Breslar Smith adventures: 23 seconds

Had to get a little creative for the birthday boy.. after all, he had the day off (MLK day), and we'd already had massages for my birthday (and more than one a week would be just.. well, decadent.. but anyway). Zeric has been accumulating the right equipment for good coffee: last year an espresso maker, this year a coffee roaster.. and Indonesia has great coffee, and great coffee people. So, I found Pak Agus at Caswell's Coffee (http://www.caswellscoffee.com/) who does a great coffee class, and signed up for a six-hour class just for the two of us.

We showed up at 9:30am and we were ready. Even if we weren't ready, we would have gotten ready fast because we started off with Agus making us a great latte. Agus is two-time barista of the year for Indonesia (2006, 2009) and so we got to learn all about the competitions. Tough stuff! We began the class with a coffee cupping (tasting). Come to find out, tasting coffee is just as complicated--if not more--than tasting wine. We tasted three coffees and rated them against six criteria. Crazy how you taste so many different things, based on what you're paying attention to.

Remember to slurp loud and fast when you taste!

Coffee's flavor depends on the bean, and the terroir, and the weather, and the transport and storage, and the agtron number (how dark it is roasted) and the brewing technique. And probably a bunch of other things I have forgotten. After we talked about all of those things and tasted the difference, we headed downstairs to see the roasting. The roaster was huge (Zeric will be asking for one of those next year for the holidays), and the smell was fantastic. Beans are only roasted between 6 and 20 minutes, and crack once (like a popcorn pop), twice if you're roasting them very dark. Who knew?

Next, back upstairs to learn how to make the perfect espresso. It's not easy!!

Pak Agus says: it takes between four and five years for a coffee tree to bear fruit that's drinkable, it takes at least one month to get the beans from the farmer to the roaster, and between six and twenty minutes to roast the beans.

And then, it takes just 23 seconds to ruin it all. 23 seconds is the proper time to brew an espresso. It should be between 25 and 40 ml .. and there are many things that affect whether it all works out: the grind of the beans, how much coffee you use, how tightly you pack it, how hot the water is.

We practiced and practiced, and then we learned how to steam the milk properly. And then, our test:
     1 espresso
     1 latte
     1 cappuccino
     1 macchiato
     1 Americano
Each.