The Wormhole Coffee

2013 Holiday Gift Boxes Stocked

The 2013 holiday season is in full “GO!” mode here at The Wormhole Coffee. We’re stocked up on the usual goods and services, obvi; we’re also sporting a God-only-knows-why variety of merchandise for your purchasing pleasure. At a non-specific point and time in the future, the universe would allow–even encourage–you to pick up fresh-roasted beans from HalfWit Coffee, T-shirts, hoodies, cycling gear & supplies, Wormhole Coffee gift certificates and you never know what else of a given day and while supplies last.

Of course, Wormhole Coffee Gift Packs wouldn’t be the same in a humdrum bag or box, so this year we’re sporting “Empire Strikes Back” + “Dr. Who” lunch boxes + donated human organ receptacles (not intended or qualified for actual use, you sickos!). Try the Mayan Melk, our current signature drink, and enjoy holiday shopping made into a quick, easy stop at Wormhole Coffee.

Posted by masterworm on December 13, 2012 at 3:49 am

New Signature Drink: Mayan Melk (Winter 2012/13)

White Hot Chocolate + Earl Grey Lavender Syrup + Cracked Pepper Marshmallow = Mayan Melk

Our latest signature drink here at Wormhole Coffee tends toward well-balanced excess, if that’s possible. We hope you’ll agree and big thanks to Katherine Anne Confections for supplying the yummy cracked pepper marshmallows. Come and get it; these things come and go–but the memory of the flavor profile should last at least until 2015.

Posted by masterworm on December 3, 2012 at 5:38 pm

A Tale of Two Guys & Kickapoo

Kickapoo Coffee owners T.J. Semanchin and Caleb Nicholes both found the relatively small town of Viroqua, Wisc., on their own, for different reasons. Then, coffee brought them together.

More on that story later. First, let’s get to the beans.

The Roasting

When it comes to roasting strategy, Kickapoo has had a clear direction since the beginning. “”While we always leave room to experiment, we very much value a consistent product, so there’s got to be a balance,” says Nicholes.

That balance was especially hard to keep intact when the new and current roaster arrived in 2007. “We moved to a super-customizable, 30-kilo Probat, then added a bunch of technology,” continues Nicholes. “We went from [a roaster] with a few variables to one with, basically, an infinite amount of variables.

“I’m also a perfectionist and try to coax as much out of the coffee as I can during the roasting process, so it was a little painful that first few years getting to know the machine and how it works. In general, the intention is always to be doing the best job that we can. It’s hope, heartbreak, tears–and pouring everything we have into it,” says Nicholes, noting that after five years of working intimately together, he and the Probat are now old friends.

“You have to invest in technology but also understand the processes better,” he continues. “Taste changes, coffee aesthetics change, and we have changed in our crafting of the coffee and will continue to change, no doubt, but we pride ourself in being really honest with what’s going on in the cup.”

Keeping up on fellow roasters is also important, he says, which we obviously subscribe to here via this very guest roaster program (we hope you’re enjoying our cavalcade of luscious beans, usually located on the little shelf to your left when you’re making a purchase within Wyrm environs).

“For me, tasting any coffee, particularly from roasters I don’t know really well, it’s always an adventure. It’s good to know what’s out there, what you’re up against, and to keep your finger on the range of aesthetic that folks are going for consciously or slipping into unconsciously, depending on how much control they’re putting into their sourcing and roasting,” says Nicholes. “For us, it’s seeing how we stack up, but it’s also seeing what aesthetics roasters are going for, which ones we like. We might be like, ‘That coffee is roasted better than ours. What are they doing? How can we improve?’ Because it’s possible…sometimes if you get into a rut of this is how we do things, you don’t see the possibility for improvement.”

One recent improvement of note that you can see on display at Wormhole this month are the new recyclable, sealed Kickapoo Coffees tin cans. Yes, we are a bit jealous.

The Sourcing

At that point in our conversation, Nicholes headed out and Semanchin smoothly took over talking about sourcing as abruptly as his business partner moved on from talking about roasting.

“The backbone of our coffee sourcing is that we are part of a roaster’s cooperative,” says Semanchin. “We co-own our own importing company, pulling in coffee from a dozen countries. It’s all about the volume of our purchasing, but for our micro-lots, we’re direct-sourcing all our Ethiopian and Kenyan coffees this year and work with some importers, too.

“[We have a] varied sourcing program, finding the routes and avenues that bring us closest to the farmers,” he continues, noting a very positive experience with Cooperative Coffees, which works exclusively with fair trade co-ops. “We definitely have a very unique sourcing model that we’re all about tweaking and improving.

“There are often conflicting goals, the social justice piece of working with small farmers exporting their own product versus trying to source the highest quality coffee in the world,” says Semanchin. “It’s a great challenge, trying to meld those two issues, but we’ve really embraced that as part of our mission at Kickapoo…it’s, ‘How do we keep raising that bar higher and higher?’”

Where are they now? “Ninety-percent of our coffee is direct-sourced, though we try not to get into the labels, just do it how we know, the most ethical way,” he says. “We’re working on achieving the highest goals in direct and fair trade worlds. For a small company, or even a large one, sourcing coffee this way is an immense task.

“We’ve been blessed with this foundation as we started Kickapoo, had a lot of relationships already established,” he says. “As far as advice to other small, young roasters, maybe that model of the cooperative, a legal company we co-own, is something. We’ve been able to tap into that, and it was a big focus of mine previous to here–the traveling and sourcing of coffee and evolving those relationships. We’re buying from grower groups that I’ve worked with for 10 years and I think they’re rolling out coffees that we consider to be benchmark coffees for their origins.”

Star Crossed…Roasters?

The Story of T.J.

For his part, Semanchin was more about the farmers than the beans from the beginning. We like that. “I spent some time in the coffee lands of Central America, studying a sustainable development program in Costa Rica,” he recalls. “The center itself was actually located right in the heart of coffee country, coffee co-ops just down the street. We looked at coffee as a case study to see how a culture deals with [exporting a commodity that’s produced by a number of smaller agricultural operations]. The other main export was bananas, a different commodity consolidated in large corporations where very few economic benefits trickle down to the local communities and there are huge environmental consequences.

“I got to view the effect of small farms and co-ops and the potential ecological benefits of traditional, shade-grown coffee farms–but first got into it through that lens of studying the social and environmental effects,” says Semanchin, admitting coffee quality wasn’t his focus point yet. “I came back to the States, landed in Minneapolis, and through some of my connections from Central America, landed a job at Peace Coffee in Minneapolis.

“It’s grown to be a pretty big brand in Twin Cities. When I started, there were just two of us, so I was in at ground level of a coffee company focused on sourcing fair trade organic coffees. As the company grew, my responsibilities morphed into the roasting and sourcing of the green beans and that’s when my passion for cupping and getting into the roasting side continued to grow. Something drew me toward coffee and then once I got into it at the flavor-in-the-cup-level,” he was hooked.

“After my time in the Twin Cities was up, the wife and I were ready to take a plunge and get out of the city, move to a more rural setting up in Viroqua, Wisc.,” says Semanchin. “It’s a great little town to set up shop: good people, tons of organic food, schooling options (his son just started kindergarten).” He and his wife now have two children and are well-rooted in the community, life and work has come together. “I was ready to be my own boss and do my own thing and move to a small town–where creating your own job is often one of the only employment options.”

When the Semanchins moved to Viroqua, Kickapoo Coffee was already up and running, and this is where we back up into the story of Caleb Nicholes. “Kickapoo was up and running before we moved to town,” says Semanchin. “Caleb had the idea before us. My wife and I decided to start up a coffee company and, as we were brainstorming, we got news that someone had beaten us to the punch and started a coffee roasting company in town, a town of 4,000 people, so two roasters not likely.

“At first, it was a bummer, but then we decided to come and introduce ourselves to Caleb, who was open to chatting,” and, with that, going back to our interview, Caleb chimed right in, picking up where his business partner left off.

The Story of Caleb

“My passage into coffee was a little different. Right around 2000, I graduated college and had been working cafes and got a taste for cafe culture,” he says. “I was always interested in cooking and food, working at restaurants. I started home coffee roasting around 2000, working at restaurants and cafes, thinking about owning one. In the meantime, I also fell in love with wine–the world of wine, the study of wine. I worked in high-end restaurants for a number of years. Studying coffee was part of my hobby, but on the back burner after I got really into wine.

“The restaurant I was working for in Madison went out of business so I took job with a boutique wine importer and pursued wine very seriously for three years and ultimately decided to move to a small town and jump ship from the wine business,” he continues. “I was focused on my son. His mother grew up here in Viroqua; we split up and I decided to move here and kick my own thing off.

“Coffee made the most sense at the time. I didn’t know jack about commercial coffee roasting, and far as operating a coffee roasting company, I was pretty green. I started the company in November, 2005, and T.J. came in four months later,” says Semanchin. “Finances were thin and my business acumen was very thin. T.J. brought essential resources and experience in building a coffee company, which allowed me to concentrate on flavor development and sourcing.

“I really wanted to get very close to producer partners and also had a real passion for high quality and understanding the science behind roasting. T.J. and I came together on both of those in a really synergistic way. It’s important for both of us to do everything well.”

Now pay attention because Nicholes is about to reveal the ‘Rosebud’ of Kickapoo Coffee Company: “I was obsessed with candy as a kid and T.J. liked to play Monopoly by himself.”

The Future

That’s how it began. Seven years later, Kickapoo Coffee is running on all cylinders, says Nicholes. “Caleb and I both moved here to get out of the city, looking for a certain lifestyle. We didn’t have huge expectations. We weren’t focused on growth or having a medium-sized company, which is what we’re turning into…nine of us here.

“We had some early successes and a very clear vision from the get-go, which helped us become relatively successful early with some impressive growth and we had to re-consider where we wanted to head with this,” Nichols says, summing it up. “As we saw we had more resources and could bring new people on the team, we were blessed with awesome folks who kept bringing new energy to us. We were a little surprised when it got to the size we thought would take 5-7 years in only three years.”

There’s also the real-life impact on Viroqua, which draws at least somewhat of a comparison between the positive effects of responsibly produced coffee in origin countries. “We’re employing people here in our small town where there’s not a lot of job opportunities, we’ve become a resource economically,” says Nicholes. “That wasn’t the goal at the outset but we’ve realized we can be a company of ten people and do it well.”

And while maintaining sanity: Kickapoo has stuck to a four-day work week across the board. “Fridays are a family day for us, we’ve held true to that, and I think that speaks to us having a clear vision when we started and haven’t veered from that, just gone deeper as we’ve been able to grow and gain experience.”

An open heart, clear vision, dedication to farmers and family…these are the things on which Kickapoo Coffee is built and it comes through in the beans–which you can currently get at Wormhole Coffee here in Chicago in very cool, reusable tin cans.

Posted by masterworm on October 18, 2012 at 11:11 am

Wormhole Coffee Signature Drink (Fall 2012): The Harrison Gourd

New sig drink at Wormhole Coffee, the Harrison Gourd.

It’s our take on a con panna: espresso + house-made sweet potato whipped cream + lemon zest.

“We did our best to keep in line with nice fall flavors without making something too similar to the ubiquitous pumpkin spice latte,” says the ultra-smooth and imperturbable Nathan Lyle Black. Then he vanished into thin air…because such things happen in and at The Wormhole.

Posted by masterworm on September 17, 2012 at 5:12 pm

Wormhole Coffee Log: Peru

Next up in our focus series on coffee-producing nations is Peru, a country rich in culture and landscape, and home to over 110,000 coffee farmers. Coffee production rose by 19% in Peru in 2011, and it remains the country’s top agricultural export, valued at $571 million in an annual report by the USDA. Peru, for those who flunked geography, is home to a generous chunk of the Andes mountains, the longest mountain range in the world spanning across South America. The geography of Peru would seem to make it a perfect fit for coffee growing, both in terms of climate and elevation, and in many ways this is true. However, as we’ll see, Peru is actually somewhat of a newcomer on the coffee scene, with several pressing issues that make coffee from this Southern nation still a wild card in the specialty world.

