Wednesday, November 30, 2016
In Brazil, A Coffee Education For At-Risk Youth
Paulo Gabriel
Paulo Gabriel was just 20 years old when he was brought to Brazil’s Fazedores de CafĂ© project by a non-governmental organization. He was complying with social-educational correctional measures at the time, in 2014. “I was in a complicated moment in my life,” he tells me. Gabriel was one of the four teenagers that were selected for the first group of Fazedores (which means roughly, “coffeemakers”), a program for at-risk Brazilian youth in which he spent three months learning about coffee—and making friends for life, including his professor and project coordinator Regina Machado.
It has been a remarkable road for Paulo Gabriel, who was hired by SĂŁo Paulo’s Octavio CafĂ© before even finishing his internship there. The job helps him pay for his dream: culinary school. He is now entering the second semester at college, and, while competing for Octavio, placed seventh at the National Barista Championship in 2015, and sixth at the National Brewers Cup Championship.
Diego Gonzalez. Photo by Marcus Steinmeyer.
Diego Gonzales, owner of Sofá Café, was inspired to create Fazedores after reading about the US-based company TOMS, which donates a pair of shoes to a child in need for each pair of shoes the company sells. Gonzales imagined doing the same with barista courses: for every course Sofá Café sold to a customer, he would grant an underprivileged teen a course at his cafe and roastery, located in Pinheiros, an affluent neighborhood in São Paulo. He even had the right person in mind to coordinate the project: Machado, who at the time worked for Coffee Lab. The project was aimed at young adults age 18 or about to turn 18, from low-income families, and currently enrolled in school or already graduated from high school.
Mariana Dias
Guilherme Gomes
It wasn’t difficult to convince Machado to come and lead such a program. After talking further with Mariana Proença (content manager at Revista Espresso, a coffee magazine in Brazil) and Giuliana Bastos (PR professional and coffee journalist), they realized that there was a huge demand for coffee professionals in SĂŁo Paulo. With the support of so many companies came the good news: the project did not have to hinge upon a purchase after all—the Fazedores de CafĂ© initiative could provide two-and-a-half-month coffee courses, plus one-month supervised internships in coffee shops around the city, all for free.
The three-hour multidisciplinary classes are held from Monday to Friday at the Sofá CafĂ© Pinheiros location, and aim to mold true coffee professionals. It is much denser than regular barista courses, as it encompasses coffee production and processing, coffee extraction, coffee drinks, ethics and behavior in the work environment, conflict management, customer support, menu creation, sanitary requirements, mechanics of espresso machines and grinders, and coffee shop business management. Gonzales and Machado started with four partners, and now work with 25 of them, many of whom are teachers of the course themselves—Carol Pontvianne from Urbe CafĂ© e Bar administers the coffee shop business class along with Gonzales, for example.
In order to make Fazedores de Café happen, all partners came together and contributed their expertise. With that, they built a classroom on the second floor of Sofá Café and filled it up with coffee equipment (all donated by the participating partners). The room accommodates four to six students each course, and the Sofá Café Atilla roaster located meters away in another room is used for roasting practice.
Gonzales emphasizes that he believes that the project has worked fairly well so far because it is based on a sort of gentlemen’s agreement: there are no contracts obliging the parts to contribute. “In such a bureaucratic business environment, it was nice to have partners collaborate in a natural, organic way,” he tells me. And yet, they never had any problems and always had the resources to carry on with the classes. Sofá CafĂ© provides a stipend for the kids—who live far away in most cases—for transportation costs, and also provides them with food every class day. Gonzales also stresses that the project’s goal is to have a positive impact in the teens’ lives. That doesn’t necessarily translate to working in coffee: Mariana Dias, a trained “Fazedora,” is now working at a coffee shop but as a means to afford her architecture college tuition. That alone means that the project has already worked for her, says Gonzales.
Giuliana Bastos, Mariana Proença, and Regina Machado. Photo by Diogo Brum.
Machado states that the evolution of the kids is clearly visible from the beginning to the end of the course, not only in the coffee spectrum, but also in their attitude towards the other students and the professors, poise, and communication skills. “Many of them barely speak when they get here, out of shyness. A few weeks into the course and they are already making friends and asking lots of questions. It’s great to see that process developing.”
