A Grumpy Brazilian in an Aeropress

I don't remember how I first came across the Aeropress, but as soon as I saw it, I wanted it. I had been looking for a way to make coffee -- espresso in particular -- in my office without creating a lot of mess. For the past few weeks, I have discovered that something like this is possible. No longer am I the slave to the stale, vaguely machine-flavored Illy served upstairs in the cafeteria or the over-roasted swill found in the Starbucks shops of Midtown Manhattan. Using air pressure, the press extracts delicious "espresso" (not really) from two scoops of finely ground coffee. Top it off with hot water, and you have an Americano. So far I've had the best results with the Kenyan Gatomboya from Stumptown and the Novo Decaf Espresso carried by Cafe Grumpy. I heat the water to 175 degrees Farenheit using this Breville electric kettle, served up in these supposedly unbreakable glass mugs.

Coffee Fazenda Chapadão de Ferro (Patrocínio, Cerrado Region, Brazil)

Roasted March 14 by Café Grumpy in Brooklyn.

Purchased March 16 at Grumpy's Chelsea location, 224 W. 20th St., between Seventh and Eighth Avenues.

Description "Juicy and sweet cup with notes of vanilla, almonds and milk chocolate. Tropical fruit brightness & a floral finish. Award-winning farm rich with volcanic soil owned by Ruvaldo Delarisse."

In the Cup This is a fine coffee, though it has those floral and fruit finishes that sometimes annoy me (it's a personal thing). It was tolerable as an espresso at home in the Jura automatic machine, but I was less impressed with this bean in the Aeropress. (Update: I should also note that fans of the Aeropress have found some better ways to prepare coffee with it than in the official instructions, and that this is really a high-quality filtered coffee, not an espresso. A hat tip to Christian, down in the comments.)

As an Americano, this Grumpy Brazilian is less overpowering, so I can only conclude that this has to do with temperature or the method of extraction.

Of course, many coffee snobs think that some coffees are never meant to be prepared as espresso.

Certainly, not all beans are recommended for preparation at the lower temperature that Aeropress recommends in its directions.

My next experiment with the Aeropress will be with a bean more suitable for this, perhaps something from Intelligentsia.

The promotional copy for the Aeropress bills it as "the best coffee maker X ever owned" and a source of coffee nirvana that makes better "espresso" than many a machine. It is certainly better than a lot of mediocre coffee I've had in restaurants. (Read more about the promotional language in these Aeropress tips from Sweet Maria's.)

The coolest part: When you're done, you can eject the grounds cleanly in puck form into the trash. A quick rinse cleans it. Far better than the mess I usually make cleaning a French press.

The first shots I made with this device -- not using this Brazilian bean -- were indeed exquisite. But the results do vary, perhaps because of the beans, how well I manage to press the coffee, the temperature of the water (which I have to estimate based on two-thirds the time it takes for a full boil) and so forth. Some of the alternative methods suggest an upside-down brewing method that keeps the water from seeping through the grounds too quickly.

But in a coffee wasteland like Midtown, the device is a life saver on a drowsy afternoon -- and a source of amusement for the coworkers who are not yet bored with watching me demonstrate it.

Now if only I were not surrounded by so many tea drinkers.

From the Aptly Named Wondo Worka

Yes, I'm coffee-blogging again. After ambiguously adequate experiences with single-source beans from Starbucks and Joe the Art of Coffee, I high-tailed it back to my regular source of beans this week.

I'm sorry to report that the Costa Rican coffee from Starbucks remained bitter until the bitter end. I finally mixed it up with the last of the Indian Mysore, which made them both somewhat passable, because I hate to waste beans. But it was a chore. A change was in order. Name: Wondo Worka Co-Op

Origin: Yerga Cheffe or Yirgacheffe, Ethiopia. Nobody can quite agree on the spelling, apparently.

Roasted: Jan. 27 by Verve Coffee Roasters, Santa Cruz, Ca.

Purchased: Feb. 2 at Café Grumpy, 224 W. 20th St., Manhattan, between Seventh and Eighth Avenues.