Peruvian Coffee Flavor Profile

Good Peruvian coffee has many of the delicate high notes of quality Central Americans, due to the high elevation and cooler climate of the Andes, while still retaining a firmly South American profile overall. Their comparatively primitive processing methods frequently make for earthier, even baggy characteristics in the cup, although with better lots this quality can be pleasant and not detracting. Herbal and floral notes dominate in many Perus, with a medium to light body. Processing in Peru, as everywhere, contributes to its unique regional flavor. Many processing facilities consists of small, simple wet mills, many operated by hand. The coffee is then fermented for up to a day in wooden tanks, with these tanks adding their own particular flavor to the beans themselves (for better or worse). Post-fermentation, the coffees are sun-dried with the parchment on, after which they are taken to market and eventually sold to an exporter who will finish the processing at a dry mill, where the parchment is removed and the coffee is prepared for export.

Coffee is grown throughout the eastern slopes of the Andes, but is primarily concentrated, in terms of both volume and quality, in the areas of Chuchanmayo, Cusco, and the northern Andes region. 75% of the coffee is grown at high altitudes, between 1000 and 1800 meters above sea level. This is great for quality, as higher altitudes typically produce harder beans with more complex flavors, but can be difficult in terms of accessibility. Most coffee growers in Peru are smallholder farmers, many of whom speak native languages in remote areas of the mountains, working between 2-3 hectares of land. Many of these smallholders are grouped into cooperatives of hundreds or even often thousands of producers who share processing facilities. These co-ops, like co-ops around the world, assist the farmers by providing services such as access to buyers, grower education, and labor.

Unique Challenges: Will They Be Met?

Out of Peru’s 110,000 coffee farmers, 33,000 are certified organic. Like Mexico, which Peru closely follows as the top two producing nations for organic coffee in the world, many small scale farmers were already practicing a ‘passive organic’ method for decades prior to outside certification. Unable to afford chemical fertilizers or insecticides, and already employing traditional farming methods such as crop rotation and providing shade trees, many of these farmers were only a small step away from certification. However, like much of the organic movement, the jump to producing organic coffee did not include an increased awareness of quality. This is partly due to the fact that much of the processing in Peru is done using hand-powered washers and wooden tools, which often remove too much or too little of the fruit of the coffee cherry, leaving them vulnerable to fermentation and rot.

Some unique challenges facing Peruvian coffee growers include low yields and an increasing threat from global warming. Low yields are often the result of a lack of fertilization and the planting of low-yielding varietals. The level of poverty and lack of access to small loans makes buying fertilizer, be it organic or commercial, nearly impossible for many small farmers. Adding to the problem, 70% of coffee grown in Peru is of the Typica varietal, which, although renowned for its high quality, is one of the lowest producing trees in terms of volume. But with the extremely high cost of replanting, most small farmers continue to grow trees that are 20-30 years old.

Peru is rated one of the top three countries in the world to be affected by climate change, a fact which the average coffee farmer is already acutely aware of. Last year the eastern slopes of the Andes saw too little rain – this year, there has been 500% of the annual average in some areas. These droughts and deluges make predicting the harvest nearly impossible, and in a country where small-scale loans are practically non-existent, these sort of ups and downs can quickly lead to disaster. The country’s second largest agricultural export, coca, has benefited from this instability and Peru now ranks amongst the largest producers of this illicit cash crop. Efforts to tackle the encroaching threat of climate change have been small and slow, with many of the major coffee importers failing to address the issue altogether. It is estimated that the effects of climate change will lead to a global coffee shortage in the next decade unless immediate, cross-lateral action is taken. With specialty coffees comprising over 30% of Peru’s coffee exports, it is likely that even niche markets will feel the effects of this issue in the near future.

The Finish

The Wormhole has featured many excellent Peruvian coffees in its 2.3 years of life, including the Peru Balcones from Metropolis Coffee Company, which is currently in rotation. The sweet herbal flavour and light body of this coffee are typical of Peru, making this coffee a great introduction to the region. Come in soon and try some before this coffee disappears! Or, umm, goes out of season…

Sources:

Nolte, Gaspar. United States, Department of Agriculture, Foreign Agriculture Service. Peru Coffee Annual. Global Agriculture Information Network, May 2010. Link here.

“History of Coffee in Peru” Equal Exchange. n.p. Web. n.d. Link here.

Olsen, Peter. United States, Department of Agriculture, Foreign Agriculture Service. Peru Organic Products Update. Global Agriculture Information Network, May 2008. Link here.

“Peru Expanding Role as Specialty Coffee Leader” Stuff. n.p. Reuters, Aug. 2008. Link here.

Siegle, Lucy. “Peru’s Coffee Farmers Turn to Carbon Traders to Save their Farms from Climate Change” The Observer. The Guardian, May 2012. Web. Link here.

Posted by AndreaOtte on July 24, 2012 at 8:27 pm

Heart Of A Roaster Powers Passion House

Coffee roasting takes some pretty basic things: a roaster, a person who knows how to operate it to great effect, and quality green coffee beans, i.e. ingredients.

But what we learn as we talk to more and more roasters for this series is that what it really takes is…drumroll…heart. In a story already chronicled (here), Millman struck out on his own with Passion House Coffee Roasters in 2011 after his heart was questioned. Day one, he proved this wasn’t so.

“I have a 13-month-old daughter and got my first order for coffee the day she was born,” recalls Millman. “I left the hospital, roasted and delivered the order, then went back to the hospital.” More about the coffee side of Passion House in a moment, but it’s not just about this company’s commitment to coffee, but to life and their individual pursuits, as well.

Where He Came From

Pre-Passion House, Millman was a DJ and producer of house music & techno. At one point, he started a record label with a friend who’s now running it. His musical skills are used in conjunction with company initiatives these days, including at events with organizations like Common Threads–his last performance. And it all comes together: “Blending records is similar to blending coffee,” says Millman. “You want things to match up, to work together; are they in the same tone, same key?

“I’m not a huge blends guy, but when I do, I want you to be able to taste all the flavors and nuances of each coffee.”

Millman began roasting eight years ago, having been recruited by a roaster in San Diego, Calif., Cafe Calabria, to help run their downtown cafe. “I started learning how to service all the equipment because the owner also ran a service company,” he remembers. “When I started roasting, I literally stood by the roaster’s side for seven hours a day, just watching, listening, asking questions. [The roaster] would be saying, ‘Hear this? See that?’

“We also did a lot of cupping, every single day at 9 a.m., every single coffee so he could translate what was going on and look for little variances that changed the profile of the coffee.

“After six days a week for a month or so, was finally able to jump on the roaster with him there and had to do that for another three months, and then I was off on my own.”

He learned on a UG-22 model Probat and now roasts on a UG-15, which he likes and calls very “user friendly.”

Passion House Rules

Millman moved back to Chicago in 2006 to open a branch of Cafe Calabria. That didn’t work out, so instead he spent the next 4.5 years working for a roaster in Evanston (since closed), which was a “totally different, valuable learning experience.

“It was more free-flowing, free-form, not as reigimented and I learned a lot about the business side of coffee and was eventually doing more sales, consulting and training,” says Millman, which turned out to be essential in Passion House’s immediate and continued success.

It’s all about sourcing the right beans, “the best coffee we can,” says Millman. “Shannon Steele Knuckles is our brew specialist and quality-control person. She has one of the best palates in Chicago, and we’re cupping [constantly]. The goal is to stand out of the way of the coffee while I’m roasting and let the natural complexities of flavor come out and not have the roast influence the coffee.

“I can be sensitive to the roast, so I like to let the roast not influence the flavors and work on bringing out the fruit and sweetness of every coffee, letting it shine.”

But, yes, there are rules. Passion House doesn’t offer any dark roast coffees. “I’ve been in the coffee business for more than 16 years and some people just feel darker is better, but I really just talk to people and try to educate them.

“Most of the time they just want some body out of the coffee and, if you can change their mind, it’s really exciting.”

Color Us…Enticed

In addition to the quality of the beans that were thoroughly vetted by the managers of our Guest Roaster Program, it’s also Passion House’s take on the philosophy of coffee that intrigued us, their willingness to teach AND learn.

“Coffee is an endless search for knowledge, that’s the beauty of it,” says Millman, noting that Passion House is located in a warehouse space at Damen Avenue and Fulton Street here in Chicago, a business development center (ICMC) which houses other artisanal businesses, including artists, a woodshop and a metal worker. “I lease out part of my space to The Infusion Project, an art project with monthly benefit shows, all local artists. All proceeds go to benefit different places. The last one we had was for this cultural center in Hyde Park.”

These guys are good at bringing it all together, the whole bean, as it were. And, so, we’ll let them wrap this up and bask in their glowing praise. It goes both ways.

“I just want to convey how excited we are to be working with Wormhole Coffee,” says Millman. “I love them and think they do such a fantastic job. We’re always looking for interesting things to do, maybe a pop-up cafe in the near future, and, at some point or another, definitely going to have a retail outlet. The question is not if, it’s when.”

Thanks go to: “My wife, Annie, and Bayla, my daughter. They’ve been so supportive. It’s tough for her because I’m gone, leaving in the morning and not home until after my daughter goes to bed but she’s in it 100-percent. My family and friends have always been helpful and supportive.

“I’m surrounded by good people and try to be the best person I can be and attract good people to me and I’ve just been really fortunate. For us, it’s [about] building community and partnerships. We’re constantly checking in on our customers, seeing what we can do together…even in the building, this happens.”

DYK: Millman’s brother cooks at Sable Kitchen & Bar here in Chicago with accomplished and much-lauded chef, Heather Terhune? Good palates run in the family.

Posted by masterworm on July 16, 2012 at 9:06 pm

Backporch Coffee Roasters: Beans Touched With Loveliness

As is common knowledge, many of the best things in life begin in small, cramped cafes, and so it began for Backporch Coffee Roasters, “a small coffee roasting company in the heart of the west side of Bend, Oregon.”

Founded by Dave and Majell Beach in 2006, Backporch isn’t a huge operation, but the entire team there has put the non-proverbial blood, sweat and tears into making direct connections with coffee growers and serving the Bend community quality, fresh-roasted coffee–something which they’re not alone in doing, says Backporch’s Tony Querio, who we spoke with over the phone recently.

“I believe there are a total of six roasters here in Bend, one with two labels,” says Querio. “We get a lot of people from Seattle, Portland and San Francisco vacationing here, so they have a level of expectation we work hard to meet.

“Bend is also, I believe, one of the cities with the highest number of breweries per capita,” he continues. “It’s a beverage-focused community with lots of appreciation for the palate.”

Coffee fits right into Bend, an outdoor sport-driven community where cycling reigns large among local sports. Backporch gets in on the action by supporting two local cycling teams and serving coffee at the races in town.

Back To Cramped Cafes

As mentioned above, Backporch was founded six years ago (this October, actually). A year-and-a-half ago, they opened up a second location, a cafe with shorter hours and a smaller staff; it’s predominantly a production facility. “You walk past the roaster to go to the bathroom,” says Querio. “The open floor plan allows us to feature the roaster.”

Then, in September, 2011, Backporch moved the original location across the street, expanding into what now could be called their predominant cafe. Like Querio said, the roasterie-bearing location is more production-focused and shares speace with both a winery and brewery–known as a plus-plus. “There’s definitely a cool artisan thing going on in that building,” says Querio.

Expansion Comes & Into The Wormhole

We’re proud to say that we are Backporch’s first guest account and Querio had some kind words to say about why they approached us about working together: “We pursued it because you see so much battling within the coffee world, trash talking, competition and stuff,” says Querio. “We see the coffee industry going forward only if people combine resources, help each other.

“The Wormhole, when they have a guest roaster, writes about them and promotes them and generally gives a lot of attention to their providers. That connected with us, the respect they have for roasters, we wanted to be part of that.” Thanks for the kind words; glad to have you on board.

Getting Involved; Staying Involved

Specialty roasters these days are obviously interested in the entire life of the beans they’ll eventually craft into coffee, but it’s hard to do that and make it count for more moderately-sized roasters, but Backporch has proven that it can be done.