I asked whether they plan to replicate it in other cities in Brazil, and Gonzales and Proença explain they’ve taken steps to turn Fazedoras into a proper institution in order to potentially branch out. The idea is that the project will be operated by an administrative counsel and become more independent from its original creators. Right now, Gonzales, Machado, Proença, and Bastos are working towards that goal. Brazil as a whole will surely benefit from it: there are young kids in need of opportunities like this in practically every major city here, and the lack of well-trained coffee professionals is notorious. We hope we hear more and more stories like Gabriel’s and Dias’ all over the country in the years to come.
Juliana Ganan is a Brazilian coffee professional and journalist. Read more Juliana Ganan on Sprudge.
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The Holiday Coffee Drinks Of Go Get Em Tiger
IIn a time where forced “#PSL season” commercialism and a nonsense controversy around red printed cups have exhausted the minds of coffee consumers, Go Get Em Tiger in Los Angeles are going their own way.
Shop owners Kyle Glanville and Charles Babinski are big turkey day fans; whether they are true Starbucks fans, however, is another matter. In homage (or perhaps parody) to the annual glut of Holiday sugar drinks from Starbucks, Babinski and Glanville have created a new tradition: a one-day-only menu of Starbucks-themed holiday drinks, served each year on Thanksgiving.
The service began four years ago, back in G&B’s pop-up days at SQIRL. With much of Los Angeles closed for business that day, the duo decided instead to remain open, offering patrons a place to drink coffee and perhaps avoid family if necessary. “The idea was to do a special thing, and we thought, like, 10 people would show up… and we got our butts kicked,” Babsinski remembers.
Since then, the yearly Starbucksification of Glanville & Babinski’s menu has become an event in its own right, planned for months in advance with collaborators like Chelsea Scott, Go Get Em Tiger’s pastry chef. From casual brainstorming and tossing ideas to serious meetings and discussion over ingredient preparation (all of which gets made in house, of course), the planning begins as early as June.
“The closer we get to the actual day the closer we go kind of crazy,” Scott admits. “It always gets a little out of control. We always end up being super ambitious with what we end up doing.”
“The thing took off and became something that’s like our Super Bowl,” Babinski affirms. “It’s a big event for us.”
When we talk holiday drink items from Starbucks, we’re not just talking syrups mixed into coffee. This year’s pumpkin spice latte homage featured a miniature house-made kabocha squash & whipped cream pie, resting flakily atop a cup of steamed milk, espresso, house pumpkin spice syrup and nutmeg caramel. One did not simply sip this drink; you had to take a spoon and stab this sucker, pie collapsing into the warm beverage below, with sweet bits crumbling softly into the steaming glass.
The festive crème brulee latte was similarly elaborate: a glass of custard pudding milk tea made with Song Tea’s Old Tree Yunnan, topped with a breakable rum custard sugar seal. Or what about the humble peppermint mocha? At GGET it came served in an edible three-ounce “Chocolate Medansky” cup, containing a single shot of 49th Parallel espresso, mint whipped cream and candied mint leaf. Sip your drink, then chase it by eating the cup whole.
Each year offers a new set of flavors and concepts for the cafe to play with, hanging out alongside annual returning favorites. Their bottled espresso-spiked eggnog latte returns each year, and is a crowd favorite. But the most popular offering in 2016—for both staff and guests alike—was without a doubt the “Cup of Toffee” latte.
With branding mirroring a Nissin Cup of Noodles, the “Cup of Toffee” was served with dry and wet ingredients. in the cup you got sticks of housemade toffee and a sprinkling of Sudden Coffee, today’s updated version ready-to-drink instant coffee. On the side you’re given a little cup of steamed almond macadamia milk. Pour the hot milk into the dry ingredients, combine, and eat, using coffee stir sticks as a kind of poor man’s chopstick to fish out the toffee ribbons. This ramen-esque beverage is their most singular drink yet.
Chelsea Scott says, “It was just one of those things where we were laughing so much just thinking about it, and making it actually happen was a lot of fun.” Guests were also able to pre-order some of Scott’s own pies for pick-up on that day, with flavors like kabocha pumpkin and brown butter pecan. Some 250 pies were prepared by Scott and her team in the two days leading up to Thanksgiving.