Description: Nothing on the bag but the shop's menu says, "Notes of honey and apricot fill this clean sweet cup."

The Pour: It was a pleasure to try this bean as regular pressed coffee at Café Grumpy twice this week after dropping my daughter off at school, and as espresso shots this weekend. (I had a cold in the latter part of the week that I am still trying to shake, so that may interfere with my impressions.)

When I bought the beans, I ordered a 12-ounce cup of the same and was quite satisfied. I had it again on a second visit two days later. I was still drinking the other stuff at home, and the contrast was startling. This was so much better.

It's hard to find much online about the Wondo Worka cooperative. It is reportedly grown in the Sidamo province of the southern Yirgacheffe region of Ethiopia, like this "floral shining citrus" bean that I tried in this ongoing coffee-blogging quest.

In December, Ken David's Coffee Review, a leading buying guide, rated this coffee highly, saying:

Intense, bright aroma: tart coffee cherry, honey, a hint of fir, flowers. In the cup tartly sweet acidity, honeyish mouthfeel and flavor, with molasses, pipe tobacco and deep, rose-like floral notes. Very sweet, fruit-saturated, perfectly clean finish... A dramatically light roast liberates both acidity and sweetness and allows an unusual honey, molasses and rose-like floral character full expression.

A different roaster described the flavor this way: "A beautiful harmony of sweet citrus and lingering florals — lime, meyer lemon lavender cake, jasmine, and a hint of ripe honeydew."

And here is one that offers some "history":

In the lore of the bean, coffee was first discovered by an Ethiopian shepherd who noticed his goats going nuts after eating these particular cherries. So he began eating them to stay awake on long nights guarding his flock: it worked and the rest is history. You can still taste those wild nights in every cup of Yergacheffe: not too heavy or spicey and with that touch of wilderness, it is a satisfying full-bodied cup. Every coffee drinker should try the original.

I must say, these descriptions still crack me up a little, though I know what they're trying to convey. In a cup made on a Clover at the shop, I definitely found the coffee sweet with a touch of citrus, not overpowering as with the last bean I tried from this region. (And this marks the second time I've been pleased with a Verve roast.)

As an espresso, the flavor seemed more honey and molasses at first. By the third shot over the course of this morning, my head cleared -- a wonder worker from Wondo Worka? By then, I was picking up the lemon flavor, especially at the finish.

And after the unpleasant bitter experience of the Starbucks Bella Vista, it was a welcome change of pace. I'm not ready to declare an end to the quest, but this is fine coffee.

A Couple of Shots of F. W. Tres Rio Bella Vista

In my defense, I live in a neighborhood that has more square feet under the control of Starbucks than it has space devoted to food markets, bank branches or even Duane Reade drugstores. There is just one independent coffee shop, several blocks away, and it serves bad coffee. Plus, it was cold last night, 20 degrees, and the Starbucks was right there, still open, as we walked back from dinner, having just learned that our favorite sushi joint had gone out of business. And I remembered that a relative had given me a $200 Starbucks gift card more than a year ago, and it still had some money left. I needed some beans, having nearly run out of the Indian Mysore. And who knows, if a Starbucks bean turns out to be the object of my quest, that would be convenient. Name: Bella Vista

Origin: F. W. Tres Rios in Costa Rica, "in the rolling hills outside San Jose," according to the bag, "one of the region's oldest and last remaining estates. Guided by a proud tradition of quality and the long-term support of Starbucks, the owners have perfected time-honored farming methods to harvest and process the beans right on the estate and established social programs to improve the farmers' livelihoods."

Roasted: No date listed, but the bag urges "for fresh-roasted flavor, enjoy before 18 July 2009."

Purchased: Jan. 31 at Starbucks, Broadway and West 54th Street. With my purchase, I received a free cup of drip coffee, as is the custom. (Decaf, which was ready, surprisingly.)

Description: I was going to just grab a bag of the Starbucks Pike Place Blend or its espresso, but the above bag with its green leafy motif and small pictures of the farmers themselves caught my attention. "Always a favorite in our tasting room, Bella Vista is surprisingly complex with a satisfying citrus sparkle, floral notes evocative of orange blossoms and a refreshing finish."