“For us, we have huge respect for the entire supply chain that ends in roasting,” says Querio. “The way we look at coffee is that it is in its purest form perfectly ripe on the tree and everyone who touches it on the way down has the potential to best represent that perfection and ideally not ruin it.

“There’s a fine line between representing the coffee and not doing anything to it, but everybody who plays a role has intrinsic value,” he continues. “A coffee plant takes five years to produce a crop, then it’s growing season, harvesting, shipping and all those things can take so long. I put it in my roaster for 15 minutes, a barista works with it for five minutes. It’s a small role, but also very big in that it’s the final step as it goes to the customer.”

Again, Backporch proves small companies can do big things by focusing on relationships. “We’re a small roaster in the grand scheme of things, but we have amazing relationships with our producers,” says Querio, noting that part of that success hinges on the fact that even new employees go on origin trips as soon as they’re hired.

“Being there, you learn so much more and a lot of our employees switch from, ‘I’m doing coffee as something to get me through until I get another job, this is a real thing.’ After the origin trip, it’s like, ‘I’m not just selling someone a beverage, I’m selling a product from these certain producers, who I’ve met.’

“We recognize we’re a really small company still and we don’t have the resources of larger coffee roasters, but we really want to use the power that we have as best we can,” says Querio. “We buy as many coffees direct as we can and have the closest relationship possible with each coffee we roast.”

Querio roasts at Backporch, along with founder, Dave Beach. Come by The Wormhole and try their beans while you can. We’re positive you will enjoy.

Now, a cute animal photo with the product we’re hawking because we hear that’s what moves traffic on the Interwebz. Speaking of, you can purchase Backporch Coffee Roasters online; more about their roasting philosophy; and where to find Backporch Coffee Roasters HQ. Now, that cute animal photo:

Posted by masterworm on July 2, 2012 at 9:50 pm

Everyone Needs An Invisible Touch

Our newest signature drink, the Invisible Touch, is something nice, summery and not caffeinated. Before you decree heresy, you strung-out bean juice drinkers, we wanted this because we are concurrently offering one of the few Wormhole Signature Drinks to make repeated returns to the ring…Rocket Sauce–plenty of power there.

“It’s something you want when it’s hot out, but the Rocket Sauce can be intense because it’s so highly caffeinated,” says our Head Trainer, Nathan Black. “You don’t have to worry about side effects after drinking [the Invisible Touch]. It’s a soda and it’s summery and you drink it and go on with your day.”

Invisible Touch = Cucumber Water + Rose Water Foam + Lemon Zest

It’s $3, comes in a 10.5-oz. Collins (hint, hint on the name!) glass. “Naturally calling it ‘The Phil Collins’ was something we thought of, but it was too obvious,” says Black. Going back to Genesis, everybody loves it; the fact that the drink is translucent made it work that much better.”

The rose water foam is served out of a whipped cream canister you wish you had at home in the fridge. Come by, let us make this drink for you. Now, your “Invisible Touch.”

Posted by masterworm on June 12, 2012 at 5:51 pm

Rocket Sauce Is Back!

Posted by masterworm on May 18, 2012 at 1:34 pm

Handsome Coffee Roasters: Lookin’ Good!

We’ve been treating each and every one of you to a most delicious and affable coffee in the form of Handsome Coffee Roasters out of Los Angeles, Calif.

Hand-brewed within the parameters worked out by our guest coffee program managers (Otter and Canaan) and baristas, it’s been impressive to say the least and Super Hero-like to say the most.

Notes like these have been flying around: “We have been playing around with the samples you sent and the response has been overwhelmingly positive,” wrote Otter during the build-up to offering Handsome Coffee Roasters here at The Wormhole. “At what temperature are you guys pulling the Los Naranjos as an espresso?”

Answer directly from Handsome Coffee Roasters co-founder, Tyler Wells: “We’re pulling Los Naranjos at 18-18.5 grams in and 27-29 grams out. About 25 seconds. It’s fruity, creamy and pleasantly balanced.” It’s no surprise he’s taking the time to answer emails such as ours personally, when we spoke with him over the phone for this article he was out making deliveries.

“I do it every Monday and Wednesday and it’s my most productive time of the week,” says Wells. “I make a big loop, visit coffee bars and restaurants; it’s a nice way to stay in touch with our customers even though they’re surprised to see me showing up personally.

“[But] I’m the service guy and I like to know what’s going on, to drink the coffee at your place and hear what’s going on first-hand,” he continues, discussing his changing role within the company as Handsome expands. “At this point in the business it’s very interesting. I’ll have a meeting with the creative director from a hotel and then go back to the shop and have to repair a fetco.”

These guys are good. Now, more.

L.A. Gets Handsome Cafe

Nascent coffee scenes are fledgling and fun, and you can get some of such a thing in Los Angeles these days, at–you guessed it–Handsome Coffee Roasters.

They’ve recently opened up in L.A.’s Arts District at 582 Mateo Street in a cafe with open views of the roasting operations that’s already a coffee geek destination, no doubt. The space is sleek and eminently viable. “The new space turned out better than I imagined,” says Wells.

The human aspect of the vibe, however, is more fuzzy-warm panda bear than order-correctly-or-else. A mixture of “coffee geek” and non-judgmental drink slinger define the hospitality that pervades the company, says Wells. “Two things: one, we know we’re not going to be everything to everybody, so we’re not going to try. We have a core group of customers who absolutely love what we do and we’d rather be amazing for fewer people.

“[The second thing]: In the coffee bar, the motto is to treat everybody how they deserve to be treated,” he continues, espousing and crediting inspiration for this to well-known New York City chef, Danny Meyer. “You can go spend $400 on a meal at one of his spots wearing whatever you want, and they’ll treat you how you deserve to be treated,” says Wells.

This is regularly reinforced at the cafe, top to bottom. “We talk about not losing sight of the value of every single customer that comes into the cafe,” says Wells. “They’re paying for something and have expectations. We have people who fly in from Australia and we’re their first stop. I flew to Chicago to go to Intelligentsia Coffee and it was my first stop, and if someone had been [rude] or sloppy, I’dve been like, ‘I flew to Chicago for this?’

“[We’re constantly] trying to get across to our staff the different expectations people have, whether a coffee geek or someone who’s just tired and headed to work. If people want to nerd out about coffee, we’re all about it. If they just want it to-go, we’ll do it quick and with a smile.”

That pays dividends, notes Wells. “I’ll read online reviews and people will say we didn’t have this sugar or that milk, but we were really nice, and I can stand that review.

Handsome Coffee Roasters: The Goods

That’s the philosophy and that’s customer service side of Handsome. Well, here’s their actual philosophy/mission statement as writ by them:

“We will make amazing coffee the way we think it should be made. Full stop. Our way may not be for everyone, and that’s okay: we’re not making coffee for everyone…we’re making coffee for you. For those who value craftsmanship and quality over convenience and cost – we’re your huckleberry. –HCR”

As far as the on-site product, they keep it near-perfect simple. They basically offer three drinks: espresso, brewed coffee and espresso with milk. They each come in three sizes (three-, five- and ten-ounce). Simple. And good. “We buy really sweet, delicious milk that’s responsibly raised; [we] buy the best coffee beans in the world, then roast them really well. That’s the situation and that’s what we do.”

There is method behind the method. “Before changing the perception of what coffee is to people who drink it, our customers, we’re really trying to have a pure representation of what coffee is. In our coffee bar we have only whole milk, no substitutes,” says Wells. “[We offer] four items made from two ingredients. We don’t charge an exorbitant amount but we ask what it’s worth, because we pay more so the farmers can make a living and invest in their coffee. It’s a commitment to supporting people who are doing good work. There’s a difference between saying it and doing it.

We’ll be saying and doing Handsome Coffee Roasters all during the month of May, 2012, but you’ll find it being gracefully (and hospitably) slung here at The Wormhole from time to time, much as we can. Handsomely, in fact.

Posted by masterworm on May 16, 2012 at 2:42 pm

Stumptown Coffee Roasters At Wormhole Coffee Chicago!

Photo Credit: http://www.stumptownmag.com

We’ve been carrying beans from Stumptown Coffee Roasters for a few days only and you have really responded, no doubt. So much so, we doubled our order to meet demand. We can see why you’re flocking, we flocked, too; and will continue to flock to spiritually nutritious beans like these absolutely anytime. Yes, we will.

In addition to being vurry popular within the friendly confines we proffer you here at Wormhole Coffee, Stumptown is getting nods from all directions, but is still fairly hard to procure in the Chicago area–obvi. You can also pick it up at Heritage Bicycles, a fairly new and happy-making fusion of cafe and bike shop that we could do with more of, and will. So, we mentally connected with Jon Feldman, Stumptown’s director of operations, based in NYC. Without technical assistance and using the power of the collective mind trust that resides daily here at Wormhole, drinking coffee and disguising themselves as customers, we connected with Mr. Feldman to get the latest on Stumptown for you. And posterity, of course.

Stumptown & The Wormhole

First, Chicago. “We’re really having fun with [the] coffee [scene] in Chicago,” says Feldman. “We have team members from there. The food scene is fantastic, as well, and we’ve had a lot of people reaching out to us about [bringing Stumptown Coffee to Chicago].” Obvi. “We decided to partner up with Heritage Bicycles and while we were there, [we] went around to some of the better shops in town,” remembers Feldman. “We walked in Wormhole and were pretty much immediately blown away by the Delorean, then we were blown away by our drinks. We met with a few members of the team, dropped off some coffee, and told them to get in touch and I think it was Otter who reached out to us not too long after about having us as a guest roaster.”

The goal in Chicago isn’t to sign up a slew of accounts, says Feldman, but to find solid partners who want to be serious about coffee and have fun at the time–right up our alley here at Wormhole. “I like the Wormhole, it’s just fun by default. You walk in there and it’s so unpretentious, about getting back to the basics,” he says. “It’s a great example from my perspective of how to do things at a high level but make it really approachable. It’s possible.”

Quantity AND Quality: It’s Possible

Stumptown carries wholesale accounts distributed in NYC, Philly, Boston, and Washington, D.C., but the majority of their wholesale accounts are in their hometown of Portland, Ore., and up/down the West Coast. Portland is home, more so as we speak. “As we continue to grow, lot of exciting things happening in the company,” says Feldman. “We are moving into a large HQ space in Portland, which we’ve never had before. It will give us a tighter handle on operations.”

That’s important, because “we want to grow with integrity,” says Feldman, noting it’s in Stumptown’s DNA. “We will never change the principles that matter: how we source our coffee, for example.” One of those principles is to buy raw coffee beans from farmers with whom they can work with directly,” he continue, referring to the sometimes misunderstood, often misused label, direct trade. When well-concepted and -executed, it can be a game changer for the farmer and those of us who like mightily fine coffee, which comes from mightily finely treated coffee beans, of course. “[Stumptown has] formed and maintained relationships with a number of farms abroad; almost all of our coffees are direct trade,” says Feldman. “We’re going to these farms and working to make sure the products are consistently good quality product year after year, and making sure the people we’re working with are well taken care of, are paid a good price, have the equipment they need, including ideas and philosophy behind growing they need. That will never change about us.”

The other thing that won’t likely change is that Stumptown doesn’t buy any coffee beans that fall under the 85-percent mark when cupped and scored. “We’re never going to deviate from that,” says Feldman. In addition to the beans, Stumptown has an active wholesale program that works to support retailers and/or shops with equipment and training. “We’re excited that we can feel good about growing and not feel we’re going to compromise the quality of our product. “It’s about having fun, being passionate about what you do and connecting with people. Wholesale is kind of an awesome thing if you think about it, helping change the conversation about what quality coffee is all about,” continues Feldman. “We take a lot of pride in what we do. The amount of detail and scrutiny that goes into making sure we have great coffee is unbelievable.”

Product For The People

Open up, don’t be snooty, says Feldman, a long-time sommelier and restaurant operator. “The public is becoming more and more aware of quality coffee. Why would we want to [stop people from] people changing their methods or what they buy? We collectively really need to make [specialty coffee] approachable.” It seems you’re finding Stumptown Coffee fairly approachable here at The Wormhole and we appreciate that. We’ll be featuring Stumptown throughout the month of April in the year 2012, as supplies last. Double that order!