With baristas mixing furiously in Christmas sweaters, paper snowflakes hanging from the ceiling, and NSYNC’s holiday album on the speakers, the Thanksgiving tradition at Go Get Em Tiger shows no signs of stopping. Indeed, it’s become something of a certifiable coffee tradition in Los Angeles, a community gathering in a city where the coffee scene can still feel brand new. This event is about so much more than just one day in November; it’s no wonder they start thinking about it in June.
Katrina Yentch is a Sprudge contributor based in Los Angeles. Read more Katrina Yentch on Sprudge.
Photos by Jesse Tenorio courtesy of Go Get Em Tiger. Top photo by Katrina Yentch for Sprudge Media Network.
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Country Girls
I think the love of animals, understanding of wild things, and rural life in general get in your blood....at a very early age.
Kids raised on farms and in country homes tend to get a grasp on reality early in life.
Thus, above is Peggy using her dad as a saddle horse. Alas by the time I got the camera she had dismounted and was leading him around with her mama's bathrobe tie. Cooling him out I guess.
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Tuesday, November 29, 2016
21 Very Merry Holiday Coffee Blends
What could be finer than a holiday blend? Nothing, as far as we’re concerned here at Sprudge. In a tradition that dates back to 2012, we’ve rounded up some of the finest coffee holiday blends known to man. These twenty-some-odd blends, from two beans to whoocs, remind us why this time of year is such a special season to be a coffee lover. Gathered ’round the hearth with friends—or enjoying an 85 degree beach day in Sydney—this year’s guide has something for everyone, and is the biggest holiday blends guide in the history of Sprudge. Armed with mug and candy cane, we invite you to dive in, and happy holidays from all of us at Sprudge!
Counter Culture Coffee — Iridescent — $17.75 — Shop via Counter Culture Coffee
A perennial favorite here at Sprudge HQ, this year’s Iridescent is 92% Huehuetenango ConcepciĂłn Huista washed, 8% Ethiopia Banko Gotiti natural. Leaders in not just coffee taste-goodery, but coffee do-goodery, Counter Culture are donating a nickel per pound sold to help combat climate change at origin—read more about this remarkable program here.
Dogwood Coffee — “Snow Emergency” — $18 — Shop via Dogwood Coffee
Most folks would panic in a snow emergency, but not the good people of Dogwood Coffee in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Instead they’re pairing up a Colombian washed coffee from Tolima with a natural Ethiopian coffee from the Guji zone, resulting in a coffee that “pairs well with ski masks, choppers and ice scrappers. ” Okay then.
Ceremony Coffee — “Holiday 2016 — $17 — Shop via Ceremony Coffee
A two-bean blend of Ethiopia Wazzala (washed) and Ethiopia Nefas (natural), this coffee works great for both filter and espresso, and offers “a simultaneously familiar, electric, and fruity” flavor profile. Recommended!
Campos Coffee — “Superior Blend” — $12 — Shop via Campos Coffee
Campos have gussied up their classic Superior Blend with some delightfully elvish holiday art work. Just look at those wee elves, hanging around the espresso machine. They’re digging this blend Latin American and Ethiopian coffees, procured in line with Campos’ ethical quality standards.
Batdorf & Bronson — “Holiday Blend” — $14 — Shop via Batdorf & Bronson
An annual tradition from Batdorf & Bronson, this coffee is comprised of Latin American and African coffees, with flavor notes of “Chocolate and dried fruit, pecans and dates, and cherry liquor”.
Equator Coffees — “Holiday Blend” — $17.95 — Shop via Equator Coffees
A complex blend of washed and natural coffees from Brazil, Costa Rica, and Ethiopia—but not in the order you’d expect. A washed Ethiopian Guji from the Hambela Estate anchors and inspires this blend, which is natural processed coffees from Fazenda Santa Luzia and the Ureña brothers in Tarrazu, Costa Rica, where this style of processing is exceedingly rare. It’s one of the most original holiday blends we’ve seen anywhere this year.
