Turning Ethiopian

I cracked open the bag of Ethiopian Abeba that I bought at Phil & Sebastian yesterday. First I tried it in a press pot- and discovered that I really have no idea how much coffee to use for press pots (yes, I know there is a tutorial on coffeegeek among other places, but I was winging it), and what I ended up with was watery and pointless. So I tried it again as espresso, and wow- the aroma was powerful, great sort of cinnamony warm spice, and the espresso I made with it was not only delicious, but it had a beautiful leopard-spotted crema that I almost never get with my machine. I get crema, absolutely, and I get some mottling in terms of colour (flat, light beige crema is a bad sign, just so you know), but these were those beautiful SPOTS. I wish I’d taken a picture but will try to next time. It was mouth-filling delicious, too, overpowering, almost. An emotional coffee experience.

So I’ve decided that I love Ethiopian coffee. I had great luck with Sidamo a while back, and seeing as the Abeba is only 8oz, and I’ve used up about a quarter of that with today’s experiments, I am going to run out of beans, soon. So I set out today to see if I could find some of the fine Sidamo I’ve tasted from Big Mountain. Big Mountain is a Calgary roaster that does a great, medium-roast espresso and some nice single origins too, and their beans are sold at a few coffeehouses (including Bumpy’s, which is one of the best coffeehouses here) and some groceries too. I tried two spots and couldn’t find Sidamo, but I did find organic Yirgacheffe at Bumpy’s, so I decided to take it home for a spin. Here are my two Ethiopians:

Okay, enough coffee. The weather is delightfully non-humid now–bad for coffee, good for people–and I just found out today that it looks as if I’ll be in New York City, for the first time in my life, in early August. This will be work related, but I hope to gather enough impressions in my little free time to write about them here.

Calgary Farmers’ Market flaunts its bounty, and some espresso reflections

…But first a decent latte art attempt from a couple of weeks ago:

I did this one in a 5.5 oz Muti porcelain cappuccino cup (cost $90 at the Yorkville Muti store in Toronto, so I’m afraid to use it), and it’s small volume but nice and wide, a great canvas.

Anyway, I was at the Calgary Farmers’ Market today, and the summer bounty is a beautiful thing. Peaches are peaking, apricots are massive. Kris at The Daily Bagel let me know last week this his ovens are back and operational, so I picked up a dozen for our Montreal bagel-deprived kitchen (and something must have gone very right with the repair, because they are OUTSTANDING this time, remind me of Kettleman’s in Ottawa). Picked up two curries from Shef’s Fiery Kitchen (Chicken Kuku Paka and a Beef one that’s new to the menu- sort of a beef roganjosh, not as spicy as vindaloo but plenty spicy), and started off with my weekly visit to Phil and Sebastian for an espresso. It’s Black Cat this week, a happy accident- I love their usual Hines, LOVE it, but I love Black Cat too, with all its chocolaty notes and sweet smoothness. When I first started drinking espresso, I thought it would always taste the same if made with care because “espresso” defined and described a particular roast of coffee. Since I always bought either “French roast” if on offer (in other words, beans as black as coal, the kind of roast used in Vietnamese Cafe Sua Da) or whatever the shop called “espresso,” I was basically correct. You roast super dark, you destroy all the distinctive qualities of the bean.

Now I’m obviously more educated in the differences among roasts and more importantly the differences among varietals, but I’m also amazed by how distinctive different BLENDS are. Since I don’t know, usually, the origins that go into blends, I’m not sure what my blend “sweet spot” is, but I’d love to find out and to roast my own. I know, for now, that among the espresso blends that I use now–a revolving line-up of Big Mountain, Hines Public Market, 49th Parallel Epic, Intelligentsia Black Cat, and 49th Parallel Organic–all have unique profiles, and it’s not because they’re that different roast-wise. Big Mountain is definitely lighter than Black Cat, but nothing remotely approaches my former loves, “French roast” and, say, Starbucks espresso or Second Cup “forza.” The beans I use now are all fresh and I love them all in different ways. But I’d love to find something “perfect” and be able to make it myself.