FYI’s on Stumptown Coffee:

Stumptown Coffee Roasters: “Our Coffees” Roasting Philosophy! Brewing Guide Find them on Facebook and/or Twitter.

Posted by masterworm on April 6, 2012 at 2:24 pm

Worm Signature Drink: The Bedrock

Worm Signature Drink–Spring 2012

The Bedrock: an iced latte made with cereal milk and infused with a house-made fruity pebbles syrup. “It’s like watching cartoons all amped up on caffeinated, sugary milk,” says Wormhole general manager Sara Travis.

Posted by masterworm on March 27, 2012 at 11:13 am

Wormhole Coffee Log: Mexico

Mexico, this month’s regional profile, is the seventh largest producer of coffee in the world, and the number one producer of organic coffee by volume. Organic, Fair Trade, and Shade Grown coffee all fall under the category of sustainable coffee. The difference between these and what we at the Wormhole, as well as many thousands of roasters and retailers throughout the world, consider to be specialty coffee, is that there are almost no qualifications regarding quality when it comes to sustainable coffee. Specialty coffee, on the other hand, has no environmental or ethical prerequisites, but is simply coffee of a higher level of quality in all links of the market chain – production, roasting, and preparation. Organic coffee has nonetheless made a huge impact on the way people perceive and consume coffee in the past ten years, and has drawn much needed attention to the places and people from which it comes. In Mexico, the organic method and the Fair Trade market system have been adopted so widely by farmers that most of the information I was able to find for this article was written about these particular demarcations of coffee. Because the future of coffee farming, across the entire spectrum of quality, is affected by the same forces that are causing farmers to adopt these methods, in this article we will be mainly focusing the organic movement in Mexico, its history, and its concurrent impact on specialty coffee.

The Geography & The Beans

Being so far above the equator, Mexico does not have the best geography for coffee production in terms of basic growing requirements, with the exception of the southernmost provinces, most notably the states of Veracruz, Oaxaca, and Chiapas. Chiapas is responsible for the majority of the specialty coffee on the market today, followed by Oaxaca (see sources below). 98% of coffee grown in Mexico is of the Arabica sub-species, with the most common varietals being Bourbon, Mundo Novo, Caturra, and Maragogype. Specialty coffees of notoriety are mostly grown in the southeastern corner of the country, in the mountainous regions that border Guatemala, and share many of the same flavour qualities as good high grown Guatemalan coffees. The coffees from this region are typically light in body, with mild chocolate and floral notes, and crisp acidity. The name ‘alturra’ is used in Mexico to indicate high-elevation coffees. Most Mexican coffee, over 82% in one study, is processed using the washed method. The majority of high quality coffee you’ll see from this region uses this processing style, as it tends to have greater consistency and less defects. Due to water shortages and conservation concerns, some Mexican coffees are processed using the semi-washed, or pulped natural method, as it is sometimes called, which uses about a third of the water as traditional washing techniques, and typically has more body and slightly less acidity than fully washed coffees.

The People & The Market

With most of Mexico’s over half a million coffee farmers growing on less than 12 acres of land, it is a working population that sees subsistence as its primary motivator. The efforts of a whole year’s worth of labor are often traded for less than a family needs to survive, leaving many coffee farmers struggling. Chiapas, the state responsible for producing the majority of the country’s specialty coffee, at over 40% has the highest rate of malnutrition in all of Mexico. In more recent history, with so many families losing members to migration, the cost of labor has increased, which already represents about 90% of the cost of production for most farmers. Many coffee farmers lacking access to cooperatives and without means of transportation end up selling their coffees at below-market prices to intermediaries, or coyotes as they are called in Mexico, most of whom work for foreign multi-national corporations.

To give this rather depressing set of facts some historical precedence, in the late 80’s the Mexican government abandoned a state-run coffee institution that had been primarily responsible for the commercialization and export of coffees by smallholders. By the early 90’s, all state-owned coffee processing plants were closed and power was transferred to farmer’s co-ops and the private sector. This transition was difficult and fell at a time when coffee markets around the globe were suffering from over-saturation due to the United States pulling out of (and thus effectively killing) the International Coffee Agreement. The ICA, which regulated how much coffee was to be allowed onto the global market at any given time and by whom, kept countries from flooding the market when they had excesses, keeping market prices relatively stable. Between ‘89 and ‘93, during this time of global deregulation, coffee production in Mexico fell by over a third with a corresponding loss of farmer income of 70%. As a result, many farmers turned to organic and fair trade methods in an attempt to stay afloat in a sinking market. This fallout, which was affected in part by actions on the international level, in particular those of the United States, is key to understanding why Mexican farmers have taken this distinct approach to keeping their livelihoods viable in an unstable market. For example, from 1985 to 1995, the United States, the main international buyer of green coffee from its southern neighbor, saw the retail price of coffee increase by 30%, while during that same period the amount of money per dollar that went to producer countries went from $.38 to $.23, a 40% reduction. This time period saw increasing grower unrest and the advent of the organic and Fair Trade movements as we know them today.

Organic A Struggle

Because the organic movement in America has been broad and at times vague in its approach to consumers, and since more than half the specialty coffee from Mexico is organic, understanding what defines a product as organic is an important step in appreciating this region. Like all agricultural products sold in the United States that are certified organic by the USDA, organic coffee must follow certain guidelines regarding its cultivation and processing that are environmentally sustainable and safe. These include, for example, using only organic fertilizers instead of petrochemicals, implementing crop rotation, ensuring the proper handing of waste materials, and in general following procedures that will maintain or improve the natural resources of the area under cultivation. Organic coffee must be produced, processed, shipped, roasted, and retailed under strict guidelines in order to carry the little green sticker. Organic coffee must not come into contact with commercial coffee, even residually, meaning roasters cannot roast an certified organic coffee directly after roasting a commercial one – they must roast a ‘buffer batch’ in between, that cannot be sold as organic, to essentially ‘purify’ the roaster of the harmful residues of the commercial beans. Some of these standards can be difficult and costly to follow, especially for growers, such as ensuring the coffee does not come into contact with any equipment, materials, or surfaces that are not compliant with the organic standard, for example the bags the coffee cherry is picked into and the tables on which it sorted. Many farmers also struggle with the certification fee – $350 a year – as well as finding a buyer for their organic coffee, a large percentage of which ends up being sold to commercial exporters for lack of a buyer.

The organic market, like the commercial one, has its own fluctuations from year to year, and may not provide enough of a price incentive for some producers for whom the transition to and regulations of organic production come at too high a cost, such as the poorest farmers and those without co-op membership. Instead of, or frequently in addition to, the organic market, many farmers choose to sell their coffee as Fair Trade, a label distinct from organic but emerging from the same concerns regarding commercial practices and market instability. Fair Trade coffees are guaranteed a price-per-pound that does not change from year to year, allowing farmers to avoid the risk of losing everything on a bad year. Additionally, the regulatory agencies that oversee Fair Trade co-operatives provide premiums above the FT price for those organizations that give back to their communities by investing in improvements in such things as roads, schools, and social infrastructure. The drawback is that when the conventional market value goes above the FT price, as it has done the past couple of years, farmers can potentially lose money, discouraging growers and which may dismantle the long-term development plans of many communities. Many have criticized the Fair Trade system for failing to bring communities out of poverty, claiming that they hold them at a certain level where they are essentially treading water. Fairtrade International, the umbrella agency that oversees roughly 20 partner agencies in countries around the globe, in response to market conditions as well as these and other criticisms, has recently announced an overall raise in the Fair Trade minimum price, up from $1.26 to $1.40 for washed Arabica, increases in premiums for Fair Trade coffee that is also grown organically, and additional premiums for community development.

Not All Buzzwords Are Bad

Shade grown coffee, another buzz word that emerged in the early to mid nineties, was created in response to growing concern, mostly from consumer nations, about the damage to ecological diversity, in particular bird species, that is caused by certain cultivation techniques. When coffee is grown in open fields without natural shade, many animals that normally inhabit these regions can no longer survive for lack of food, shelter, or due to environmental toxins that are introduced due to coffee production. Farmers in Mexico have traditionally grown coffee using shade trees as a way to control the development of the coffee’s growing cycles, meaning Mexican coffee farms generally exhibit greater biological diversity than coffee from other countries, such as Costa Rica, who rely heavily on petro-chemicals and more robust varietals such as Catuai, which can handle direct sunlight. Many of these cultural-environmental factors that already existed made it relatively easy for Mexican farmers to convert to sustainable production methods, since their practices were passively organic from the beginning.

Organic and Fair Trade coffees, although offering price stability and environmental and community benefits for those who are able to participate, are still highly reliant on intermediaries, often require costly certification processes, and are not available to all farmers. Buyers for these markets, motivated by consumer demand, are also increasingly concerned with quality, something many growers are unaware of or uneducated about and for which there is an increasing need for outreach and grower education. Specialty coffee offers the greatest farmer compensation of all the various markets, however, Mexico has not turned to increased quality as a source of farmer profits the way other Latin American countries have done, instead relying heavily on the organic and Fair Trade models. With the best tasting Mexican coffees keeping stride with their southern competition, one can only hope that there will be more efforts made to increase grower awareness and support so that more of us here in the US can enjoy them as both organic and delicious.

Sources:

Hernandez, Gabriel, and Mark Ford. United States, Department of Agriculture, Foreign Agriculture Service. Mexico Corners the Market on Organic Coffee Production. Global Agriculture Information Network, May 2010. Link here.

Eakin, Hallie, Catherine Tucker, and Edwin Castellanos. “Responding to the Coffee Crisis: A Pilot Study of Farmer’s Adaptations in Mexico, Guatemala, and Honduras.” The Geographic Journal, Vol 172, No. 2, June 2006.

Beadle, Kristian. “Chiapas Coffee: Price, Politics, and Precipitation.” Miller-McCune. Oct. 25, 2011. Link here.

Dill, Mike. “From the Ground Up: Organic Coffee Certification, Production, and Processing.” Coffeetalk Magazine. Nov. 2009. Link here.

Clay, Jason. World Agriculture and the Environment: A Commodity-by-Commodity Guide to Impacts and Practices. World Wildlife Fund. Island Press, 2004.

Calo, Muriel, and Timothy A. Wise. Revaluing Peasant Coffee Production: Organic and Fair Trade Markets in Mexico. Global Development and Environment Institute, Oct. 2005. Link here.

Posted by AndreaOtte on March 15, 2012 at 5:29 pm

Noble Coffee Roasting: All Heart

Worm has been revamped. You seem to like it. Now we’re sweetening the pot with guest beans from Noble Coffee Roasting, out of Ashland, Oregon. You will like these beans greatly, yes, you will.

As you know, we have a proclivity toward NOTES. Our guest roaster program managers, Otter and Canaan, have taken this to the extreme when utilizing these notes of which we speak to decide upon and most fruitfully interact with our guest roasters. In the case of Noble Coffee, this was appreciated.

“Otter and Canaan sent us descriptions that were spot-on, exactly the way we feel about those coffees,” says Noble’s founder, Jared Rennie. “We appreciate obviously legit coffee people tasting our coffees and appreciating them, I just want to say that.”

Oregon & A Beautiful Rogue

First off, the Noble folks are situated in the Rogue Valley, “a really beautiful place to live, a little gem,” says Rennie.

Before he founded Noble, but already in the coffee business, he had offers to work for various other companies, but “the hallmark of our company is that we really, really love where we live a lot,” he says. “Sure, we could have a bigger company in a larger area, but this place is so beautiful and it’s home base.” By the way: Rennie went to high school and college in the Rogue Valley. It’s home.

It’s also a much-visited tourist town and plays host to the annual Oregon Shakespeare Festival. Noble lives and breathes in a main coffee house and roasterie (opened in 2009), and also slings beans from a “walk-in closet-sized” coffee bar serving espresso and chemex pours. They also do their thing weekly during the summertime at the local farmer’s market.

The. Core. Philosophy.

