Turkish Coffee

I've been itching for an excuse to fire up my ibrik ever since I found one at PTA Thrift, and the opportunity came this week when I got some super-dark-roasty coffee. I searched around for a good cardamom-blend recipe and this one seemed good:

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup water
• 1/2 tablespoon of extra finely ground coffee (powder consistency)
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cardamom
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar [might double this next time]
  

Preparation:

1. Bring water and sugar to a boil in ibrik.
2. Remove from heat and add coffee and cardamom.
3. Return ibrik to heat and allow to come to a boil. Remove from heat when coffee foams. [This happens very quickly – make sure to pay attention]
4. Again, return to heat, allowing to foam and remove from heat.
5. Pour into cup, and allow to sit for a few minutes for the grounds to settle to the bottom of the cup. Cardamom pod may be served in cup for added flavor.

Verdict:

I won't pretend that I'm up to the standards of dar-al-Islam, and I probably need to amp up the sugar (the cardamom pod also sounds like a good idea), but this is a damn tasty cuppa. Great for dark roasts, and makes me think again about getting a proper Turkish grinder from Mariakakis'.

UPDATE: For cup two, added more sugar and the cardamom pod. Zing! Very very tasty. Thinking now maybe add a little chili powder? Or maybe add some of the chili schnapps for a caffé corretto-style business.

Counter Culture La Golondrina

Having finally exhausted the stock of the beans that shall not be named, I decided to go with a can't-fail bean, the La Golondrina from Counter Culture. It was on sale at WSM and though I'd not had the beans before, I've had it on drip from the Daily Grind a few times, happy each time. I won't go full-on coffee geek here, but suffice to say that this is a very, very solid coffee, great flavor and body, no sugar or milk necessary at all. Highly recommended.

Larry's Bean Martin

Larry's is an incredibly reliable roaster - their espresso brews up rich and creamy, never over-roasted, and I've had many of their other beans in the past all to excellent effect. Which makes Bean Martin even more disappointing - it was on special at WSM, and as Larry's is always a good bet it was an easy call. But Bean Martin is not a good coffee -over-roasted, unbalanced and ultimately just muddy. I was just coming off of finishing off some overly-old beans with no kick left in them and maybe that's affecting my palette but I don't think so - this is just way too far in the other direction, all roast and no middle. I suppose I'll have to give over my usual biases against milk and finish off the rest of the beans cafe au lait to attempt to balance out a bit.

Don't worry Larry's, I'll be back!

Larry's Beans Costa Little Ricky

Despite the great selection of Counter Culture coffees now on offer at Weaver Street, I must admit that among local world-class coffee roasteries, it's Larry's Beans that's captured my heart and palette. In addition to always stocking their creamy, buttery espresso, I've been cycling through whatever happens to be on sale. This week, it was their Costa Little Ricky, which out of the French press is one of the best yet. Wonderfully chocolatey and balanced with no acidity, it's just a great smooth brew. Highly recommended.

Wild Flour - Banff's Artisan Bakery

On my initial pass-through of Banff, one place looked the likeliest for good coffee, WiFi and atmosphere - Wild Flour. I was right. High ceilings, gray floors, Scandanavian-style tables and chairs and big glass windows team with a bakery in back (also visible through a glass window), menus written in chalk on blackboard-painted cabinets and classic glass display cases for pastries. Plenty of seating inside - not cramped -and outside tables both on the streetside and as the cafe opens into a courtyard.

And the espresso (a single) was excellent - solid crema, rich and smooth. The filter coffee - all fair trade organic (as is the rest of their product "whenever possible") - was also good, and came in three gradations of darkness, all house blends (as was the espresso). Didn't have the bread but it smells excellent - everything is made in-house - and the staff is a good one. If ever you find yourself in Banff, this is

Evelyn’s Coffee Bar, Banff, AB

Sitting in a coffee shop, ruminating as the world goes by on a gray and rainy day - and then writing about it - is an awfully cliche way of eating the world. I’m not even, at this point, sure of where I picked it up as a habit. Was is just suffused in my by popular culture, some third-order derivative product of the Seattle scene? Did I come by it honestly? Do I even like coffee?

At any rate, I sure think I like coffee, and sitting in coffee shops contemplatively - with or without masses of people, with or without the loud noise of a city, of civilization. As it happens, I’m getting the best of all possible worlds right now, a beautiful mountain view in the distance, a busy coffee shop around me, a sidewalk full of humanity passing by outside and then, just past the sidewalk, absolutely hellish amounts of noise from a Cat shovel tearing up the street. It’s glorious - the quiet of the mountains is wonderful, but a week of it has found me craving the awful, glorious succor of humanity’s destructive noises. Trains passed by the lodge last night, and that was a start, but the diesel and electric and metal and stone and dirt is rattling the table here, and that makes me happy. And now there’s the smell of cigarette smoke wafting in from outside, which is really nice.

The coffee: I really need to stop ordering double espressos, as each one I’ve had here has been dumped into a cappuccino cup, allowing whatever crema there’s been to disperse into islands around the inky black. The taste - not bad, but I should really go with a single next time to actually judge the quality.

UPDATE: Had the single. Still not good. The baristas are... not particularly committed to their craft.