they are hugely complimentary and while they compete in the same area, they are both busy, and I have noticed seem to have a crossover clientele to a certain extent.



Pranzo, on Colin Street just down from the Hay Street intersection is run by Pete and Jan and turns out a truly amazing array of biscuits, cakes, muffins and some great lunch items that are perennial favourites for many local workers.

Nic, Pete's barista is one of my favourite Perth baristas and she manages to keep an endless supply of Fiori's coffee moving across the counter with an equanimity that would surely stand her in good stead if she ever chose to compete at the barista championships.



Pete and Jan's daughter is another Pranzo secret and seems to share her mother's passion for creative new muffin recipes. Some wicked new chocolate and cherry ones had our office staff heading up for repeat visits in the mornings recently.


Epic Espresso is tightly focused on the coffee. As such it has the most consistently good ristretto shots in Perth. Owner Corey Diamond's business model is all about keeping the staff trained to peak levels and ensuring that the blend reflects the training. A recent tweak to the blend has seen a shift to a more savoury style of coffee that reflects the beans currently available.



Epic has two Synesso's, both are three group machines, one for in-house and one for take-away coffee.

I was a bit sceptical when I first saw the two very shiny but expensive machines (not to mention the 4 Mazzer grinders) - how could any cafe need two?

On leaving through a large crowd this morning it was quite obvious why one machine would just not do. Epic are a huge presence in West Perth and from their Outram Street lair they dominate the art of ristretto pours.



The staff at Epic seem to be a cross between a team and a family and the state Barista Championships was boosted this year not only because they had two of their staff competing but because they all turned out to support all the competitors.

The 'Team Epic' t-shirts were ubiquitous for the whole weekend and I think we'll be seeing them again next year.


This morning I had a ristretto at Epic and a flat white at Pranzo. It never fails to astound me that two cafes can be so different - even down to the quite different coffee blends they use and yet both be producing great quality coffee.

A really bad trifecta

Mrs Grendel and I have just been lying on the bed, collapsed in a heap after finally getting the Junior Grendels off to sleep.

Jamie Oliver's cooking show was on, and Mrs Grendel likes what he cooks (he uses lots of lemon of which she is very fond).

Unfortunately in Australia, Jamie's program is on commercial television and is thus interrupted by inappropriate ads. Not that I mind commercial television, its just that sometimes they don't do themselves any favours with the programming of advertisements in proximity to certain programs - like Jamie's Kitchen.

In the final break in the program there was a series of three ads, a disastrous trifecta of mispromotion. One was for Continental's dried-crap-out-of-a-packet, one for McCain's Frozen-brown-stuff-on-pasta and the third was for KFC.

Having just seen Jamie prepare a really really yummy looking Spanish style fritata, the glossed up images of Mac'n'cheese et al actually looked pretty chunderous, and the KFC just looked its usual greasy self.

So, why would you put an ad for this crap on during a program that really pushes the fresh food is good food message? It is not going to help sales when people have just seen how good food can look when you show them a pile of limp looking mash-from-a-bag.

One of the reasons I don't have Google Adsense on Cafe Grendel is because it kept coming up with crappy products I in no way want to be associated with - like NesPods.

I think I need a coffee!

Teeth cleaning for tasters

Whether you are tasting wine or cupping coffee, one of the worst things that I have found for ruining my palate is toothpaste. They almost universally seem to impart a lingering nastiness that while it may 'Freshen your breath' certainly kills your chance of detecting any of the more subtle flavours.

Sadly though, if you don't want to inflict your bad breath on those around you, brushing your teeth is a must do each day. However, for days when you will be tasting/cupping there are alternatives.

The first of these is to make your own tooth powder. The recipe is simple - three teaspoons of bicarb soda and 2 teaspoons of sea salt. Wet your brush, dip it in, brush your teeth. If you know you have bad breath, brush your tongue. Besides the odour from bacteria between teeth, the vast population of bacteria on your tongue actually creates a greater pong than the residents on your (hopefully) pearly whites.

Charcoal is another simple expedient - basically you need to burn a piece of bread, grind it up to a powder with a mortar and pestle and brush with the resulting charcoal. At this point I think it wise to recommend that you DO NOT USE YOUR TOASTER for this operation.