From there, it’s about the coffee. “We are the only coffee company in the world that blends the level of quality we do with the dedication to sustainability we have,” says Rennie, noting it can be the high-end kind of difficult to reconcile the two. He explains:

“One of my majors was international studies and I spent a lot of time in Latin America and have seen the way societies are affected by doing business with the United States and Europe,” says Rennie. “When I visit farms, I care about how what we are doing as a company affects not just the well-to-do folks, because in South America there is a small and powerful upper class, and one of the reasons I started the company was to make sure those folks at the lower levels are increasingly doing better.

“[I've] been a judge for the Cup of Excellence in Brazil, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Columbia; I’ve visited farms in Panama, Costa Rica and all the places I’ve just mentioned, and every time you go, you can figure out who the big dogs are, who are the people who care about quality social change, who just cares about quality, and who cares about both,” says Rennie. “I’ll be on a bus with coffee buyers from all over the world and they’ll say, ‘What a nice guy!’, and I want to say, ‘He’s also married to the daughter of the ex-president.’ The point is a lot of folks in specialty coffee are buying from people that are already really, really well off.

“What also happens is that those sorts of people are established and also conservative and kind of mechanized,” Rennie says, and focuses in on his subject. “What we know is that coffee is the number-two most chemically laden crop in the world that we consumer. Cotton is number one.”

Rennie and his team work to look deeper into situations and make decisions based on those facts. “We like to research and get into the entire situation,” he says. “Are there other animals on the farm or are they just mono-cropping coffee? How is the coffee itself being treated? Are the owners of the farm living a decent life? How are the pickers being treated? If it’s seasonal labor, where are they sleeping and what’s it look like? Their compensation? We want to find fantastic coffees and compensate the farmers accordingly, but it’s not just about compensation,” continues Rennie.

“This all happens once we’ve deciphered that the coffee is amazing,” he says, his voice becoming even more animated. “Number one, it has to be blow-your-mind, awesome, awesome coffee.

“It’s not true that it’s hard to find great coffee. [You] get out there, figure out who to talk to, and [there is] awesome coffee everywhere,” says Rennie. “The tricky part is to find awesome coffee, with a good story behind it, that’s sustainably produced.”

Obviously, what Rennie is talking about doing is harder than he makes it sound. There are reasons why. He was a high school Spanish teacher for eight years (his wife, Carolyn, is too). He judged his first Cup of Excellence in 2008 in Nicaragua, was on a large panel of experts and was the only one who spoke Spanish. He ended working as a go-between for multiple roasters striking deals with producers. People noticed and he got offers to work for top companies that were much appreciated, but Rennie knew Noble was his destiny.

Noble History & How It Works

Rennie begat Noble Coffee Roasting in his garage in 2007. He bought a Probat, started roasting coffees and giving them away, then got busy with wholesale accounts and residential coffee delivery before going through the aforementioned expansion into the current space.

Everyone on the relatively small staff at Noble can handle almost any position within the company at a moment’s notice. “We all do everything, right? I’m a barista, I work the bar, I roast, I cup.

“We don’t hire roasters, we hire bar backs, train them to be baristas and when they’re great baristas, we consider teaching them how to roast. Everyone here is multi-skilled, which is really cool,” says Rennie, noting that with such dedication comes a fair bit of pain. “We are so dedicated to these ideals, the core values I’ve set for the company (quality, service, sustainability), it’s unending,” he says. “It’s about uncompromising quality and dedication to service for our customers, employees, suppliers.

“It’s an unending quest,” he says, a noble one we think. Also, Noble Coffee is about gratitude: “My wife, Carolyn…this company wouldn’t exist without her,” says Rennie. “When I was teaching and had this dream, she was the one that said, ‘Let’s do it, let’s give it a go.’ She’s very supportive.

“Also, big props to Caleb Peterson, our wholesale manager, fantastic barista, and all-around good guy,” says Rennie. “Reed Bentley is doing most of our roasting now, is a fantastic barista and a wonderful roaster.

“Peter McCarville is our retail manager and he’s somebody I couldn’t live without. Also, Marjie Gosling, our director of sales. She’s the reason we have this relationship with Wormhole Coffee,” says Rennie. “She’s also a fantastic barista, has baked for us at times and generally does a lot of stuff.

“We have five key people and three of them know how to roast, and we’re all tasting coffees at the bar, checking the roasting–whatever it takes.”

And that’s what it comes down to, whatever it takes. Come try Noble’s beans at Wormhole Coffee all through this month of March in the year 2012.

Noble Coffee Roasting: award-winning coffee!

Posted by masterworm on March 13, 2012 at 10:15 am

FYI, In Case You Hadn’t Heard…

Posted by masterworm on March 7, 2012 at 9:05 pm

Supreme Revamp Underway: Proof

Hey Folks,

Things are on track to ensure we come back to your right on time. Our artists, laborers and layabouts are straining mightily to open the bean vats back up to public consumption. This should be happening on or just after Saturday, March 3. The following is…progress. Finality will come sooner than you know. For now…

A look inside the revamp

Advanced Delorean Hoisting

Espresso table delightfully customized and brilliant in all aspects—we think.

Nathan Lyle Black at Wormhole Coffee

Girl In A Bubble

Posted by masterworm on March 1, 2012 at 12:30 am

WORM REVAMP SUPREME COMING UP

We’re looking forward to it.. and we’re not looking forward to it.

The Wormhole Coffee (that’s us) will be closing up
shop not for a rest, but for a re-do. We love
our space, but we’ve been living in it for
a couple years, so we’re bringing in an
off-planet construction crew that’s been
researching hull shapes and such for
decades now, anticipating this moment.

We’ll leave them to it, for the most
part, but here are the things we know:

1. The whole place is going
to be torn apart.

We’re starting from scratch, especially
in respect to our bar. This should
increase customer flow because there is
essentially none as it stands and it sucks. We’ll
push the bar back, have food items and retail at the front.
It’ll be easy to come, order, and leave—or stay. Also, there’ll be lovely seating around the entire bar, which, BTW == hyperspatial palette infusion & ecstasy array.

2. The DeLorean is going airborne.

It’ll likely leave its spot in the front window and head up, up and up–seriously, above the bathrooms at the back of the shop. We’ll be reinforcing the supporting wall, obvi, and hoping it’ll end up in full flight mode with some advantageous strokes of lighting falling here and there.

This’ll also open up about ten, count ‘em ten, new seats in the front of the shop, the better for you to lounge and laze or have corporate-type meetings or whatever it is that you’re trying to do here.

3. The Custom Espresso Machine Table

One of our ‘Mad Genius’ staffers designed and built our custom espresso machine table. Ice and other extraneous-yet-needed accoutrements will be on-hand, perpetually. Water will flow, efficiency will grow, your drinks will be “Better…Stronger… (and likely) Faster.” Awesome-nova.

4. New and tastier foods.

We’ll have a new line of sandwiches, healthy & completely
tasty OJ, yogurt, and highly-specialized granola.

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

All that said, the whole point of the new space will be to make life better for our baristas, allow more room for stretching out to our peoples and to…evolve. We don’t ever want to tamper with the fact that The Wormhole Coffee is about comfort…a comfy, calming, productive space with couches. The better for you, and for us. We will continue to alert this planet to our re-opening factoids and keep you updated on the process throughout.

Stay tuned to The Wormhole on Facebook and Twitter, of course. We will also be dispensing data on a new social platform not yet readily available on Earth (besides here) and will let you know about that sometime in the past, but you’ll think it’s the future, and…okay the DeLorean’s working. Gotta go. But yea, see you again soon. Thanks for enduring this critical transformation with us!

Our hearts will be with you.

Always.

Posted by masterworm on February 15, 2012 at 6:07 pm

Coava: In Chicago, Only at Wormhole

We’re going to talk about the beans being sprayed our way by Portland, Oregon-based Coava Coffee. But first, we have to admit, we kind of want to go there for a visit and then just kind of not leave. Ever. Never ever.

We talked to one of Coava’s original team members, Sam Purvis, about the new’s and the next’s and the were’s–but first, about working there. “Coava is very small and very much like a family,” says Purvis. “Our staff meetings involve chicken wings and Coors Light and lots of fun times, [while] talking about getting better.

“We all roast and make coffee in the same space. We share life together and are growing up in this industry together,” he continues. “We have a really good [coffee] community here [in Portland], a lot of good friends at different coffee roasting companies and cafes. We hang out and see each other at regional competitions. It’s a great market to be making and roasting coffee, to say the least.”

It gets better. “We kind of just keep it simple. We really enjoy the coffees and farmers we work with, that’s our bread and butter. Three years in, we’re getting opportunities to work with farmers that usually take a long time to get into relationships with, and I think people just appreciate our company because our focus is on sourcing and roasting phenomenal coffee. We don’t get caught up on anything else…no drama, no bragging.” So we’ll be doing it for them.

From Whence They Come (And How They Evolved)

Founded by best friends Matt Higgins and Keith Gehrke in 2009, Coava is now operated by Higgins while Gehrke is putting his efforts into a new brewing company. According to Purvis, Higgins was a long-time figure in the Portland coffee scene and in the Bay Area before that. “For Matt, especially starting as a barista and working up to a point where he was really falling in love with coffees based on their region and terroir, he got to a point where he wanted to source and roast his own coffees,” says Purvis. Thus, Coava.

Obviously, Portland was ready to receive this caffeinated frequency. Coava procures and roasts only single farm, single producer coffees “that can stand on their own two legs,” says Purvis. “When Matt [Higgins] was working in coffee ten years ago and beyond, it was all about blends. He’d come across beautiful coffees from time to time, but didn’t have the availability of these coffees from producers focused on lot separation and such.

“As those coffees became more and more available, Matt felt the way people roasted should accommodate that. We don’t find a need to blend at all because there’s so many beautiful coffees that stand on their own and are grown properly.”

Higgins is the head roaster and still puts in heavy hours at the roaster (new 12-kilo roaster coming!). Purvis also roasts, and, in a quick aside, met Higgins while the two worked at a coffee bar in North Portland right as Higgins was starting Coava. “He had taken a job consulting for a coffee bar that was just getting off the ground,” remembers Purvis. “He taught me a lot about coffee and I started helping out with Coava in the baby stages, then went and worked for a friend of mine who owns coffee bars in Portland, then came on full-time at Coava 14 months ago.

“For me, it’s imporant to enjoy what you do and not get caught up in any of this being our identity, but enjoying people [who are] doing the same thing and give people props when they deserve them. Every one of us leaves our ego at the door.”

See what we’re talking about in regards to possible future employment at Coava Coffee? Looking for the HELP WANTED! sign still.

Evolution Underway

As noted above, things are being upgraded at Coava as we speak, equipment-wise. They are currently in the process of building out to accommodate their new roaster, a Probat 12-kilo L12 that “we just received in the mail,” says Purvis. “Right now, we’re roasting on a 5-kilo that’s sitting in our cafe space; the new roaster should be operational in about a month [March 2012].”

Coava currently has around seven or eight people working the cafe side of things with only Higgins, Purvis and their office manager, Laura holding down all aspects of their roasting operations.

At this juncture in the space-time continuum, and such, Coava distributes wholesale mostly in Portland and then in a few other major coffee markets: New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago with yours truly being the only destination in Chicago as you know and love it today. We wouldn’t be surprised–or chagrined–if this situation doesn’t last. The more ridiculously quality beans that flood the city of Chicago, the happier we’ll be about it all.

Come get’em at Wormhole while you can; Coava Coffee is our Guest Roaster of the Month for February, 2012. Drink it.

Other Fun Things We Found ‘Bout Coava Coffee

Seriously awesome post on Coava Coffee by the blog, Dear Coffee, I Love You. You can find this article and many more on Coava’s About Us page.

Posted by masterworm on February 14, 2012 at 12:01 pm

More Compost Than Ever at Wormhole (Seriously, That’s No BS)

Your beloved Worm-fam has begun an all out assault on all unnecessary waste created in producing our liquid nectar of the gods.

We’ve been proactive since our humble beginnings in limiting excess strain on the environment through large-scale [legit] recycling, to-go containers comprised of compostable/non-petroleum plastics, and safe cleaning supplies. We’re taking it a step further and have joined up with Growing Power to begin a compost program.

