Posted Thu Feb 16, 2006, 7:52pm Subject: Re: My COFFEE
stinkyjones Said:
If my theory is true, a lot of these ridiculous circular arguments can be easily resolved by pointing the discussion to the "Communicating with pstam/Peter in Beijing" thread.
pstam Senior Member Joined: 27 Jan 2004 Posts: 2,302 Location: Beijing Expertise: Professional
Espresso: ECM, SAN MARCO, EURO 2000 Grinder: MAZZER Vac Pot: YES Drip: YES Roaster: YES, HOME STYLE
Posted Thu Feb 16, 2006, 9:49pm Subject: Re: My COFFEE
stinkyjones Said:
As someone who is passionate about espresso, you will certainly agree with me that there is often no correlation between price and quality. Perception yes, but quality, no. If there is no frame of reference for the masses, they will believe anything . . .
More than 70% of the clients are foreign guests, mainly from France, Germany, Italy, and other places, not many local clients. So they know coffee and free to order whatever they want. BTW, there is almost no promotion of coffee at all in that shop.
Peter in Beijing ------------------- http://www.kaffa.cn/ ------------------- I am looking for the way and the place to extend our trainning courses.
Would somebody please, for the love of everything that is good and true in this world, send this man a bag of freshly roasted Black Cat. Surely there are planes leaving for China every day from Chicago. We could then end this discussion once and for all.
Either angels will sing in the sky above Peter's head when he discovers the true UNDERSTANDING of espresso, or he'll dismiss the spicy, chocolaty, creamy, smooth sensations as a poor definition of espresso in which case he can continue, secure in the knowleddge that he does not need to taste ANY other bean or blend and can chuckle at the rest of us poor, unfortunate, deluded North Americans, Northern Europeans and Australians as we experiment with differnet methods, machines and combinations.
Geoff (who honestly can't believe he's the first one to think of this)
gime2much Senior Member Joined: 10 Dec 2004 Posts: 1,965 Location: Sunny S Fl Expertise: I love coffee
Espresso: La Pavoni, Astoria comm, 2... Grinder: La Pavoni Zip, Bunn... Drip: Bunn comm Roaster: Popcorn popper (air),co/ufo
Posted Thu Feb 16, 2006, 11:28pm Subject: Re: My COFFEE
espressionist Said:
Would somebody please, for the love of everything that is good and true in this world, send this man a bag of freshly roasted Black Cat. Surely there are planes leaving for China every day from Chicago. We could then end this discussion once and for all.
Either angels will sing in the sky above Peter's head when he discovers the true UNDERSTANDING of espresso, or he'll dismiss the spicy, chocolaty, creamy, smooth sensations as a poor definition of espresso in which case he can continue, secure in the knowleddge that he does not need to taste ANY other bean or blend and can chuckle at the rest of us poor, unfortunate, deluded North Americans, Northern Europeans and Australians as we experiment with differnet methods, machines and combinations.
Geoff (who honestly can't believe he's the first one to think of this)
Back in the days when I used to import roasted from overseas...
From California to HK you were lucky if an air shipment went door to door within 7 days. Sea freight 4-5 weeks. The 7 days was with a good shipper, sometimes 2 weeks was "normal". Man I miss caffe calabria beans.
Before air fright I did sea freight (shock horror) some 8 years ago. Naturally timing big sea freights and cash flows etc..meant on a few occassions we had to do air freight from Arne in San Diego , even before tasting you can see that the shots just exploded out of the pf. The taste was infiitely a lot better. It's hard to imagine not being able to see a difference between <10 days to >30 days old shots.
UPS from Italy to HK is just 2-3 days, air freight of an LCL pallet is again 7 days if you are lucky. My experience of getting beans and equipment into China it takes a little longer with all the red tape.
Posted Fri Feb 17, 2006, 9:16am Subject: Re: My COFFEE
pstam Said:
More than 70% of the clients are foreign guests, mainly from France, Germany, Italy, and other places, not many local clients. So they know coffee and free to order whatever they want. BTW, there is almost no promotion of coffee at all in that shop.
The origin of your customers is not a basis for validating the quality of your coffee.