Groundwork Coffee — “Holiday Blend” — $21.95 — Shop via Groundwork Coffee
For “a sweet and juicy blend” meant to evoke warm weather Christmas spirit everywhere—from sunny Los Angeles to Sydney and Cape Town—Groundwork starts with a Guatemalan coffee via TG Labs, and pairs that with an Ethiopian METAD and Uganda Sipi Falls. This is most especially a filter coffee, and would taste great through a home batch brewer.
Bespoken Coffee Roasters — “Holiday Blend” — $17 — Shop via Bespoken Coffee Roasters
Based in tiny Corvallis, Oregon, the husband-wife team behind Bespoken Coffee Roasters are earning praise a bit further up the Willamette River, earning shelf space and hopper time at several of Portland, Oregon’s best coffee bars. Discover this microroaster through their Holiday Blend, a blend of Guatemalan, Ethiopian and Kenyan coffees with notes of “cocoa, plum, and sweet molasses.” We love how Bespoken keeps it real, suggesting their Holiday Blend as a great option for those who dig a little cream and sugar in their post-turkey, post-pie, perhaps-even-post-brandy brew.
Tim Wendelboe — “Nacimiento Merry Christmas 149” — $17 — Shop via Tim Wendelboe
Not a blend exactly, but a lovely Christmas release all the same from Oslo’s Tim Wendelboe. Nacimiento is a Pacas & Bourbon coffee from the Santa Barbara region of Honduras, from husband & wife producers Jobneel & Fany Caceres Dios. Grown nice and high at 1700 MASL, this coffee matures under limited sunlight and cool temperatures, resulting in a complex, singular expression of terroir in the El Cielito. Winner of the 2016 Nordic Roaster Competition, this light roasted coffee has a wine-like complexity, with fresh and dried fruit notes. Available worldwide and highly recommended!
Intelligentsia Coffee — “Celebration Blend” — $19 — Shop via Intelligentsia Coffee
The celebration continues with Intelligentsia’s annual offering. Comprised this holiday season of coffees from Ethiopia, Kenya and Colombia. Intelli’s online retail excels year in and year out, with multiple bundlings and special edition offerings we’ll be featuring throughout our 2016 holiday guides.
Huckleberry Coffee — “Sister Winter Holiday Blend” — $19 — Shop via Huckleberry Coffee
Denver’s Huckleberry Coffee tell it like it is: this blend would taste great with a splash of booze, especially in the context of a large holiday family gathering. To achieve this balance they’re blending coffees from Guatemala and Ethiopia, resulting in a coffee with downright fruitcake-ish notes. Even better, portion of sales go to help leaf rust recovery in Guatemala.
Madcap Coffee — “Holiday Fusion” — $19.50 — Shop via Madcap Coffee
One of our favorite holiday blends each year, Madcap keeps things simple and quality focused with this two-bean blend of featured coffees. This year’s Holiday Fusion combines Madcap’s Kenya Karinga and Costa Rica Santa Lucia, for a coffee with “notes of cranberry and sparkling acidity.” We definitely recommend this blend!
Onyx Coffee Lab — “FRAMILY: Holiday Blend” — $16 — Shop via Onyx Coffee Lab
A blend in honor of your friends and family—”Framily”—this coffee from Arkansas’ Onyx Coffee Lab combines a washed Ethiopian Hambela with honey processed Colombia La Plata coffees. We’re digging the tasting notes like “German chocolate cake” and “mint and spice.”
Joe NYC — “Rockefeller Holiday Coffee” — $17.50 — Shop via Joe NYC
No matter which holiday you celebrate on December 25th—for some of us this year it’s Hanukkah!—Joe’s got the hookup, in the form of their much-loved annual Rockefeller holiday release. This year Joe’s featuring a single origin coffee from the Marcala region of Honduras, from producer Roger Antonio Dominguez Marquez. $1 from every bag of Rock purchased will be donated to the NY Cares’ Annual Coat Drive—learn more here, and happy sipping.
Quills Coffee — “Yuletide Holiday Blend” — $20 — Shop via Quills Coffee
Lousville, KY coffee heroes Quills Coffee are offering up a holiday coffee that does what it says on the box, with notes of cranberry, spice cake, caramel, and the all-important ‘cheer’. It’s a marriage of Kenyan and Costa Rican washed coffees that somehow doubles as Quills’ first-ever holiday blend, a tradition we hope continues for many years to come.
