Saturday, November 15, 2003


woody, spicy, mystical

why is coffee like yoga?

"coffee illuminates things with a flash of truth, dispels the clouds of illusion and its murky gravity," sez jules michelet. it's a phenomenon of the enlightenment, don'cha know.
 
thus it's somehow apropos that today, when i'm tasting david haddock's espresso aficionado from counterculture, i also receive john friend's 2004 anusara workshop schedule.

the theme: sandalwood and black cardamom. in fact, today could almost be an oriental perfume in and of itself!

first, there's friend's mystical magic merry band tour, complete with a cute pic of ganesh that would warm the heart of any tea stall fan.

which includes me, if only for the george harrison downloads alone!

yoga people in bklyn, the studio where i take most of my classes, began as an anusara studio. at that time it was just about the only studio in this part of bklyn. (now there are so many: area, yoga lab, brooklyn yoga, etc. etc.)

while yoga people has moved far from anusara -- in fact, lately it is sadly veering towards the worst tendencies of jivamukti, which i hope the owner wendy will correct -- i still sometimes detect a hidden anusara attitude in myself, which i try to be careful to note. and that's just because my first teachers were john-friend people.

thus i have to confess that i love prof. douglas brooks, for example. great presentation of kashmir shaivism. (speaking of which, eddie, can you get more shiva on that radio!?!)

but on to the espresso. with a born-on roast date of the 12th, i ground this on my mazzer mini at 4-1/2 to 5 notches to the left of the arrow decal.

the fragrance was perfectly black cardamom (i went and stuck my nose in my jar of whole black cardamoms just to make sure). i pulled at 25-second shot on my silvia, and gaped.

i have a nice 3-oz. shot glass, which i use because dr. john's josuma malabar gold blend with robusta can easily fill that with its huge crema. and so did the aficionado.

in fact, for a moment, i thought i must have switched coffees! but no, it was the aficionado, which does indeed give a large amount of crema, although in the end not as much as the josuma.

the aficionado is roasted to bare dots of oil, so i'm calling it vienna/northern-italian roast. to my mind, the aroma continued with a woody spice/basalmic thing. it certainly has a very long dry finish, with a dutch cocoa aftertaste.

what do i mean by that? i mean, if you've ever set a pinch of say, droste cocoa out of the box on your tongue, that's the aftertaste i'm talking about: a powdery, pleasant slight bitterness. it does haul you off for a glass of water after a while. . .

the coffee clung heavily to the back of the demitasse spoon, the same way thin gravy clings. what i call a creamy body, too.

when i talked to counterculture's charming cindy chang about this coffee, she said that at this time of year she might prefer their espresso forte. i didn't get a sample of this, so i can't compare.

it's a coffee that any espresso lover should try. note: unlike other counterculture coffees, however, this blend doesn't appear to be certified organic.

let me just close by saying that there's something about this coffee that reminds me of a guerlain perfume. maybe in mood alone. . .

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