Being from the United States does not make me an expert on hot dogs, laziness or defrauding stockholders; much the same as hailing from China does not make you an expert on Nikes, feng shui or copyright violations.
Lacking a frame of reference for the type of espresso shots that most of us are referring to is a universal thing. The percentage of shops pulling "the good stuff" represents a very very very small percentage of total coffeehouses, so most folks, even in a large city like Chicago, have never had the opportunity to visit one of these shops to know what "the good stuff" is.
Heh heh. It shall be known as "stinky's theoreum" . . .
Anyhow, I'm beginning to think this argument is more cultural than anything. As Americans, at least, i think we are bred to thumb our nose at convention, label our grandparents as out-of-touch geezers and lead rather than follow. We dare to *gasp* take something that has been held as an absolute, break it down, study it and improve on it in immeasureable ways.
Tradition is much more highly regarded in other parts of the world.
I, for one, am glad you do post here as I have learned alot from you about the Chinese culture and the state of Chinese espresso. I can usually cut through the language, culture and understanding issues, but "here" is a place for experimenting and trying new ideas. You, Peter, come across as having found good espresso (with documentation and tradition to back up your claim) and that's as far as it's going to go.
In Peter's defence, if he is using those "upsidedown" cannisters that you screw onto the grinder and using it within a day or two, then it is entirely possible that he is producing a decent cup of espresso.
Peter, you have tried "fresh" roasted arabica coffee from a Chinese roaster, found it to be unsuitable for espresso and decided that, therfore, all fresh roasted Arabica coffee is unsuitable for espresso. No one here has had the opportunity to try this Chinese espresso, but hundreds here have tried (Intelligentsia, Hines, Hairbender...etc...etc...) and found it to be exceptionally good for espresso. I have also tried some (supposedly) fresh roasted espresso blends that, indeed, are worse than bagged Italian blends.
My (snarky) post above was meant as a serious suggestion for you to try some HIGHLY RECOMMENDED espresso blends...if you are interested in furthering your understanding. Of course, if you and your clients are happy with what you serve then "c'est la vie". But please, stop dismissing other blends as unsuitable - clearly they are suitable and in most cases preferred.
Geoff (who is looking for a mule to smuggle a camera inside a bag of freshly roasted coffee)
pstam Senior Member Joined: 27 Jan 2004 Posts: 2,302 Location: Beijing Expertise: Professional
Espresso: ECM, SAN MARCO, EURO 2000 Grinder: MAZZER Vac Pot: YES Drip: YES Roaster: YES, HOME STYLE
Posted Fri Feb 17, 2006, 10:16pm Subject: Re: My COFFEE
espressionist Said:
Sincere question to Peter...Why are you here?
I, for one, am glad you do post here as I have learned alot from you about the Chinese culture and the state of Chinese espresso. I can usually cut through the language, culture and understanding issues, but "here" is a place for experimenting and trying new ideas. You, Peter, come across as having found good espresso (with documentation and tradition to back up your claim) and that's as far as it's going to go.
In Peter's defence, if he is using those "upsidedown" cannisters that you screw onto the grinder and using it within a day or two, then it is entirely possible that he is producing a decent cup of espresso.
Peter, you have tried "fresh" roasted arabica coffee from a Chinese roaster, found it to be unsuitable for espresso and decided that, therfore, all fresh roasted Arabica coffee is unsuitable for espresso. No one here has had the opportunity to try this Chinese espresso, but hundreds here have tried (Intelligentsia, Hines, Hairbender...etc...etc...) and found it to be exceptionally good for espresso. I have also tried some (supposedly) fresh roasted espresso blends that, indeed, are worse than bagged Italian blends.
My (snarky) post above was meant as a serious suggestion for you to try some HIGHLY RECOMMENDED espresso blends...if you are interested in furthering your understanding. Of course, if you and your clients are happy with what you serve then "c'est la vie". But please, stop dismissing other blends as unsuitable - clearly they are suitable and in most cases preferred.
Everyone is telling their understanding here, so do I.
When you say something, I may tell my comment about it. When I say something, anyone can and did the samething. Why should I have to stop talking, and you and others can continue?
Are you different from me in some sense???
Peter in Beijing ------------------- http://www.kaffa.cn/ ------------------- I am looking for the way and the place to extend our trainning courses.
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