Klatch Coffee —The Many-Splendored Blends of Klatch — Prices vary — Shop via Klatch Coffee
Not one, not two, but four unique holiday blends are on offer this season from Klatch, including one they describe as “Santa’s favorite Holiday brew, dating back to his days as an Ethiopian reindeer herder.” That’s probably our favorite holiday coffee copy of the 2016 season.
Olympia Coffee Roasting Company — “Holiday Blend” — $17 — Shop via Olympia Coffee Roasting Company
“A complex expression of the Bourbon varietal”, this year’s Holiday Blend from Oly Coffee is a gift perfectly suited for the coffee nerd in your life. Olympia takes an El Salvador Bourbon coffee from producer Ricardo Ariz and blends it with an 100% SL 28 / SL34 bourbon hybrid from the Kagomoini Cooperative in Kenya. The end result is Bourbon on Bourbon, from two very different sets of terroir on opposite sides of the world. Some might think it geeky, but this is very much our idea of fun.
Populace Coffee — Joyeux Holiday Blend — $18 — Shop via Populace Coffee
A lovely little blend from Populace Coffee, a brand with big things on the horizon in 2017. This year’s Joyeux is equal parts Colombian and Kenyan coffee, and should play nicely at any upcoming family gatherings—plus its color scheme is perfect for the stuffing of stockings.
PT’s Coffee — “Abominable Snowbrew” — $14.45 — Shop via PT’s Coffee
This is the People’s Choice winner for this year’s best blend name and coolest holiday blend art—look at the cute little cartoon yeti. He’s terrifying and yet, the coffee he guards is delicious. PT’s are blending up African, South American, and Sumatran coffees for a coffee that pairs well with sumptuous spiced meats and mulled wines.
Stumptown Coffee — “Slay Ride” — $19 — Shop via Stumptown Coffee
The heavy metal music enthusiasts at Stumptown Coffee are offering up a wicked blend for you heshers out there. We don’t know what’s in it, but we know it shreds, man, with flavors of citrus, cinnamon, caramel, and surely some Rainier in there somewhere. Rock on.
Verve Coffee Roasters — “Holiday Blend” — $20.25 — Shop via Verve Coffee Roasters
We’re continually impressed by Verve’s approach to the holiday blend, which they refer to as an “exciting challenge” to curate each year. This year’s blend takes three washed coffees from very different parts of the world: Kenya, Guatemala, and Honduras. Once united you get a coffee with flavor notes like “Molasses, Sugar Plum” and perhaps our favorite flavor note of the season: “Festive”.
Jordan Michelman is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network, and he loves a nice holiday blend. Read more Jordan Michelman on Sprudge.
Several of the roasting companies featured in this guide are advertising partners on Sprudge. A complete list of partners is published on the lower right-hand side of each article.
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Spitfire Coffee: A Tiny Treasure In The French Quarter
The past and present co-exist in New Orleans. On one side of the French Quarter’s Jackson Square sits CafĂ© Du Monde. Since 1862, the classic shop has been serving beignets and chicory coffee to those needing a caffeine boost and a mess of powdered sugar. Except for when iced coffee and soda were introduced in 1988, the cafe has hardly changed.
If you want a completely different coffee, one rooted in the present day, it’s a mere five-minute walk away. Exit CafĂ© Du Monde, stroll across Jackson Square, avoid getting caught up in an impromptu jazz band or magician performance in front of the St. Louis Cathedral, and duck down St. Peter’s Street. Don’t blink, or you’ll miss Spitfire Coffee.
There isn’t much room to maneuver when you walk in—Spitfire has a grand total of four seats. The shop punches above its weight due to a strong multi-roaster program, as well as reimagined specialty drinks that involve cocktail bitters such as habanero and mole.
