25 September 2008

exactly a year ago


captains legs, originally uploaded by d.glasky.

20 September 2008

Let's continue

Two days after that last post, I received a package in the mail at work. My mother bought me The Flavor Bible (Thanks mom!). I've been leafing through it almost religiously searching for "the answer" or at least some inspiration (it really is a great title, the puns could just go on but I'll stop here). And, of course, my new flavor obsession does not appear in this book.

Muscadines and/or scoppernongs.

These little southern morsels don't need a dictionary to inform me of their flavor. It's GRAPE. And not just like, red and green grapes, but the artificial flavor of grape you get out of Welsh's jelly or the purple popsicle. Yum.

They taste great with cheese, and the overabundant imagery of californian tourist packets of grapes and wine and cheese comes to mind. How appropriate that I, a Californian transplant, find the "southern grape" to be so delicious.

I'm coming up with ideas for muscadines. Cheese, perhaps Gorgonzola. Honey. Stephen told me to come up with something easy and delicious and then make it look complicated. Okay.

But really, Monday is a chance to experiment for everyone. It's a chance for the judges to practice with the new rules, and maybe a chance for me to break out a beverage that has been instrumental to creating a coffee community in Atlanta. It really requires nothing more than popping the top of a bottle, but out of any of the drinks I've come up with it, I find it inspires me the most. It certainly doesn't meet any type of Oos and Aahs with culinary types, and its flavor matchings are a little obvious, when you think about it. But the creation of this beverage has been for the regulars, the lovers of octane, and it meets my coffee obsession with an overwhelming "Hey y'all," an homage to my new southern roots, fertilized with coffee.

As for the SERBC I think I'll stick to the muscadines or other food experiments, but for Monday I might just put on that southern twang.

15 September 2008

how to propose to your barista girlfriend







An idea Ben and I joked about and then tossed to our good friend Kurt, tamper maker extraordinaire.

13 September 2008

train train traaain.

SO it begins. And the mania slowly sets in. This time around I am not trying to graduate from college, travel to Japan, or move into a new house. Thank god.

I set out early this morning to start collecting ingredients for what I had planned would be my signature beverage. I was looking for pistachio, rhubarb, and fresh ginger. Not huge plans, but some place to start. The drive to Your Dekalb Farmers Market is a longer stretch from the new house, so I can only make it every once in a while.. Not to mention gas prices went up a dollar yesterday with all this Ike jazz.

YDFM is a mecca of fresh produce and hard to find spices. Unfortunately, it's a madhouse on Saturdays. I went it armed with a scarf (it's freezing in there) and a basket and made my way through the crowds. This place attracts everyone, so the lanes get crowded as restaurant chefs pack their buggies with their weekend's menu and I scramble between the children who get lost underneath the fruit tables.

Amidst the cacophony I find my way to the kale. Rhubarb looks like kale, so I figured it'd be over in that general vicinity. Hmmm... wrong. I wander through the cabbages and then to the fresh herbs and the pre packs of baby spinach. Nada. When Aly and I were discussing the possibilities of rhubarb, she brought up memories of Iowa and rhubarb pies.. how everything had rhubarb in it since even a small crop would yield enough of the stuff to feed an army. She remembered it being fall, and yet the farmers market is out.

I consult a text that greatly helped me in composing my signature beverage last spring : Culinary Artistry by Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page.





I happened upon it my accident in the book store, but its use has proved its validity. It breaks up foods into seasons, gives you great flavor pairings for a variety of foods and spices, and even goes into the process of developing a menu. And the book says rhubarb is a spring veggie. Thankfully, flipping to the "fall" page puts me back on track and I wondered why I hadn't just bought the book already. So I did. $30 well spent. The book is really meant for those starting up a restaurant or developing a menu, but isn't that what we are doing in competition? Thoughtfully searching for ingredients (great coffees to serve as espresso), how to highlight their features (as in searching for the best complimentary milk for a capp), and finding great flavors to pair with it (sig drink!). This book is excellent, and too great a gem to keep to myself.

11 September 2008

Enkutatash

Well, to start, Happy New Year. It is the first day of the New Year in Ethiopia.

My love affair with the country has only become more intense since I started working in coffee, but I can also attribute the love to two other facets, food and music. Have you heard of the Ethiopiques collection? Several compilations put out with years and years and years of fantastic music. Today I have had on #21 - Ethiopia Song, Tseguy-Maryam Guebrou. An amazing female pianist... seemingly fit for the overcast day.



Anyway,

Crystal is finally certified, and she's rocking out awesome beverages on the bar. Now that she's making drinks, I can spend some time practicing for the southeast (will it ever happen!?) and work on small edits around the shop. No rest for the wicked; it feels great to be doing research again. Everything from processing and trade to water quality.

Though, at times, I feel stifled. As if the internet isn't offering enough, and so I delve back into dusty shelves of Georgia State (where they wont even let alumni check out books). Once when speaking to a regular customer about keeping up with music, he said it was perhaps a trend that when you get older and can no longer find the time to search out all of the latest new bands, you find yourself diving back into roots (he was referring to the Everly Brothers). The analogy works here. and though I am nowhere near the definition of "old," I have found a subject I used to loathe -History- more appealing every day. How can I understand current trade and export regulations in Ethiopia or Kenya if I know not of its political history? Coffee is a commodity to us, but to the farmers in Guatemala who were given land during the Arevalo administration in the 50's, it was a blessing to their family.

Context is everything.