I know someone who did and their insurance company still suspects intentional arson.

I recommend the BBQ - at least this way it will only be your neighbours who call the fire brigade and not you.

If either of these sound unpleasant (wimp!) or just to much hard work (lazy sod!) then children's toothpaste often has much milder flavours - and sometimes fruity ones, that may not dominate the taste buds and linger quite so much as the menthol and eucalyptol loaded adult tooth cleaning products.

You may also be able to find some homeopathic tooth cleaning products (powders mostly) but beware as these are also sometimes flavoured with spice oils or menthol.

A not-quite-ANZAC-day reflection

One of the great things about having a blog is that you have somewhere to get the stuff out of your head. Naturally when you have a coffee blog most of what you write is going to be about coffee. But sometimes not – like today.

Yesterday our team at work had a corporate development day, the first part of which included a talk by Peter Hughes, a building contractor who was critically injured in the first Bali bombing in 2002.

It was a remarkable presentation and you really get a sense of just how much Peter’s life changed for good and ill after the bomb went off.

One of the most notable things Peter said was about the immediate response of people to the blast and how so many young Australians went straight in to help those who were injured. Peter, burned and maimed by the blast had staggered outside only to be blown back inside by the explosion of the car bomb outside the Sari nightclub. He made it back out - with 13 people in tow that they had collected as they moved out. He then went back inside the burning Paddy's Pub to bring out more injured people.

Peter reflected on the others he say helping out right after the blast and later in the hospital in Denpasar.

Peter Cosgrove later referred to the young Aussies who helped out in the immediate aftermath and for some weeks afterwards as ‘diggers without uniforms’.

Australia’s history does seem to have a strong streak of mucking in when help is needed and we seem to be at our best when the situation is at its worst.

There was another example of that yesterday when a young bloke, Brock Curtis, jumped on his surfboard and paddled out to rescue his mate who had been bitten by a shark.

Imagine going out in the water to the very place a shark has just attacked someone. That really is the most extraordinary thing, and the tragedy of his mate’s death does not lessen the enormity of the act.

A quote, sometimes attributed as an old Norwegian folk saying and at other times to George S. Patton goes; “Courage is fear hanging on one minute longer”. Regardless of the origin, the truth of the statement is evident. Most people who are heroes are heroes because they transcend their fears for the brief time required to do what needs to be done.

I don’t think the fear is gone – and I imagine that the later nightmares that many people have after such an event are reflections of the enormity of that fear, but the fact that a person can push through the natural desire for self preservation is remarkable.

I don’t know that Aussies have this capacity more than other people, I hope we do as it makes up for some of our other national flaws. I do know that we see it more often when the need is greatest, just as we see greater community strength and charity when times are toughest.

I wonder sometimes whether the very fact of our current affluence has led us to complacency and isolation and whether if we had to struggle together a little more we might be more successful as people.

It seems that the true spirit of Australia was born in adversity and is renewed in adversity - may we never become afraid of a little adversity.

Something old that is new

I remember hearing quite some time back that a team of scientists from Brazil had been travelling the mountains of Ethiopia testing wild coffee plants. One natural variant they found had lower levels of caffeine that most Arabica varietals. This had some obvious potential as a natural replacement for decaffeinated coffee. The team back in Brazil embarked on a process of selective breeding from the seeds they brought back and have now achieved their goal of a naturally bred lower caffeine variety of Arabica coffee.

First released in October last year, I hadn't heard much from within Australia of the new variety and assumed that the small early crop had been bought up by overseas buyers.

Opus 1 Exotic, as the variety is known has only 1% caffeine which is 30% less than most other Arabic varieties. Allan McMurray of Rubra Coffee in Myaree Western Australia has managed to acquire some of this special Daterra coffee. While I haven't yet sampled it myself I am naturally excited to see the coffee on offer as eventually it holds out hope of a low-caffeine coffee that removes the need for expensive and less sustainable de-caffeination methods that can potentially affect the flavour of the coffee.

I imagine that Allan and the team at Rubra are even more excited to have the chance to bring this coffee to the WA market which may well need a decrease in caffeine levels - especially around the stock market trading firms at the moment!