In a way, co-owner Nicholas Christian backed into a barista role. He had been working as a chef and kitchen manager in his native Portland, Oregon, and was interested in the coffee-into-espresso process—a curiosity that was stoked when he crossed paths with a Synesso tech. Christian recalls fixing an espresso machine via a Bluetooth earpiece, with the tech on the other line deciphering the machine’s different sounds. Before moving to New Orleans prior to Hurricane Isaac in 2012, he had stints with Boxcar Coffee Roasters in Boulder, Colorado as a roaster; as a chef back in Portland; and as photographer turned consultant and cafe manager for Dallis Brothers Coffee in New York. After landing in New Orleans, Christian turned back to the chef trade before meeting John Peters, the original owner of Spitfire Coffee, who offered him a consulting job.
“When I first got [to New Orleans], it was a [coffee] ghost town,” Christian says. “There was not much going on at all really [with coffee]. A lot of it was still really dark roast. Lots of bottom, lots of flavors, things like that. That’s one of the reasons I jumped at the consulting job because I thought I might have a chance to actually, slowly change coffee here.”
Peters’ family owned the French Quarter building, which dates back to the 1700s, and the cafe space used to be an art gallery. The cafe’s name comes from the WWII fighter plane; a Spitfire-themed banner hangs behind the register. Christian and his business partner Scott Burlington, who handles the back end of the business, bought Spitfire Coffee from Peters in 2015; an Olan Mills-esque portrait of the two owners hangs in the shop.
The unusual suspects at Spitfire Coffee.
Menus close to the register detail the espresso and filter drinks, plus a list of specialty drinks and craft chocolate bars. Brewed coffees are made via Hario V60, while iced coffee is available from a Toddy or a Yama. Due to the humidity in New Orleans, Christian found that redialing the espresso on the shop’s Nuova Simonelli Aurelia II had to be done many times every hour. To combat this, he sets the water-boiler temperature as low as 194 degrees F, looks for a five-to-six-second espresso drop, and ends the shot at between 27 and 29 seconds. The lower temperature and slower extraction help keep espresso’s round, balanced notes in the spotlight. According to Christian, the espresso shots are now more consistent and have a thicker, more stable crema, without as many high and low notes.
Miami’s Panther Coffee is the shop’s mainstay, while other roasters featured include Nashville’s Crema Coffee Roasters, Jackson, Mississippi’s BeanFruit, Chicago’s Passion House, and PDX’s Coava and Extracto Coffee Roasters.
Roaster roster.
“I want to try to find roasters from each section [of the country] because we get a huge international crowd here,” Christian says. “I love it when people come in and [say], ‘Oh my god, this is the best cup of coffee I’ve had in the States. Where did it come from?’ I’m like, ‘That one actually came from Chicago. When you are in Chicago, go check this out.’ It’s great for the international market to also see that Americans don’t just have Starbucks.”
Christian also had to win over locals, who were accustomed to the city’s traditional dark-roast coffee and chicory. He said he would put chicory in the pour-overs at first, and slowly removed it over time.
Moving forward, Spitfire aims to open in another neighborhood and try to become a part of the revitalization of a different section of town—something of an extension of Christian’s desire to just change the coffee culture.
“The thing that I love about the coffee scene in this city is that this is the most welcoming, friendly coffee city I’ve ever worked in,” he says. “There’s rivalry, but it’s all friendly. It’s all fun. Everyone sends [customers] to each other’s shops. Being in a tourist city, that’s one of my favorite things to do.”
Evan C. Jones is a Sprudge.com contributor based in St. Louis. Read more Evan C. Jones on Sprudge.
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Fantastic Beasts
Alan took me to see it last night. He took Becky the night before.....
It was excellent, a very enjoyable evening..... Lots of fun creatures for laughs and lots of slightly scary stuff for thrills. Pretty good CG, good characters, a few more falling bricks than might have been necessary to advance the plot, but it is an adventure after all. Not a great deal of plot, actually, but plenty of action throughout. It sure wasn't boring.
I could easily see why he wanted to see it twice. It is one of those movies where at the end you wish there was more and you keep remembering small details for hours afterwards. I will be looking forward to the DVD and movie night, a popular tradition here at Northview.
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Monday, November 28, 2016
4 Inexpensive Home Improvements for the Winter Months
Is your home ready to weather the upcoming winter? Now is the ideal time for making some improvements around the house to make sure it’s ready to handle the cold weather, snowstorms, and other “unforeseen” surprises. Here are 4 inexpensive home improvements that you might want to consider, including: checking and tuning up your heating system, adding extra insulation, spicing up your kitchen and repainting.