It’s our goal, with the help of all you lovely people, to cut our garbage in half over the next six months.

Considering most of our trash is compiled of compostable cups and coffee grounds, this should be a relativity easy goal to reach. How can you help? Skip the trash and toss it in the bus bin! We’ll be hand sorting everything that stays out of the garbage so if you’re unsure what can be composted, just toss it in with the dishes and let us figure it out.

If you’ve got questions or would like to get involved please feel free to send them along to compost@thewormholecoffee.com.

More information on Growing Power available at www.growingpower.org.

Posted by masterworm on January 18, 2012 at 4:30 pm

Madcap Coffee…In Your Pants

Neither mad nor angry nor especially prone to wearing caps, Madcap Coffee has indeed still won over our ever-lovely-beans-loving hearts here at Wormhole Coffee in Chicago.

Our guest roaster for January, 2012, their beans will be gracing our espresso and/or pourover counters on most days. Of course, that’s when the burros are able to make it through the interwoven mountain passes they must traverse to get Madcap’s mad-lovely (did we mention they’re ever-so-lovely beans?) beans to you. We’re completely making things up now, but that’s the last of that.

Now, The Notes

Founder, Visionary and Head Bean Sprayer at Madcap Coffee is Trevor Corlett, who founded the company in 2008 with help from stand-ups like Ryan Knapp, who we talked to for this installment in our so-so-lovely guest roaster series. Knapp is the head of roasting operations at at Madcap and one of the founders.

Some background on the Madcappers: “Trevor is the main founder,” says Knapp. “I came up with him and helped him launch it but it was his dream and idea, and it came together.

“He’s a super laid-back dude but is so into coffee it’s ridiculous. He’s been doing it for [a decade or so] and was determined to make it work,” continues Knapp. “Even when everyone told him it was crazy, he kept going for it. He loves coffee and really wants to break it down and get people excited about it, to enjoy it.”

As you know, we’re not afraid to range far and wide for our Wormhole Coffee guest roasters, but not always. We haven’t mentioned this yet, but Madcap’s main HQ (i.e. roasterie and coffee shop) are located a scant four hours away in Grand Rapids, Mich. Not San Francisco? The horror, etc. Seriously, though, coffee is a staple. We all get it. Humans get it. Grand Rapidians get it.

“A lot of people are surprised when we say we’re from Grand Rapids,” says Knapp. “It’s not where you’d expect something like Madcap to be, I guess, but this community was definiteliy ready for it, is into great food and beverages. We had a ton of support from the get go and keep getting more.” Go Grand Rapids; make you less reticent to bring a true coffee shop experience to your hometown? [Bad (or Good?) Angel: Are you crazed? Don't get into the coffee shop business! You'll never sleep...or make money...again.] We’re back. What was that? Anyway…Madcap Coffee.

The Present…And The Future (Of Course)

Per mention above, Madcap’s in their third year of roasting coffee with a sweet, totally hipster-ready shop in downtown Grand Rapids that gets all kinds of overly-effusive reviews (we’re just jealous) and seem to have a bevy of ridiculously cool people working for them. Barista exchange, guys? Not permanent but, lingering, perhaps? Let us know.

Anyway, “At this point, we’re one cafe and one roasterie,” says Knapp. “Our roaster is in the basement of our cafe and all of our coffee is done in real legit small batch roasting. Our batch size is 15 pounds, so we put a lot of emphasis on profiling and bringing out the best flavor in the coffee.”

All cool, all good. What’s that he went on to say? “We’re expanding with an upcoming cafe and roasterie in Washington, D.C., sometime this summer,” says Knapp, noting that Corlett has moved to the area to spearhead the effort. Just like in Grand Rapids, the philosophy will be to acquire, roast and brew killer coffee. Like this:

Start-to-finish isn’t just paid lip service at Madcap. “I do all the buying for the company, so I get real excited about offerings,” says Knapp. “Even as a small company, we’re very focused on relationship coffee, so everything we’ve got coming in are from farms we’ve traveled to, worked with the producer and cooked hundreds of samples of those particular coffees.

“A lot of the coffees are repreats from [previous years] and we’re cooperating with farmers to get beans from special lots and try new techniques based on our feedback. In my experience, the coffee gets better as the relationship with the farmer deepens.”

For example, Santa Lucia. “It’s a coffee we’ve bought every single harvest of since we opened,” says Knapp. “Each harvest, the producer invests more money in his farm, the quality gets better each year. It’s exciting on our end because the first year it was fantastic and each year scores higher and higher and we’re seeing that more and more with different farms we’re working with.

“I think a couple of the biggest factos in that is coffee, where it’s able to grow, ends up being in some of the most remote areas of the world and you’re trying to work with people who grow coffee as their only option, to survive,” says Knapp, settling into his subject.

“Where coffee grows and is produced, they’ve often just produced it and not taken care, so a vital part of this collaboration between roasters and farmers is that farmers are starting to realize what makes a good cup of coffee,” he says. “Farmers are getting to taste the coffee, which is really unique, and they’re able to do things differently and make more money. A lot of farmers are geeked out about growing coffee. One of the biggest things is bringing awareness to farmers through conversation: if you pick ripe, we can pay you a dollar more a pound.”

Where To Find’em

You can always order online here.

You can find their blog here, their Facebook page here, and their Twitter here.

Meet Ryan Knapp in this video and get his thoughts on the Hario V60.

They’re “not looking to be in every shop” by any stretch of the imagination, but they are open to the idea. If interested, let’em know.

To Leave You With A Flourish

Because you’ve cared enough to read this far (and if you skipped ahead, go back to the beginning and start all over, now!), here’s a visual, artistic flourish that constitutes the end of this article. Ahem:

Posted by masterworm on January 11, 2012 at 12:43 pm

Wormhole Coffee Log: Kenya

First up in a new series of regional profiles to be dispersed bi-monthly on the Wormblog for your educational enjoyment, we have Kenya, a country known for producing some of the finest, and most expensive, coffees in the world. As you will come to discover (we hope, we hope), the Kenyan coffee experience is nuanced and pit-fallen in ways that play out both on the coffee market and in the beans themselves.

It’s amazing to consider, when you take a closer look, just how many hands come into contact with a plant that we typically just see in it’s final form. Yes, I said plant! It’s easy to lose sight of coffee as an agricultural product when the trees on which it is grown are rooted thousands of miles away, and yet, the people who tend to them must think all the time about us, as we are the reason those trees exist in the first place.

We hope that by offering an inside look into countries of origin, we are able to give the consumer (cafe-goers and coffee professionals alike, as we are all, at this latitude, buyers of coffee in one way or another) a greater understanding of the complexity that exists within the coffee industry, in terms of farming, processing, trading, and culture. We hope you enjoy, and maybe even do some research of your own! Signed: Otter

The Kenyan coffee industry, through such traditions as meticulous harvesting, post-fermentation soaking, and post-process sorting, produces some of the cleanest and most consumer-friendly coffees on the market today.

The crisp, apple-like acidity, deep red wine and blackberry flavours typical of high-quality Kenyan coffees, as well as being the results of processing, are also some of the more common tasting notes of the SL-28 and SL-34 varietals* that account for the majority of the coffee grown in the country.

Although the quality of Kenyan specialty coffee is typically above the industry average and has remained that way for the past decade, the coffee sector and the country itself have been experiencing some serious problems due to water shortages, political instability, and market collapse, that may affect production in the near future.

Where It’s Grown

The main growing regions for specialty coffee are concentrated around and between the dormant volcano of Mt. Kenya and the capital city of Nairobi to the south. The mountain is the second highest in all of Africa, behind Kilimanjaro, and the indigenous people of the surrounding area consider it sacred (the local name for it, Kirinyaga, translates literally as “God’s resting place”).

The moderate temperatures, equatorial
sunlight and rich, volcanic soils
surrounding Mt. Kenya are prime
conditions for coffee growing.
All coffee in Kenya is grown
between 1,400-2,100 meters
above sea level, and is
harvested between October
and December. 99% of the
plants are of the Arabica
sub-species, and almost all
are picked by hand. Although coffee’s
native homeland of Ethiopia borders Kenya
to the north, coffee wasn’t cultivated in
the region until the late nineteenth
century when it was introduced, curiously, not
from Ethiopia, but by French missionaries from
Reunion Island. Although the original plants
brought to country were of the Bourbon varietal
(pronounced “bore-BONE”), these days most of those
original Bourbon plants have been replaced by the
higher-yielding SL-28 and SL-34 strains. These were
developed by coffee researchers at Scott Laboratories
in the 1930’s (in addition to these strains, the researchers at Scott Labs also produced a lesser-quality strain known as Ruiri-11, which contains Robusta* genetics and whose beans have a dirty acidity that is inferior to the other two strains). More info here.

The SL-28 and 34 strains are famous for their complexity in the cup, often reminiscent of blackberries and Cabernet. Experiments done growing these varietals in other parts of the world have confirmed these flavours to be intrinsic to the varietals themselves (even more info here).

Real People, By Hand

DOWNLOAD PDF

Kenyan coffee production has an extremely high reliance on human labor at all stages of the production process. Approximately 60 percent of the coffee in Kenya is produced by smallholder farms of 5 acres or less, organized into cooperatives that market and distribute the coffees of their associated small producers (LOTS of info here). Unfortunately, despite the fact that this country produces some of the world’s greatest coffees, the coffee farmers themselves remain some of the poorest in the industry. Due to a collapse in the early 2000’s of the market system which allowed farmers to purchase fertilizer on loan, many typical coffee farmers have been suffering with declining yields and worsening quality year after year.

According to an article in 2006 by the Inter Press News Service, the average smallholder farmer was being paid approximately 20 cents per kilogram of green coffee, which was then passed through several coffee middle-men to eventually garnish around 3 dollars per kilo at auction. This huge discrepancy is in part due to a corrupt market system whereby nearly all coffee in Kenya is sold at weekly auctions, and is then exported through one of three government-controlled marketing agencies.

Until recently, acquiring coffee from Kenya meant going through government channels which made the individual farmer practically non-existent in terms of the market value chain, and inhibited efforts to increase transparency and quality control. In the past several years there have been efforts from many specialty coffee roasters and importers to bypass the industry middle men by engaging with growers at the source–visiting farms and small washing stations, and cupping coffees with the producers themselves in order to give constructive feedback and to encourage dialogue about how quality, and profit, can be improved on a production level.

The Beans Themselves

Going back to the coffee itself, the typical Kenyan coffee is wet-processed, meaning the fruit of the cherry is separated from seed (the bean) by submerging the cherry, after the skin has been removed, in tanks of water which are sometimes treated with small amounts of organic acids to speed up the fermentation process. The flesh, or mucilage as it is referred to in the industry, begins to break down during the immersion stage and is then removed using running water that washes away the loosened mucilage.

The coffee may be soaked and rinsed more than once before being laid out on patios for sun-drying. One of the advantages of wet processing is that it helps equalize the water content of the beans, making them easier to roast and imparting a more balanced flavour in the liquid. Drawbacks include a need for large quantities of clean running water, and for skilled operators to work the various machines involved. Also important, if often neglected, is the disposal of the waste water which can be harmful to the environment, especially in ecologically sensitive areas where much of the world’s coffee is grown.

Because of the complex mechanics involved with wet processing, coffee farmers must bring their individual harvests to a washing station where the processing will occur. These washing stations are of varying degrees of sophistication. The best stations execute procedures that wash each lot separately according to rigorous standards using well cared for machinery. On the other end of the spectrum, there are washing stations that are so abysmal that they destroy what could have been good coffee with improper processing done on faulty, poorly maintained, often ancient equipment, often due to lack of access to information, and the inability to replace or repair machinery because of the high cost. Because processing must occur as soon after harvesting as possible, many times farmers in remote areas have no choice but to use the station nearest to them, even if it means sacrificing the quality of the beans.

