Over coffee this morning at Coffee Machine Solutions one of my colleagues mentioned that we had not spoken with our mutual friend

Coffee break at Coffee Machine Solutions

and company web consultant for quite some time. This lead the conversation to the events of the last few weeks that incorporated Christmas, New Year (surprisingly) and then the Great Flood that together had transformed a traditionally social season into something else entirely. After coffee I decided as a belated New Year’s resolution to contact all those friends and family that I missed and immediately set about making an embarrassingly long list of names. So far I haven’t got past skype call number one as a rather agitated and fuzzy (he really does need a decent web camera) web consultant began the conversation by loudly demanding a ‘cafe mocha vodka valium latte decaf with nutmeg’

Web mania.

…..it seems he needed a soothing, energising pick-me-up/put-me-down with instantaneous results so he could recover from the enormous workload he is currently experiencing and feed the enthusiasm he had for a new business idea that would require more pick-me-ups to cover the increased work hours needed! A spin-off of this conversation was the possibility of having George Clooney promote a new range of coffee capsules that carried the aforementioned rocket fuel. I

The Sara - espresso coffee at it's best.

have my doubts about the viability of the project as I am sure there would be huge problems getting product registration past the relevant health authorities and what school P&C Association is going to allow the iced coffee version to be sold in their canteens….and all professional marketers know that there is no way of guaranteeing success without the ubiquitous schools market. Of course the icy pole would be an instant winner with teachers and parents!

The entire conversation raised a whole new question of whether a tree change to the secluded but beautiful Mount Tamborine environs and then spending all your waking hours running your business

Mt Tamborine at rush hour!!

empire from an environmentally friendly home perched among the treetops above a cascading mountain stream has not led to a touch of cabin fever.

On to call number two………

The Mona Lisa

Under the heading of there is nothing new under the sun and that all truth is timeless we bring you this startling piece of breaking news from the Aroma Festival in Sydney last year.

The Mona Lisa in more detail.

It took 16 steady hands and the same number of keen eyes for detail all of 3 hours to assemble this amazing reproduction of Da Vinci’s masterpiece the Mona Lisa.

Created from 3,604 coffee cups filled with mid-toned lattes, dark long blacks and pale flat whites to provide the shades and tones needed to  cover the 610 cm by 400 cm  area.

This is slightly larger than the original Mona Lisa currently hanging in the Louvre Museum which measures only 77 cm by 53 cm and is the property of the French Government.

Mona Lisa shows her pours?

The Aroma Festival which is held at The Rocks in Sydney each year describes itself as:

“a sensory overload and indulgence with the pungency of brewing coffee, the heady explosion of spice as it hits the nose, the satin quality of chocolate as it melts on the tongue and the clean refreshing flavour of the first sip of tea.”

The 2010 festival kept with the coffee creation theme, using (they assure all concerned) 680 litres of out-of-date milk and stale coffee to re-create another timeless and powerful female image from a more contemporary era. This years effort took a team of 12 over 4 hours to assemble the 5,200 cups of various coffee styles into a 650 cm by 550 cm montage of Marilyn Monroe.

Marilyn plays The Rocks

Cialde is fresh ground espresso coffee hermetically sealed to provide the coffee connoisseur with the freshest espresso experience without all the fuss. If you want beautiful espresso coffee quickly and easily every time without having to grind fresh beans or tamp at exactly the right pressure with a perfectly flat surface and all the other rigmarole that goes with coffee…..read on. For those that see the process of buying beans, grinding and tamping as the main event you should probably go and do the gardening your partner has been nagging you about for weeks as this article will be as useful as ………………

Cecilia 2 Group Cialde Coffee machine

La Piccola has just provided us with a Sara and a Cecilia from their range of Italian made espresso machines to demonstrate cialde coffee in our showroom over the Christmas period. We will be resting our beloved Expobar Mega Crem two group machine while we play with the Cecilia as the main coffee maker and use the Sara as the demonstrator model. We have also got a range of cialde pods from Grinders Coffee, Lucaffe Australia and Caffe Mauro to test drive.