Image Source: Flickr
Checking and Tuning up Your Heating System
Before the start of the cold season, it’s not a bad idea to tune up your furnace. 30% of an average home’s energy costs are related to heating, and this number can spike further if you have inefficiencies with your furnace or boiler system. The first place to start is by replacing the filter at the beginning of the season and every couple of months while you run the furnace. When purchasing a new filter, note that the cheap ones are made just to protect the furnace fan motor, so make sure to get a more efficient and healthy pleated filter for improved air quality. Source: Inhabitat
Adding Extra Insulation
Unless you live in an older home, chances are the walls in your house are fairly well insulated with fiberglass batt insulation. If not, you’ll want to look at insulating your home’s walls sufficiently.
Even brand new homes often lack sufficient insulation in the attic. Since heat travels up, this presents a huge problem in the winter. According to Energy Star, you don’t have enough attic insulation if you can easily see the floor joists in your attic. This do-it-yourself guide from Energy Star shows you how to better insulate your attic on your own. Source: Money.USNews
Spicing Up Your Kitchen
Full kitchen remodels can be incredibly expensive, and that’s especially true if you have to get plumbers or electricians involved. But a lot of kitchens don’t necessarily need a complete redo; they could be vastly improved with just a few inexpensive changes and upgrades.
If your cabinets need a facelift, consider sanding and staining them, or even repainting or glazing them to add an updated look. And if your appliances are still in good shape, give them a good cleaning inside and out to help them look their best.
Winter might drag on, but that doesn’t mean you can’t make these long, cold months productive. Instead of counting down until spring, create a list of easy, inexpensive improvements to help pass the time while you’re stuck indoors. Then get started – because spring will be here before you know it. Source: TheSimpleDollar
Repainting
You’ve been staring at your neutral colored walls every day for months. Want to brighten your mood? Try repainting! Go with a bright, cheery color to liven things up.
I always repaint in the winter because that’s when I need the most visual stimulation. A new coat of paint can dramatically lift your mood and the mood of the entire room.
Make sure you crack open the windows to let in fresh air while you’re painting. Or, consider going with an eco-friendly, low-VOC paint so you don’t have to worry about breathing in toxic fumes. Source: MoneyCrashers
Contact:
Kerrisdale Roofing & Drains
8279 Ross St, Vancouver, BC V5X 4W1
(604) 360-2114
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Cafe Imports Is Now Non-GMO Certified
Cafe Imports is now officially verified as a producer of non-genetically modified organisms by the Non-GMO Project. The green coffee buyer announced the certification via a blog post on the company website on November 4th. They join other coffee brands like Allegro and Anchorhead but are the first on the supply side to achieve the designation.
From Cafe Imports’ blog post:
We also oppose the fact that the easy and clear labeling of food products that include GMO’s has been majorly and unfairly fought by the GMO-Food industry. For these reasons, we took the step to become certified through the Non-GMO Verify project. Our commitment to our customers is to never work with GMO coffee in an effort to help maintain the integrity and consumer clarity of a product we all care for so much.
Genetically modified food is a bit of a hot button issue for many: are GMOs dangerous per se or is there some level of accepted genetic modification, what are they doing to the environment, should GMOs be labeled on food products, etc. But with this certification, Cafe Imports circumnavigates the controversy entirely in hopes of providing more transparency to the end user.
Their full statement can be found here.
Zac Cadwalader is the news editor at Sprudge Media Network.
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Nominate The Best In Coffee For The 2016 Sprudgie Awards
The Sprudgie Awards—”The Only Awards In Coffee”—are back for an astonishing eighth annual season, and the worldwide nominations process begins today. Fill out your nominations ballot by clicking here now, or simply use the Google form embedded below. Read on for more information about the award categories.