Of course, balance and flavor are also products of the beans themselves, and coffee, being an organic product, is full of imperfections, which is why it all must be sorted to distinguish the good from the bad. In Kenya, as in many countries, the beans are sorted through screens as well as by hand, in order to produce the kinds of high-quality lots that specialty coffee buyers are looking for. For most of the coffee in Kenya a grading system is used based on screen hole size, and therefore bean size–the larger the bean, the higher the quality–and those grades dictate how much that coffee will be sold for at auction. The major drawback to this system is that it invalidates the individual farmer by pooling many separate lots of coffee together into one giant batch that is then sold by grade, such as the famous “Kenya AA”, which is simply the largest screen hole size and nothing more.

From the Road: Kenya, June 2010 from Counter Culture

This homogenizing effect makes it easy to ignore the needs and demands of the growers themselves, since it is not being sold by individual lot. Many specialty coffee companies are pushing for greater transparency by demanding information about where the coffee was grown, by who, at what altitude, and so forth. Since many times much of this information cannot be obtained through auction, importers are traveling to the farms and washing stations themselves to search for these answers, and to cut out the middle men who are siphoning profits from the labor of the farmers. Such efforts by companies like Counter Culture Coffee and Intelligentsia are well documented and can be followed on their websites, often on blogs written by the buyers themselves (an example here).

In the specialty coffee sector, many advances to processing methods have been made over the past years which are changing the fortunes of many small shareholders. These include such things as utilizing raised drying beds instead of patios; improving machinery such as the depulpers which can, if not working properly, cause damage to the beans; and investing in training and education for the farmers themselves so they can understand and perform quality control at the source instead of having to depend on industry professionals who may be far away, expensive, and possibly corrupt.

Long Way To Go

The coffee industry still has a long way to go to bridge the producer/consumer gap (consider that most countries that grow coffee barely consume it, compared to rates in the U.S.), but by promising higher prices for coffees that meet certain standards, more farmers will be likely to make the extra effort. This is especially important in countries like Kenya, where many small farmers are giving up on their coffee trees in favor of more reliable crops, things like maize or bananas.

Kenyan coffee has the potential to be some of the best in the world, but without a fair market and access to vital information regarding quality and industry expectations, one can hardly blame those that choose to go the safer route.

Illustrations by: Stevie Baka (find her at Wormhole!)

Posted by AndreaOtte on December 23, 2011 at 9:52 pm

Wormhole Guest Roaster Dec. 2011: Counter Culture Coffee

Count us here at The Wormhole as total suckers for shiny glass items, sci-fi paraphernalia and long, meandering conversations RE: quantities of high-end coffee beans and the process that begat them, plant to gullet.

Gullet-wise, it’s time to announce that we are currently offering the tastily balanced beans of Counter Culture Coffee in our guest roasting program this month. One of their most unique products, Cascara (link a PDF, fyi), is also featured in our current signature drink, The McCallister.

Canaan Vallejos (our resident, self-described “stuck up, half-witted, scruffy looking nerf herder”), who heads up our guest roaster program along with Andrea “Ottermatic Weapon” Otte. Vallejos said it was an easy call to feature Counter Culture: “This company has really been an asset to the industry in a whole here in the states,” he says. “Good people. I digz.”

DEDICATED COFFEE SPACE

Hence, we visit the non-restrictive confines of Counter Culture Coffee’s Chicago Training Center, one of a number of such coffee data-saturated temples Counter Culture has created up and down the East Coast. Their foray of such endeavors into Chicago creates new opportunities for all of us: coffee professionals, home baristas, random sippers of roast and brew notes and such things, and coffee drinkers who want to know more about what’s in their cup.

For the at-large coffee aficionado, Counter Culture’s regular Friday a.m. cupping (eleven-hundred hours) puts you immediately behind the scenes of coffee culture in America, a place we at The Wormhole have called home for some time now. The crew at the Chicago facility mainly consists of Joshua Dugue and Richard Futrell.

These two work to set up interesting coffee tastings at these weekly cupping and foster discussion in about as gentle a manner as is possible; there are no right’s and wrong’s, just personal opinions and a general yearning to dissect the aroma, flavor and other characteristics of coffee from the bean to dry grounds to adding appropriately heated water to said dry grounds to create a “cup” (hence, cupping) fully of fresh, perfect coffee that’s capped with a layer of grounds at the top that one breaks with a spoon, getting said nose as close to the cup as possible at that moment as possible and taking in the heady flavors and such issuing forth. Take notes (we love notes!), talk about it, enjoy. It’s not that complicated (oh, but it can be).

Past the Friday a.m. cupping, in-depth, knowledge-enhancing programs of all kinds are offered for coffee professionals. “On a daily basis, we do lots of education for beginner baristas and experienced baristas, to hone their skills,” says Futrell, noting recent discussions included a chat about coffee quality and sourcing with Tim Hilton, Counter Culture’s coffee buyer and Ken Burlich, their sustainability and product relations manager. Also, a pro series where Peter Giuliano works with professional baristas to up their game.

“Over the last five years, [we've seen the development of] a new class of professional barista, who are dedicated to their craft in the same way a chef works at being a chef,” says Futrell. “Ten years ago, barista was largely an hourly position you did during college, now it can be on par with a baker, a chef, a farmer.”

The pro series appeals to that type of person (training at this level doesn’t come cheap, we’re talking in the range of $500 for a two-day session with Giuliano. But knowledge is power, power is money…yada yada yada. It’s really just about making ridic good coffee that you enjoy however much though you put into it…or don’t. We put lots.

A BIT ABOUT COUNTER CULTURE COFFEE

Though Counter Culture beans are still fully roasted in Charlotte, N.C.; however, as mentioned briefly above, they’ve reached out to coffee communities across the country with regional training centers. “We don’t have shops of our own, which most roasters of our size do and that’s how they present their brand to the public, so it’s both a brand experience center for the public and a way for us to completely embrace our exclusive customers–prepare them to present our brand to the public.

“The real crux of what we’re all about is partnership, strong partnerships from seed to cup. We’re about supply chain transparency and relationships, connecting the end consumer to the farmer,” says Futrell, noting again how important retail partners are in this process. In Chicago, you can find Counter Culture beans at Swim Cafe, The Grind, Common Cup–and, seasonally, The Wormhole.

More about how they work with coffee shops: “Our sales team are more coffee educators,” says Futrell. “When we meet with a potential customer, the idea is to have a conversation and see if we’re a good fit for each other.

“We’re not going to come in and do your coffee program, but we’re going to be there to help make sure you do it well,” says Futrell, continuing: “For instance, we have cafes ask us to lead cuppings. What we will do is have you and your staff in for a cupping leaders lab, then help you with two public cupping at your cafe. The first one, I’ll lead and your managers assist; then, we flip it and they lead their own cupping. You and your staff need to be the experts; more powerful if the expert is the person behind the counter [on a daily basis].”

As far as the early days of Counter Culture and the “crop” part of the process, Futrell says, “Geoff and Peter were going around the world ten years ago, doing things differently–looking at the soil, processing techniques, getting to know the farmers, tasting the coffee and giving the farmers feedback.

“As they were doing this, they created that style, all about transparency through the entire supply chain and also quality. Now, we know we can pay farmers for high-quality coffee because we can charge more for high-quality coffee.

“Our triple bottom line for sustainability: environmental, social and fiscal,” says Futrell. “Sustainability is also about profit: a sustainable farming operation is one that makes money and it’s the same with roasters. The real goal with direct trade is that every knows who makes what money and the goal is that everyone along the way makes the money they need to [be sustainable].”

ON THE CHICAGO COFFEE SCENE

“I love being in Chicago, and so does Counter Culture,” says Futrell. “We would much rather compete with high-quality roasters here in Chicago, it makes us all better. We taste each other’s coffee, learn from each other…it’s a fair way to compete and there is so much business out there, none of us are going to put the others out of business.

FIND COUNTER CULTURE HERE

Counter Culture on Facebook, Twitter, etc.

Oh yes, $1 from every purchase of Counter Culture’s 2011 holiday release goes to charitable uses, FYI.

Posted by masterworm on December 10, 2011 at 1:14 pm

The McCallister: On Tap At Wormhole

It’s not so much the caffeine that kicks you in the teeth with our December 2011 signature drink, The McCallister. Though [the caffeine] is definitely on-site and present for duty.

More so, it’s the complex, rich, smoky, cherry-cranberry flavor cutting into mega-tart and scrumptious Seedling apple cider.

We should probably stop there, but here’s a big part of why we’re especially excited about The McCallister: Cascara. In short, it’s uniquely prepared coffee with many of the qualities of tea. In long, according to Peter Giuliano, director of coffee at Counter Culture Coffee:

“The roasted seeds are not the only delicious part of the coffee plant. The dried fruit of the coffee cherry, known as cascara in Spanish, can be steeped in water like tea, creating a deliciously fruity hot beverage. Coffee has been consumed this way for hundreds of years in Ethiopia and Yemen, where it is called Hashara or Qishr.

“It is almost impossible to find outside of East Africa, but our partner Aida Batlle prepared some Cascara for us from her three farms – Los Alpes, Kilimanjaro, and Mauritania – and the results were wonderful. We loved it so much, we thought we’d share it with you! Cascara captures the flavor of the dried coffee cherry and gives a glimpse into the diversity of coffee flavor and coffee history.”

The Blueprint

The long and short from Stevie Baka, our massively multi-talented barista:

“We mull it for 45 minutes with the [Seedling] cider with cardamom pods, cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, and fresh chopped ginger,” says Baka. “Then we steep the cascara in it for six minutes.

“Next, we steam the cider and pour it over fresh muddled cranberries and blanched almonds.” This leads to the main decision you’ll face when trying this drink at The Wormhole: munch on the almonds and cranberries at the beginning, throughout, or at the end. “[Some people] sip it and eat them at the end, [the cranberries and almonds] are really good after they steep in the cascara,” continues Baka.

“The cranberries were somewhat controversial,” says Baka. “They become this little floating mass on top and we tried to get cranberries to sink, but they naturally float in a bog, so it was virtually impossible.”

Posted by masterworm on December 6, 2011 at 3:52 am

Guest Roaster: Ipsento Coffee

Connect. Sit. Read a book. Three values the original owners of Ipsento Coffee set out to instill in their business.

These days, owner Tim Taylor, (he acquired Ipsento in April, 2009) has calmly hewed to that same path as far as the cafe itself, while nurturing measured spurts of growth as they make sense for himself, the company and his daily guests which some also call customers…we guess. (We at The Wormhole feel much close to our daily denizens, too; that’s why we reserve the right to growl every now and then–family is as family does. Raaaaarrrr!)

You can hear the steady heartbeat of life at Ipsento, the very term rooted in the concept of self-discovery, says Taylor: “We’ve tried to keep and honor that original concept. I actually had staff volunteer [when I acquired it].

“Then, I found out I could bring in the roaster, and [a culture came together],” continues Taylor. “We made Ipsento our Chicago coffee laboratory, retail shop and roasterie, all in one–constantly educating ourselves and our customers.”

Toward these high and lofty goals, Ipsento offers a nice range of coffee-centered knowledge enhancement opportunities: “Coffee 101,” for instance, is about the history, selection and brewing of coffee. First, it’s a presentation and conversation upstairs, then it’s a hands-on demo at the brew bar. There’s also “Barista Basics”: it covers the making of ‘spro, as well as lattes, cappuccinos and forays into latte art (chills running down your spine? you may very well be destined to be a barista and should approach this class with caution). Register at ipsento.eventbrite.com.

The crew at Ipsento also works with wholesale customers in staff training and such, staying connected to their beans and those who serve them. Staying connected is huge, says Taylor: “[Our goal] is to remain boutique,” and involved in the entire process of serving high-end coffee. “I bought the beans they’re serving at Wormhole this month last year in Panama. With my first company, I established direction relationships with growers to continually buy from them and work with them to grow high-quality coffee. I jumped on that ship and now it’s about continuing to do that.”

ALL ‘BOUT THE BEANS

In the current aspect of the time continuum in which we all hover–most of us, most of the time–Taylor gets help on the roasting side of things from Jon Colón.

Although he’s fairly new to the roasting side of things, Colón put two years in as a barista before roasting and that has served him well. “Tim was doing most of the roasting and just needed someone to fill his shoes for a week and everything just kinda clicked for me,” says Colón. “I wasn’t super versed but when I was behind the roaster, it just clicked.