Sara Red Cialde Coffee Machine

Many of the larger coffee suppliers and roasters are now producing pods which can be bought conveniently over the web or from specialty outlets. Our first coffee experience on the Cecilia was a great hit with technicians, office staff and the warehouse manager from the business next door all lining up to try the new machine. One of the great features of cialde is that you can easily make coffee for people with several different tastes all at the same time.

Mr Exclusive Cialde

I had an espresso using a Mr Exclusive pod from Lucaffe, the warehouse guy from next door had a flat white using a Grinders Coffee pod and one of the tech’s had a cappuccino using a Lucaffe Nocciola pod (has a hint of hazelnut). Three different types of fresh ground espresso coffee, three successes and all done at the same time with no fuss, no mess! This Cecilia is a commercial two group machine (also available in 1 and 3 group models) with more than enough grunt to keep a busy cafe or office humming along and the Sara is designed for the smaller office or home and can equally keep up in the morning coffee stakes. No mess, no grinder, no stale beans, no plumbing (unless desired), no waiting and great fresh coffee in a flash!

Cialde Coffee Pods

We have the Cecilia Red 1 Group on special for Christmas over on the Coffee Machine Solutions site as well as a number of other great packages.

Buon Natale!

The Flying Nun Cafe

I was recently asked to quote on a coffee machine for an existing business that had found they needed to upgrade their kitchen to meet the growing demand from an ever expanding clientele. Having been chained to the computer for a very long time this request had the added advantage of a justifiable field trip out of the city and to a cafe, no less. Those of you who know me are aware that my idea of exercise is turning the pages on an extensive menu and for adventure I like to peruse an eclectic wine list. So away I went in the trusty Kia expecting no more than a brief jaunt into the near countryside and maybe a passable toasted sandwich and coffee. Don’t tell anyone, especially  the Minister for War and Finance, but I blew the lunch budget that day when the toasted cheese sandwich was substituted by ‘barramundi fillet with smoked paprika & thyme crust, Greek spinach & ricotta filo with flamed cherry tomatoes’ washed down with a wonderful espresso shot crafted by David from beans from Zentveld’s. How did I manage to resist dipping into the cakes when there were so many, so close and not a sign of my guilty conscience? It may have had something to do with the fact that I had a little trouble trying to get out of my seat and that the last few holes in my belt seem to have disappeared in the last couple of months. Culinary endeavours aside, I met the delightful Linda and David the espresso master to find out that not only did they have strong, nay very strong ideas on exactly what the new coffee machine was going to be able to do but it also had to complement the experience that is the Flying Nun Cafe. About this time I broke into an embarrassed sweat as I realised I had just blithely committed to a hand-built, custom painted, royal- purple-with-silver-fleck coffee machine – the Minister for War and Finance was going to get a real kick out of this one!

So began a couple of weeks of sheer hell as I worked through the numerous issues associated with ensuring that the purple bean guzzler was appropriately souped up under the hood, covered in a royal robe of flecked purple and ready for the feted installation date.

The Ruggero Americana coffee machine.

Of course everything took longer, was more complicated and more expensive than my careful planning (or shoot from the hip guess-work) allowed but riding in to my defence came Melbourne Cup Day. We were to install the day before MC, and one of the hardest phone calls of my life was to David on the Thursday before to tell him I couldn’t meet the deadline to which he replied,                                              “what are you completely nuts, the day before Melbourne Cup? It’ll have to be the following Monday”….and I was saved.

Don’t miss a great drive out of town, a great place to eat and unwind, Jasper the Macaw and a coffee experience provided by David and the Purple Ruggero.

Jasper loves to entertain.

Having just experienced another one of those dreadful annual markers that seem to whip past with increasing rapidity I was lucky enough to experience two of Brisbane’s fine dining establishments in just two days.

Thursday night was the cheap and cheerful end of the market and I was taken to the Good Taste Chinese Restaurant in Riverhills for a wonderful evening with excellent food, expertly prepared and delivered with happy, smiling service. All round a great local night out and home early enough to groan about eating too much while catching the late the news.