Each year since the launch of this website in 2009, we’ve given out the Sprudgie Awards honoring the best and brightest in specialty coffee in the following categories:
Best New Cafe — Honoring the most outstanding new coffee bar to open in 2016. Past winners include Paramount Coffee Project (Los Angeles), Scandinavian Embassy (Amsterdam), Intelligentsia Logan Square (Chicago), Pergamino Cafe (Medellin), Milstead & Co. (Seattle)
Notable Roaster — Honoring progressive, delicious, and exemplary coffee roasting around the world. Honored brands may be brand new or longstanding. Past winners include Heart Coffee (Portland), Small Batch Roasting Company (Melbourne), Drop Coffee (Stockholm), Blue Bottle Coffee (Oakland), Verve Coffee Roasters (Santa Cruz), and Tim Wendelboe (Oslo).
Best Coffee Writing — Outstanding original coffee journalism honoring individual authors, published during the previous calendar year. Past winners include Matt Perger (Barista Hustle), Alexis Madrigal (The Atlantic), Dr. Lisa Knisely (Bitch Magazine), Erin Meister and Liz Clayton (Serious Eats: Drinks), and Oliver Strand (NYT Style Magazine Online).
Notable Producer — Honoring excellence in coffee production across the coffee-growing world. Past honorees include Aida Battle (El Salvador), Rachel Peterson (Panama), the individual growers of the Ethiopia Commodities Exchange, Gilbert Gatali (Rwanda), Orang Utan Coffee (Indonesia), Emilio Lopez Diaz (El Salvador), and Tim Wendelboe & Elias Roa (Colombia).
Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence — The most hallowed of all the Sprudgie Awards, honoring individual achievements for the betterment of coffee. Past winners include Markus Reuter, AndrĂ© KrĂĽger, and Thorsten Keller, Jim Karr, Gerra Harrigan, Marcus Boni, Kyle Glanville & Charles Babinski, Aleco Chigounis, and Stephen Vick.
Other annual awards include the Sprudgie for Best New Product, Nicest Package, Best Coffee Video or Film, Best Coffee Subscription, Best Coffee Magazine, and this year’s newest awards, Best Coffee Podcast and Finest Coffee Event.
Nominations for the 2016 Sprudgie Awards are accepted until Sunday, December 11th at 11:59 PM Pacific Standard Time. Following this we’ll host an open public vote on nominees from all categories, leading up to our awards feature in early January.
Vote! Share! We can’t wait to see who you pick to make the shortlist for the Eighth Annual Sprudgie Awards.
The post Nominate The Best In Coffee For The 2016 Sprudgie Awards appeared first on Sprudge.
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Mother Honey Locust
Decorated her children for the holidays......
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The La Marzocco Home & Specht Design Custom GS3 Espresso Machine
A stunning custom espresso machine in time for the holidays? Thank you, Santa. Seattle-based La Marzocco Home are teaming up with Specht Design from Melbourne for a limited edition custom outfitted GS3 espresso machine, the next iteration in LM Home’s ongoing Craftman Series, profiled previously on Sprudge. The project kicks off the launch of LM Home in Australia, and offers US consumers a chance to check out Specht founder / designer Dan Schonknecht, whose custom espresso machine design work has a worldwide following.
Designed and manufactured in Australia, this custom machine has a Mannex white body with matte black chrome accents, paired to American oak side panels, group cap and paddle. Perhaps its most unique embellishment is the machine’s “periscope manometer on the group that allows users to manipulate pressure with pressure being read in the group head”, as per La Marzocco. This gadget evokes something nautical, or perhaps even the Mad Scientist’s laboratory (pronounced “lah-BOR-a-tory”).
This periscope manometer reads the pressure at the group.
The machine’s drain gate comes pre-installed with an Acaia Lunar scale (2015 Sprudgie Award winner for Best New product), as well as Specht Design’s custom side mounted steam lever. As a GS3 model this could certainly work in an espresso bar, or would be a real jewel of wonder for the well-appointed home espresso geek, dork, or nerd in your life.
Acaia scale embedded in the drip tray.
The La Marzocco x Specht Design GS3 retails for $9,500 via La Marzocco Home. This is an extremely limited release, with select machines available for the United States market, along with machines allocated for users in Australia. And while a GS3 won’t fit in any but the very largest of stockings, once they’re gone, they’re gone—I’m sure you’ll find a little room under the tree.
Jordan Michelman is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Jordan Michelman on Sprudge.
La Marzocco is an advertising partner with Sprudge Media Network. A complete list of partners is published on the lower right-hand side of each article.
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