Wednesday, May 03, 2006


gimme keeps its promise

this morning i meandered into the kitchen, where i could be found gazing sadly at my empty bag of scott & jessica's los lirios, the c.o.e. colombian. it reminded me of the wonderful c.o.e. colombians i had also cupped last week with the beautiful scaa board member and shining juan valdez star mary petitt.

(you know mary gets rather bashful about this, but one of the reasons i admire her so is that she is a feminist coffee pioneer, one of the first 2 women to pass the rigorous nybot exchange cupping exam and work as a professional cupper there. as such she, like erna knutsen, the mother of us all, has helped pave the way for many women to forge their own careers in coffee.)

let's face it: in the past, we specialty coffee lovers sometimes gave colombian coffees short shrift. we thought they were all the same, the stuff we were used to, basically a crisp taste experience not that distant from folgers, but of better quality when bought from our nabe independent roaster.

then we discovered mesa de los santos. this reminded us how good colombian could be when it was good.

and so when most people new to specialty coffee (who tend to like colombian because that is what they know and were rather used to) asked me for a nice morning drip, i would often recommend scaa board member oswaldo acevedo's mesa.

but you know -- after the los lirios, after cupping with mary -- i feel i owe colombian coffee farmers a huge apology. because colombian coffee isn't the same old-same old.

not at all. colombian coffee can be fantastic coffee, and we should all re-aquaint ourselves with the regions and micro-climates colombia offers.

as this train of thought passed through my sleepy head, i set about brewing up the last of peter g's counterculture caranavi. as i wandered over to get dressed, i noticed a small package not far from the phone.

did i get a box yesterday?, i asked my poor husband. oh well, he said, i forgot to tell you.

and what, dear readers, was in this box? salvation!

yes, kevin from gimme had warned us all that the colombian c.o.e. el naranjal from huila was nearly ready. and here it was.

thanks kevin! this hits the chemex first thing tomorrow, altho' it looks like kevin's recommending it as an americano. . .

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