I bought a half pound of Ethiopian Abeba (roasted by Novo Coffee). I’ve had mostly good luck with single origin espresso- and it has to be espresso since I don’t own a drip coffeemaker- especially Ethiopian (Sidamo), so I look forward to trying this and reporting about it. Sebastian showed me a new single-origin bean, an Ethiopian Yirgacheffe, that Novo calls “Adado Espresso.” I like the sound of this.

Here be dragonflies

Well, one dragonfly, and a beautiful one at that- chillin’ next to the mailbox.

Another view:

I don’t recall ever seeing a creature like this one here. This seems like part and parcel of a very weird summer with very weird weather. May was freezing with lots of snow; June was on the cool side (and in Calgary, that means that most nights, the heat went on), and the last few days, it’s been almost unbearably hot and humid. This is humidity like we’ve never experienced before (in 7 years here): 19 and even 20 degree dewpoints, bona fide “haze,” the whole east-of-the-prairies experience.

Martiniboys

Well, I just survived nearly 48 hours with no home internet. It was … horrible. I can’t write about it.

But the nice Shaw repair guy finally showed up this afternoon and all is well. We have a new splitter thingie. All those hours with no service at home, and having to suffer the shocking indignity of a cyber cafe in my own city (I know!) made me realise that the internet is a precious, precious thing, and that I should spend as many of my waking moments on it as possible. Pain like what I went through yesterday, trying to pick up unsecured wi-fi from hapless (and pretty stupid, really) neighbours steeled my resolve. As God is my witness, I will never be without high-speed internet, in the comfort of my own damn basement, again.

I was perusing restaurant-related sites, as is my wont, and came across one that’s increasingly interesting. It’s from a Toronto outfit called “Martini Boys” and has listings for six cities: Miami, NYC, Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver, and the martini-soaked city of Calgary. What I like about it, in addition to a colourful, engaging, and generally sensible layout, is that it has an “opening/buzz” section. I like this- there is so much happening so fast in this town that we need a source that tries to keep up with it. They have a relatively easy way to contact them to give them tips. All in all, a class act, pretty much. EDITED TO ADD that their geographical knowledge of Calgary is hopeless- they list a stripper bar down by Chinook Centre as being in “Bankview,” which is of course my neighbourhood and nowhere near Chinook, but that’s a kink to be worked out, or so one hopes.

I must add that the friendly and gracious Mr Ian Chiclo of Calgary’s free alt weekly, ffwd, has been sending me samples of what will be that mag’s new webite via our interaction on facebook. It looks GREAT, really a huge improvement over the crapulent site linked to here.

Acceptable Behaviour

If you ever ride the C-Train (Calgary’s light rail), you might have noticed posters that are part of a campaign to enhance civility- telling riders to turn down music, not put feet on seats, not block entrances, that sort of thing. Two things have irked me about the posters: First, the drawings are… weird. Every person featured has this bizarre sort of smile that seems to indicate that all CT riders have conduct disorder or just had face lifts, even little kids. Second, and I ranted about this in one or two of my courses last year, the posters were (WERE) rife with American spellings: “ACCEPTABLE BEHAVIOR,” with an illustration of, among other things, the sign to “City Center.” Trivial? Well, in point of fact, signage is all properly Canadian (every platform indicating the direction to “CITY CENTRE,” thanks very much), and really, one of the more interesting and challenging things about emigrating from the US was, in my case, being diligent about learning and using Canadian spelling, nomenclature (as with “in university” instead of “in college,” among many others) and even pronunciation (”COMP-uh-zit” instead of “com-PAH-zit,” and “shed” in “schedule”). I LIKE that my name has a “zed” in it. So in light of all this effort and care, it pissed me off, more than a little, to see these signs.

Well, I’m happy to report that, despite my not having complained officially (that I can recall; I complain a lot) about these spelling snafus, the signs have been corrected- “ACCEPTABLE BEHAVIOUR” and “City Centre,” big as day.

Sometimes little pleasures are enough. I’m going to write CT and thank them.