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Coffee and MushroomsINeedCoffee has a new (and lengthy) article on the Role of Fungi in Coffee Plantation Ecology. It's interesting and all, but I was expecting we'd learn some deep dark secret of how some exotic bean got its exotic flavor by some sort of symbiotic relationship with a psychotropic fungus of some kind... Instead it seems to pretty much say "a healthy coffee mountain will have lots of various fungi." Oh well... There's always Tonx's terrific Amanita Muscaria photoset to look at on Flickr while checking out his Latte Art... I always wonder what coffee goes best with those... ...


Portrait of a Barista The barista is the Italian word for the skilled person who prepares coffee (ultimately espresso) in a coffee house. What would you want your barista to be like? This is not a trick question. The more I think of it, the more I believe it, that the world of coffee making must be laying on the shoulders of a barista. (by: Iulia Pascanu) I believe that because the coffee I am beeing served in a coffee house, I expect it to be good. On the other hand, the manager of the bar expects me to be pleased with the service and come again. If the coffee is not good, I will not do that. Now who is responsible for...


Starbucks Barista Equipment Sale A little birdie told me today that Starbucks is having another big sale on their Barista coffee equipment next week -- starting Wednesday, March 23rd, in fact. If you're a regular reader of this site, you're probably aware that while I'm not a terribly big fan of Starbucks' coffee (over-roasted, over-priced, and served overly tarted-up, in general), I do happen to be quite fond of their Barista coffee makers. They actually work well, and wonder-of-wonders (for consumer grade coffee makers) they actually brew at around 190 degrees, which produces a proper cup of coffee. So I'm seriously thinking about a new coffee maker. My oldest has been wanting to swipe a morning cup from my beloved Barista Aroma Quattro,...


Today’s Coffee Is Tomorrow’s DebtThis just in -- Starbucks is expensive, and buying on credit is even more expensive... There's a shocker, eh? It must have been a slow newsday, but the Washington Post has an article on how college students are in debt, and still buying lattes... To quantify the craziness, Lim distributes coffee-consumption charts. One shows that a five-day-a-week $3 latte habit on borrowed money can cost $4,154, when repaid over 10 years. She also directs students to a Web site she helped create. The whole point being that it'd be much cheaper to make their own coffee in the dorm. Of course, that's assuming that they don't go nuts on exotic blends, decent grinders, espresso machines, home roasting, etc... So what's...


Starbucks Barista Aroma Review I finally sent off my beloved Barista Aroma Quattro 4 cup drip brewer to a good home, and upgraded to the newly revised 8 cup Barista Aroma. I'm glad I did -- and I'm glad I waited. The previous revision of the Barista Aroma & the Quattro were both very simple coffee makers that made a damn good cup of coffee. Better (in my opinion) than most of the consumer coffee makers I've tried, mostly because they brew at an adequate temperature, and seem to do a good job of distributing water over the grounds. The new revision of the Barista Aroma makes it essentially a smaller version of the 12 cup Aroma Grande, and it has inherited a...