“Having the barista background, [there are] a lot of parallel concepts, the way different properties of the coffee develop over the length of a brew. The way I roast is very similar to the mental process I go through to brew a cup of coffee.”

TECH TALK: PACKING THE HEAT

Ipsento’s roaster? A Dietrich IR3. “The things I like and hate about it are kind of the same. It’s a three-kilo [roaster] and I end up roasting five to six pounds per batch,” says Colón. “It’s got an infrared ceramic heater and air control, which gives it a nice, soft, gradual roast. it’s easy to control and to have these gently sweeping curves in the profile, which translate to a delicate, subtle, enjoyable cup of coffee.

“Small batch is great in terms of quality control, you can make small profile changes batch to batch,” he continues. “I actually profile and make changes on the machine I’m roasting with, which can be a plus if properly managed.”

The roasting style here is to buy good beans and leave them alone as much as possible. “If we’re sourcing high-quality coffee, it’s going to come through in the roast,” says Colón. “I don’t want to balance everything out, I want the crop to be itself.”

Then, the next words out of Colón’s mouth stop us dead in their tracks even though we weren’t moving at the time (on this plane, anyway, to be clear). “It’s a time test.” Knowing our reputation in such matters, we waited, ready to step up to the plate, discuss these things that we know and of which we have notes, but he moved on, and so did we. Maybe that was how it was all supposed to happen, maybe not. And we were talking about coffee, right?

Enough about the principles of the matter. Back to the bean. We’ll be serving Ipsento’s Panama Elida Estate processed in three different ways: natural, washed and honey. It’s the same crop from the same farm harvested right around the same time and processed in three different ways; try them side-by-side and see how much the process affects the final product. “It’s something you don’t ever get to try.”

QUICK BRAND CLARIFICATION

You might have seen Ipsento’s beans packaged as Coffee Ambassadors in the past, but from here on and thenceforth, Coffee Ambassadors is the import side of the business and Ipsento roasties will fly proudly under the Ipsento Coffee banner.

Posted by masterworm on November 28, 2011 at 10:39 pm

Black Friday Retail Invasion

Here at Wormhole Coffee, our BOMB_TASTIC gift cards can be refilled over and over with however much a person desires. Also, in addition to the T’s, hoodies, home brewing gear, etc etc…we just procured a bunch of metal lunch boxes (Dr. Who and Star Wars inspired) so that people can assemble gift boxes for holiday times.

We’ll have it set up so that you can mix and match whatever you’d like and use the lunch box as a vessel to hold said gift items.

Example: Lady wants to get her bestie something cool for the holidays. She can pick a T-shirt in their size, toss in a LB of Metropolis coffee of her choice, and throw in a $20 gift card for good measure.

Papa-Bear wants to get his Son who frequents The Worm something. He can grab a v60, pack of filters, and a $15 gift card so the kid can pick his own coffee. = Home brew set up WIN.

They will all be 100-percent customizable, so pricing will be variable depending on what was put in said lunchbox. The lunch boxes will NOT be sold separately. Available NOW through much of Earth‘s holiday shopping season at Wormhole Coffee, Chicago. Also, we have coffee, tea…and…things. Lots of things.

Posted by masterworm on November 25, 2011 at 2:05 pm

Throw [Down] the Tomahawk

Sometimes, it seems, when you throw an axe with great force and velocity, and it hits a tree, maple syrup issues forth and suddenly the State of Vermont has found it’s calling, it’s passion, it’s livelihood. Maine, too, we think.

And, thanks to a version of the above tale read by our barista/talented illustrator, Stevie Baka, a bit of Native American lore in a book about Buffalo Bill–of course–we have The Tomahawk, our current seasonal drink.

Must admit up front, time’s limited to try it if you haven’t already–many of you have–because…well, just because. It’s a complex drink that deserves copious notes. We’ve got them. And illustrations, too, per Baka.

The Process According to Baka

Thank the gods, or what have you, we work with such talented people with ever-active minds, is all we’re saying.

Inspiration. “I like the idea of green tea lattes and was reading this Buffalo Bill book and they talked about throwing tomahawks at the trees and that’s how they discovered maple syrup. In looking for common pairings of maple syrup, [found it's] common to pair green tea with maple syrup, so it all came through.”

Fulfillment. “Then it was working with everyone [at Wormhole]. We narrowed it down to the brown sugar, the cayenne, and all that. It took us about two days of adjust ments but only because we wanted the sweetness to be from the maple, not the brown sugar, but it was really hard to not let the matcha overpower the maple flavor.”

Etiquette. “It’s an in-house drink, because of the sugar rim, so we force people to drink it [in-house]. It was hard to follow the Rocket Sauce, which is so popular–people keep asking for it and it will be back eventually.”

Components de “The Tomawhawk”

Powdered Matcha
Milk
Cayenne
Maple Syrup
Brown Sugar
Maple Sugar (on the rim)

We’ve really appreciated this happily lime green concoction at Wormhole this month and wouldn’t be surprised to see it make a re-appearance just when you least expect it, although, of course, we’ll let you know when to expect it right here. Especially now that here IS here (if you’re reading this, our website is live; we are happy, and resting).

Thanks. Bye, now. Come in and try immediately or we’ll encase you in carbonite. No, we won’t. Far as you know, for now.

Posted by masterworm on November 1, 2011 at 8:04 pm

Roasters We Luv

This month, we’ve been featuring the intrepid beans of our neighbor to the North, 49th Parallel Coffee Roasters.

First, we liked the beans. Next, we LOVED the fact that they started out as a cafe, then five cafes; started roasting; sold the cafes and emerged an intrepid roaster (who now boasts one mighty shop we’d love to visit one day—and will). We can do this and we will. You’ll see.

The Wormhole bean purchasers have sampled a range of geographically-based options: Costa Rica, Panama, El Salvador and Guatemala have all come into their pervue and emerged unscathed, if quaffed. Now, more on it.

Transitional Bean Wrangling

Michael Piccolo is on point when it comes to 49th Parallel’s roasting operations, but brothers Vincent and Sam also play major parts in the operation (Sam is widely regarded as a top Canadian barista–maybe THE best). Per the things we LOVE about them, this coffee-coursing-through-their-veins family proved they knew what they were doing by founding those aforementioned cafes, Caffe Artigiano, and perfecting their coffee shop craft. But, as most of us grok, knowledge comes at a price.

“As a cafe, we got tired of not being happy with the coffee we were getting, so Boss Man decided to set up a roaster in August, 2005,” says 49th Parallel’s Barrett Jones. “It was convenient because we had five very busy cafes, so didn’t have to worry about [selling beans]; we could maintain [just with] the existing cafes and then they got sold a few months later.

“Over time, many of the core group of people who were managing the cafes and such all made their way back,” says Jones, noting how the change in mission has affected those involved. “As a roaster with a number of cafes serving your coffee, there is more responsibility and you can also have a much larger impact. Everything we do is a little more planned out than it would be with one cafe, where you can experiment.”

Growth Is Good

Life is flux, and so is the business of coffee roasting, or so we hear. 49th Parallel began major operations with two roasters, a 60-kilo and a 5-kilo. This worked until their taste-riven beans became highly commoditized (i.e. treasured by increasing numbers of consumers) and so 16 months ago they moved “across the road,” says Jones, and added yet another voluminous and highly-charged-with-pure-coffee-energy 60-kilo roaster to their lovely affair.

As far as the evolution of their roasting of the beans: “We’ve really changed quite a bit over the years,” says Jones. “Our coffees are definitely lighter now, but better developed. We aren’t going light for light’s sake. They’re tasting good and developed and that took a lot of time to figure out how to make that happen, make what we wanted to taste happen.

“We still get the occasional person who wants something dark, as well as something good, so we do get those and we deal with that.” We’ll mostly gladly peddle the “light for light’s sake” beans here at Wormhole Coffee–we don’t hew to the Dark Side…today.

Welcome to Chicago

49th Café in Vancouver

Though Mr. Jones has yet to visit Chicago (tsk…tsk!), we’re as excited to bring 49th Parallel beans to Chicago as they are to be here. “Chicago’s a new market for us and we’re excited anytime we get into a new city, a whole bunch of people who never had us before,” he says, noting they’re also beginning to supply multiple shops in NYC and have boots on the ground there right now.

“We’d heard about Wormhole Coffee and wanted to be involved from the start and we’re excited, it’s an awesome project,” says Jones, without any coercion at all, we swear.

In addition to their current shop, the Brothers Piccolo and their team will be opening a second cafe in Spring 2012, “a dream location,” says Jones. As our quote horse, Jones, says: “[Coffee is] a good excuse to visit another city, meet good people and make some coffee.” Again, we agree, and are proud to feature coffees made by 49th Parallel.

Posted by masterworm on November 1, 2011 at 6:19 pm

The Wormhole [Blog]

This is where we collect and discuss the musings of critical importances, i.e.:

And by that, of course, we’re talking bikes, whiskeys, single-digit bit gaming, erstwhile electronics, wholesome nearby eats, hyperspatial travel (travails), and, naturally, the coffees and the exquisite manipulations that we attempt to do upon them.

Anything else, of course, will likely be analyzed and distributed forthwith, as well. Particularly, the pertinent advancements we’re making in the realms of Wormland, Fritz, and all future conquests and/or disturbing cataclysms which we’d certainly hope to sidestep, or sharpen to fit our insidiously tasty desires.

Have confidence, sugarbubs, and we will become your sun & stars, insofar as getting you ready to conquer each day with relative ease. Because you’re worth it.

We’re fairly nerdy about roasting beans, fixing flats, robot master weaknesses, and liquor & chow pairings so do be wary of these inherent strengths. Life is longer than you might initially have detected. We want to fill every day with the things that are most important, start to finish.

And, let’s be fair, to make it all the way to the end of each of ‘em…you’ll need to be sufficiently caffeinated, friends.

Keep us posted on everything that registers meh, all that you heart imperishably, and, of course, those things that you’d shatter the Bifrost for to avoid ever coming in contact with again. Even if that means you’ll never see your gold-plated Zelda-II cartridge clock on your hope chest.

Ever, ever, again.

Thanks for always being there, Doc.

Posted by masterworm on October 31, 2011 at 12:00 am

White Hot Chocolate + Earl Grey Lavender Syrup + Cracked Pepper Marshmallow = Mayan Melk

The Roasting

The Sourcing

Star Crossed…Roasters?

The Story of T.J.

The Story of Caleb

The Future

Peruvian Coffee Flavor Profile

Unique Challenges: Will They Be Met?

The Finish

Sources:

Where He Came From

Passion House Rules

Color Us…Enticed

Back To Cramped Cafes

Expansion Comes & Into The Wormhole

Getting Involved; Staying Involved

Invisible Touch = Cucumber Water + Rose Water Foam + Lemon Zest

L.A. Gets Handsome Cafe

Handsome Coffee Roasters: The Goods

Stumptown & The Wormhole

Quantity AND Quality: It’s Possible

Product For The People

FYI’s on Stumptown Coffee:

Worm Signature Drink–Spring 2012

The Geography & The Beans

The People & The Market

Organic A Struggle

Not All Buzzwords Are Bad

Sources:

Oregon & A Beautiful Rogue

The. Core. Philosophy.

Noble History & How It Works

1. The whole place is going to be torn apart.

2. The DeLorean is going airborne.

3. The Custom Espresso Machine Table

4. New and tastier foods.

From Whence They Come (And How They Evolved)

Evolution Underway

Now, The Notes

The Present…And The Future (Of Course)

Where To Find’em

To Leave You With A Flourish

Where It’s Grown

Real People, By Hand

The Beans Themselves

Long Way To Go

DEDICATED COFFEE SPACE

A BIT ABOUT COUNTER CULTURE COFFEE

ON THE CHICAGO COFFEE SCENE

FIND COUNTER CULTURE HERE

The Blueprint

ALL ‘BOUT THE BEANS

TECH TALK: PACKING THE HEAT

QUICK BRAND CLARIFICATION

The Process According to Baka

Components de “The Tomawhawk”

Transitional Bean Wrangling

Growth Is Good

Welcome to Chicago

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1. The whole place is going
to be torn apart.