The Pour: I have mixed feelings about Starbucks. For years, my wife and I owned some shares of SUBX in our IRAs, and for many years they reliably rose above the market rate. I had always been impressed by the quality of the service, and the cozy "third place" branding. You could always sit in a Starbucks for an hour or two, working, reading, drinking coffee. In a pinch, you could always pop into one to use the bathroom, which was reasonably clean, nothing to scoff at in New York City. But over the last couple of years, stores seemed a little dirtier, some of the staff less knowledgeable and eager to please, and the coffee, not quite so good. That led to the comeback of the founder Howard Schultz, who wondered whether mass production had led the chain on a path to mediocrity. (Around the same time, we were treated to the tale of Schultz -- a New York resident -- wandering into Cafe Grumpy and declaring the cup made on the Chelsea shop's Clover machine the best cup of coffee he had ever tasted).

So I thought I'd see if Schultz has managed to sneak some good culinary beans into the store. Bella Vista is exclusive to SBUX and supposedly the finest coffee from what is the best coffee region in Costa Rica. Not surprisingly, the chain is a dominant force in the Costa Rican coffee industry.

The price of Bella Vista was reasonable, but the quantity was large -- 16 ounces of beans. But, as I mentioned, I had this old gift card -- personalized and customized with a cartoon approximation of a bicycle-riding New Yorker -- in my wallet. I'd been having trouble using up the money on it, because a couple of months after it was given to me as a gift, I bought the refurbished Jura-Capresso machine and embarked on my quest for great home coffee, both to save money and time. The lines at Starbucks near the office were long, and the coffee seemed to be getting worse.

So how's that comeback going? Well, some people often complain that Starbucks coffee tastes overly bitter, in part because of its "over-roasting" technique. Time was, I didn't mind that strong flavor. But I've been tasting many different styles of culinary coffee lately, and perhaps my tastes have changed. I found Bella Vista distinctive and strong but far too bitter. I have tried a number of beans that claimed to have floral or citrus flavors. It is certainly adequate, and probably better in a cappuccino or a regular cup with milk.

With a business model aimed at mass production and mass shipping and gimmicks like customized gift cards, it's hard to see how Starbucks can compete on the high end, which would require fresher beans from more sources -- in other words, more inventory. And if people will line up for "good enough" coffee, why should the chain cater to someone looking for a finer quality? Starbucks is aiming consistently at the middle.

The Bella Vista bean might grow on me, but I doubt it. After my experience with changing perceptions of last week's coffee, I'm willing to give it a few more days. For one thing, just as I started to make these shots, the Jura's computer decided it was time for a cleaning tablet and procedure (it requires this to remove oils from the brewing chamber after about 200 coffees), so perhaps that might make a difference. (Update: It didn't.)

And I will have to go back to Starbucks at some point. I have $34 left on the gift card. Maybe I should stage an espresso blend showdown with Joe the Art of Coffee.

Standing Up for Coffee at Zibetto

Zibetto is right around the corner on Sixth Avenue, near 56th Street. You drink your cappucinos or espressos at the long bar or at a shelf in the opposite wall. There are no chairs. New York mag summed it up when Zibetto opened in 2006: "It takes nerve to open an espresso bar across the street from Starbucks—especially an inconspicuous nook without drip coffee, free wi-fi, or even seats." The service is friendly, with little or no waiting -- Anastasio Nougos owns the place and pulls all the drinks. The coffee is great, though I am still partial to Cafe Grumpy in Chelsea. Zibetto is an old-world experience that transports away from a part of the city where it's rare to find a place that isn't a chain or a ripoff. I find it hard to believe he can stay in business at this spot, but I'm glad he has. Today I knew I was running low on beans when we walked by, so I picked up a can of Danesi espresso beans imported from Italy. When I got them home, I decided to make myself another shot in the Jura. The top popped off the vacuum container with a satisfying whoosh. Fresh. Aah.