I'm fairly sure that the green beans are not cheap - the crop is a limited crop (production last year was just over 1200 kilos or just 50, 24kg boxes) , but one with a potentially huge market and as a Daterra product it is fully Rainforest Alliance and Utz (formerly 'Utz Kapeh') certified which also attracts a premium.

It will be interesting to watch how the Perth coffee market reacts to the new coffee, and the all-important results in the cup will shape this.

I imagine that you'll shortly see the new Opus 1 Exotic appearing on the shelves of the many Rubra coffee stockists around WA.

A very Grendel birthday

Yes it was - there was chocolate cake and everything on Sunday.

Fortunately although I took most of it to work I did leave a little for tonight to have with icecream.

No coffee though, apart from a very quick shot from the Presso. I tried the aeropress and perhaps I am just not working it to its full potential but I have yet to have a cup of coffee from it that I can honestly say I enjoyed.

Cupping at 5 Senses

Friday was a caffeine day. I met in the morning with Sam and Chris at Zekka, followed by a mid-morning trip down to Rockingham to 5 Senses for a cupping session.

The crew down there made us feel welcome (as usual), gave us a sneak peak at the big metal coffee roasting monster known as the 'Renegade' then took us into the cupping room to participate in one of their regular cupping sessions.

I'll let the photos speak from here!














As you can see we were part of a large group which consisted of Terry and Therese (from T5 Espresso in Joondalup), Chris, Sam, myself and the staff from 5 Senses. The session was really about identifying which coffees really had the kind of qualities that they wanted for both blends and single origins.

I thoroughly approve of regular cupping sessions and most the roasters I know carry them out on a small scale in their own roastery. A lot of home roasters are also now both cupping and recording the results from cupping sessions in their own home. It is a useful practice that not only familiarises you with the characteristics of particular coffees but educates your palate.

This was cupping with a difference - a pour from the espresso machine, using a standard roast, not so much to seek the defects in the coffee but to characterise the coffee.

While we were there I took a series of photos of a pour from the Synesso which I have placed in a slideshow so you can see the pour in action.




Thanks guys for letting us play in your sandbox!

Rainy Roasting

I love roasting in rainy weather, it always seems to progress very well when there is a good amount of humidity and the air is cool.

Today I roasted some Yemen Ismali - I'd promised a bag to someone during the week and thought I'd better roast it up. It looks terrific, but you just never know until you make a coffee with it. I'll be looking forward to trying it next week.

Meanwhile the Junior Grendels are entertaining themselves with rainy day games - Jnr Grendel Number Two is playing 'Dr Who and the 'Garlics' (Daleks) and also being 'Rumble the dog' for Jnr Grendel Number One who is being a dog trainer.

I went with Sam, Chris, Terry and Therese down to 5 Senses Yesterday and I'll write that up later - but tried some interesting coffee and got a sneak peak at the roasting setup including the Renegade roaster they recently acquired.

Zekka Slideshow

As promised, I took the good camera back to Zekka today - here is the result.

Zekka

The area around King Street is really now the golden area for coffee in Perth. The presence of Tiger Tiger in Murray Mews, Velvet Espresso at the St Georges Tcs end of King Street and Ristretto in Central 160 meant that the area was a hot zone for good coffee.

It just became an inferno.

UPDATE: Matt over at Abstract Gourmet now has his review of Zekka up on the site - and sadly, once again, he has much prettier photos than I do.


Zekka are on King Street between Murray and Wellington Streets - a fortunate balance in location - in fact the placement of the great cafes in the area are taking on a certain symmetry.

Zekka have chosen a unique option for their coffee - they are using Campos coffee from NSW, the first WA cafe to do so.

I'm always wary of shipping coffee, it often doesn't travel well and you have to take great care to ensure it doesn't suffer.

I'd say Will Young and the Campos crew have a pretty fair idea of what they are doing. The coffee was excellent.

The espresso shot had a bright acidity on the edge of sourness (this seems more typical of East Coast roasters) and a wonderful dry astringency like the skin of walnuts. It was very balanced in the mouth and a ruddy crema, light in texture topped it off.

The flat white was equally enjoyable and I was amazed that a coffee so bright as an espresso should cut through milk with a real nutty caramel presence and still with that dry, pleasant astringency following it up like a dry lager or brut champagne.