Friday night was Aria at Eagle Street and ‘Wow!’, yep, that sums it up….location, venue, food, service, wine list……’Wow!’..oh, yeah, and the bill! It seems I should have paid a bit more attention to the wine list or at least that little part with the numbers after the dollar signs. Still, we had an exquisite meal accompanied by that understated but professional service that sees the wait staff there just when they should be with just the right amount of gentle manoeuvring to ensure we didn’t embarrass ourselves by using the wrong fork or drinking the finger bowl.

Aria Dining Room

My ‘Jamon’ or for the average gourmet challenged folk, the slow cooked duck egg with lots of other tasty little things placed artistically around the plate and a lovely piece of toast expertly wrapped in its own napkin (still not sure why and I wasn’t brave enough to ask) was fabulous. Fabulous being a word that will crop up again and again; fabulous view, fabulous staff, fabulous food and fa-abulous wine list. The two younger members of our group were especially taken with having their chairs held for them when sitting, the sheer volume of folded hand towels in the bathroom and having their napkins re-folded every time they left the table.

Entrée done, mains past, dessert being cleared, the last of a (that word again) fabulous local sticky riesling and I decide to have a coffee (ah, finally he gets to the point and this is not just a bragging exercise) before we try to walk after so, so much food. Sadly I am the only coffee drinker in our little group of four but the espresso is….(drum roll please)…fabulous, as you knew it would be. I enquired and the Single Origin people from Sydney had roasted the beans that were so lovingly and expertly transformed into the liquid gold that perfectly finished the evening. Granted, an espresso in a restaurant can be bit of a punt as very often the emphasis on the food and service relegate the coffee making to a level slightly above that of napkin folding and door holding. But not at Aria, here someone took the time to take the beans and pilot the machine (sorry, I forgot to look) to a perfectly fabulous finish. I can’t even mention the petits fours that came with the coffee but the nougat……….And so we rolled home with the girls taking careful little steps in their high, high heels to avoid cracks in the pavement, smooth concrete slopes in the car-park and other dangers known only to those who don high heels. I just rolled, with enough calories to sustain a small African nation and a notion that the next dreadful annual marker seemed a long time to wait for a Nellie Melba.

Due to our enduring fascination with all drinks milky we often overlook the fundamental building block of all good coffee beverages – the espresso shot.

It is not difficult to pull a good espresso shot but it does take attention to the fundamental details, good equipment & fresh coffee beans. There is an Italian saying ‘The customer must wait for the espresso; the espresso must not wait for the customer’. And never a truer word has been spoken as espresso is an impatient companion and does not fare well if left for any length of time.

My Rancilio Miss Silvia V3 is clean, primed and ready to go, the cups are warm, the beans are fresh & my Rancilio Rocky Doser grinder is free from yesterdays coffee leftovers.

Yes, Virgina I am ready to pull Santa that great espresso shot.

My friend and coffee mentor, among a large number of purists, always discards the first shot of the day using it to prime the machine. This practice also ensures that any leftover coffee grounds are cleared from the grinder and the whole system is flushed before your first coffee.

The Rocky produces the fine grind preferred by the Miss Silvia and by slightly overfilling the portafilter basket (approx 7 gm or 14 gm if you are using the double like I am), tapping lightly to settle the grind and evenly tamping so that I am left with a smooth, even surface slightly below the top of the basket. Make sure you wipe off any excess  coffee grinds that will have settled on the rim of the portafilter. Part of the fun of the coffee experience is perfecting the ‘grind and tamp’ routine that will give you your preferred  coffee every time. What I am ultimately looking for is the extraction to be a warm, dark amber colour with the consistency of honey dripping thinly and evenly into my coffee cup. If the extraction is too fast and runs like water I will need to use a combination of a finer grind and/or more tamping pressure; if the extraction is non-existent or just intermittent droplets I  will need to do the opposite and use a coarser grind and/or less tamping pressure…..oh what fun we are having!

When you decide to try another type of coffee bean or beans from another supplier you will have to go through this process again as each bean type will grind in a slightly different way.

Over time you will develop that inner timer that all baristas possess but to begin with it’s a good idea to time your shots, 25-30 seconds is about right to produce 25-30 mls and you have either two espresso shots if you are sharing or a doppio if you are lucky!