Zekka, managed by Aaron and paired with a very sylish-looking mens fashion house, the kind that I would avoid walking into for fear of making everything immediately appear crumpled (I can crumple an Armarni at 10 paces from it).

The cafe itself is a haven, tucked at the end of a long sloping ramp and easing out into a small comfortable courtyard.

The La Marzocco machine is matched with a Mazzer grinder and Aaron was pulling some good shots with this combination.

I didn't have time to try the food on offer, but the muffins (which I think they make at the cafe) looked great and I could see several kinds of toast on offer inclusing one that appeared to be bursting out of its crust with fruit.

I only had the pinhole camera on my phone to work with this morning but I'll head back tomorrow with the SLR for some pictures that do the place justice. Already it seems as if it has been discovered by those looking for a good coffee and I noticed a number of people who appear to be 'regulars' even only one week out from opening.

I think Zekka are a terrific addition to Perth's coffee scene and as the first point of contact that many will have with Campos Coffee, Zekka will uphold the reputation for integrity and excellence that Campos have worked hard for.






Who: Zekka
What: Coffee and light meals
Where: King Street, Perth (between Murray and Wellington
When: Thursday, 3 April 2008
Coffee: Campos Coffee
Accessibility: Excellent - Wide door off King Street and an even sloping ramp with handrails on both sides, good bench height and space to move around.

Update: WA Coffee Lover's Map

I've updated the WA Coffee Lover's Map to include Zekka and some other recent changes.



View Larger Map

Kopi Kecilsapi

It is an odd coincidence when you start talking about Kopi Luwak, and then just a week later have the opportunity to break the news on something that may prove to be even more exciting.

Biologists from the University of Queensland (including a certain Dr Bill Mason who is an old mate of mine) have just returned from Indonesia where they have been conducting a wildlife survey on the island of Irian Jaya.

Coffee, is of course a famous product of the eastern side of the island (Papua New Guinea), but the discovery that has been made seems restricted to the highlands on the West of the island.

There is a reasonable number of mammalian forms native to the island, and as unique to Irian Jaya as Australian fauna is to Australia. The comparison with Australian fauna is not coincidental as the animal the team discovered looks a little bit like a kangaroo in that it has slightly larger rear feet and lever/pivot arrangement of the joints that allows it to lift on its hind legs to graze the undergrowth.

It is in fact more closely related to cows and oxen and has been given the scientific name of Bos Irianii (Bos from the latin for 'bull', Irianii, naturally enough for the island on which it was discovered).

The commonly used local term for the species is a Kecilsapi (literally a "small cow" in Indonesian), and at just 60-80cm in height they are indeed a comparatively small species. Their hind leg adaption allows them to graze the undergrowth in the rainforest slopes of the highlands, and as the title of this post suggests it seems they have a liking for coffee beans as well as the lower leaves of the coffee plants.

Like all members of the Bos family, Bos Irianii is a ruminant, an artiodactyl mammal that digests its food first by chewing and then by regurgitating this food in a semi-digested form known as cud. This is possible because of the digestive arrangement of four stomachs, the first of which is known as the rumen.

The compartmentalised stomach (pictured below) has four compartments: the rumen, reticulum, omasum and abomasum.



This has a unique effect on the coffee beans that are eaten by Bos Irianii which, like that of the civet cat or Luwak, results in enzymatic changes to the coffee - and again like the Luwak, these are beneficial.

As the Kecilsapi is exclusively vegetarian the beans are partially digested only with other vegetable matter and this renders the final extraction of the beans from the 'cow pats' slightly less unpleasant than from the rather more odourous Kopi Luwak.

The population of Kecilsapi is unknown, but likely to be limited since their only recent discovery means they are unlikely to be numerous. I haven't yet had the chance to try Kopi Kecilsapi, but I am assured that is is incredibly smooth, and rather like a monsooned malabar in appearence pre-roast.

It is also very rare, and while I hope to obtain some at some point, I will have to wait until the team goes back up to Irian Jaya as they were unable to obtain quarantine clearance to import any on their return this time (not surprising really!)

I'm also awaiting an email with some photos, which I will hopefully be able to post up shortly.