It is important to keep your machine and all your coffee tools clean, always wipe up excess coffee grinds, flush your group head and portafilter and wipe out both with a damp cloth or paper towel after each use. Ensure your portafilter basket is dry before adding the grind as a wet basket will unevenly effect the grind and influence the pressurised water passing through the grind with a result that is never as good as you are striving to achieve.

I use filtered water in both my Grimac Terry pod machine and the venerable Miss Silvia but taste is individual and you may be happy with your tap water (too chlorine flavoured for my taste) but seriously consider your water source if  lime scale is a problem in your local area.

To celebrate (or brag about) the new additions to my kitchen we have a fabulous Miss Silvia / Rocky combo deal now available over at Coffee Machine Solutions

coffee bean stockpile

According to the Invest Centre

red coffee cherries pre-harvest

Breaking life-long habits is a hard thing to do and even after a mid-life crisis and career change I still find myself sneaking into bookshops all over the country to make sure that everything is still being maintained properly in my absence. Recently I tried to slip into one of my all-time favourites, the Bay Bookshop in the centre of Batemans Bay, NSW. Batemans Bay being one of the most picturesque parts of the NSW south coast (and so-oo unbelievably cold at this time of year for those of us lucky enough to already reside in god’s own). Owned and operated by the irascible Beth and the lovely Peter (I may possibly have that the wrong way round!) is one of those special, comfortable bookshops that doubles as a social meeting place for those strange but likeable folk who are frequently found frustrating old booksellers by trying to find copies of long out of print titles about ‘Ferreting for Fun and Profit in South Yorkshire’ or ‘Pickling Vegetables Like Grandma Used To Make’.
When I can tempt Beth and Peter from the store we have whiled away many hours solving the problems of the world at the Starfish Deli across the street.

A view from my table.

The Starfish is an inviting and open cafe/restaurant on the bank of the Clyde River with uninterrupted views only matched by the great food, fine coffee (and yes, sometimes a red wine or three). This of course can only happen when Peter is not charging through the countryside ruining a good walk by assaulting an inoffensive white ball of dubious parentage and endless patience.
I started this long winded story to complain about the way Peter likes to show me books that I cannot have and he really scored this time with a beautiful tome that was a special order for a customer and I was only able to drool over it from a distance. The Modern Cafe by Francisco J. Migoya is beautifully produced by the Culinary Institute of America (the CIA!) and is a fabulous resource for any cafe operator looking for growth in clientele and sales. The Modern Cafe is 550 pages of real world advice, fabulous photography, 400 recipes and expert instruction on the launch and management of a cafe (according to the fly leaf cover and you are right, I am sucking up to see if I can get a freebie from the Australian distributor – I’ll let you know how I go).

Not that I needed any real justification for a serious yet satisfying addiction but the news out of Japan this week is that researchers at Nagoya University have concluded that coffee (including to a lesser extent both decaffeinated coffee and tea):

• Reduces the risk of diabetes.
• ameliorates the effects of fatty liver and hyperglycemia.
• improves insulin sensitivity.

This new research reinforces earlier findings from the George Institute of International Health at the University of Sydney .

Now that morning coffee over the Australian almost feels as good as half an hour on a treadmill!

I was recently taken by a coffee machine techie friend (he who services and repairs coffee machines) to One Drop Specialty Coffee on St Pauls Terrace, Brisbane to experience “one of the best in town”. One Drop turned out to be a wonderful lift on an unusually bleak winter’s day. My less than enthusiastic mood was not helped by the lack of parking around Spring Hill due to the Caravan, Camping and Touring Holiday Show at the RNA Showground across the road. The One Drop menu board told the story of ever changing sources of beans from around the world and to my surprise the accolades heaped upon the establishment by my enthusiastic techie mate were born out by a wonderful espresso experience. I couldn’t get a chance to talk to the staff due the crowd of customers that were keeping the barista and staff flat out serving the current offering of Sumatra Aceh coffee and wonderful looking food. If they have such a thing as a quiet time I’ll get back to try the next bean offering from some far flung corner of the coffee world and meet the guys.

Remember where you heard about this fantastic, well known, iconic Brisbane cafe that has been winning customer and industry awards for years.