Roastmaster's Blog

This is an official Nekisse update, current as of the date and time of this posting.

Things are really heating up around here.  Much like Kemgin, the Nekisse is not loitering around the DoubleShot.  In fact, we suddenly find ourselves in short supply.  In fact, as of right now, I only have 17 gold 12-ounce bags of Nekisse left and available for sale!  In a vain attempt to be fair to our online customers as well as our local customers, I'm going to put an online limit of 7 bags in the website inventory.  Once they're gone, that's it.  The remaining 10 bags are for sale in-house.

If you have bought the Nekisse, or you're planning on it, you'll want to pay special attention to the suggested food pairings on the label.  The blueberry lemon-drizzle bread is a great breakfast loaf that will pull you in with its citrus notes that play on the fruity tones of Nekisse, bringing our some of that berry flavor as well as the chocolatey sweetness in the coffee.

Our chocolate lava cake recipe is so rich.  With Nekisse, the brightness of the coffee comes in to cleanse your palate between each super chocolate bite with citrus and strawberry flavors.  Here are the recipes.  Hope you enjoy.

Blueberry Lemon-Drizzle Bread

1 1/2 cups (7 1/2 oz./235 g.) plus 1 tsp. all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. kosher salt

1/2 cup (4 oz./125 g.) unsalted butter, at room temperature

3/4 cup (6 oz./185 g.) granulated sugar

1 Tbs. finely grated lemon zest

3 large eggs

1/2 cup (4 fl. oz./125 ml.) whole milk

1 tsp. pure vanilla extract

1 cup (4 oz./125 g.) fresh blueberries

For the syrup:

3 Tbs. fresh lemon juice

3 Tbs. granulated sugar

For the glaze:

1/2 cup (2 oz./60 g.) confectioners’ sugar

3 tsp. fresh lemon juice

Position a rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 350° F (180° C). Butter and flour a 9-by-5-inch (23-by-13-cm.) loaf pan.

In a bowl, sift together the 1 1/2 cups flour, baking powder and salt. In the bowl of a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter, granulated sugar and lemon zest on medium-high speed until lightened. Add the eggs one at a time, beating until each is incorporated. Add the milk and vanilla and stir until blended. Add the dry ingredients and stir just until blended. In a small bowl, toss the blueberries with the 1 teaspoon flour. Gently stir into the batter.

Scrape the batter into the prepared pan. Bake until lightly browned and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, about 50 minutes. Transfer the bread to a wire rack set over a rimmed baking sheet and let cool in the pan for a few minutes, then turn out onto the rack.

While the bread is baking, make the syrup: In a small saucepan, boil the lemon juice and granulated sugar over medium heat until syrupy, about 2 minutes. Remove from the heat. Using a wooden skewer, pierce the sides and bottom of the bread all over. Brush the bread generously with the syrup.

To make the glaze, in a small bowl, stir together the confectioners’ sugar and lemon juice. When the bread is completely cool, drizzle the glaze over the top. Makes 1 large loaf.

Chocolate Lava Cakes (or Molten Chocolate Cakes) - courtesy of my mom

1 cup sugar

2 tablespoons cornstarch

8 oz. bittersweet (not unsweetened) chocolate, chopped

½ cup unsalted butter, diced

3 large eggs

3 large egg yolks

Butter and flour 5 custard cups.  Whisk sugar and cornstarch in large bowl to combine.  Melt chocolate and butter in heavy medium saucepan over low heat, stirring constantly.  Cool 10 minutes.  Add sugar mixture to chocolate mixture and whisk until smooth.  Whisk in eggs 1 at a time, then whisk in yolks.  Divide batter between pans.  (Can be prepared 1 day ahead.  Cover and refrigerate.) 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Bake cakes until puffed, dry and cracked on top and tester inserted into center comes out with some wet batter attached, about 25 minutes (28 minutes if batter has been chilled).  Cool cakes 10 minutes.  Cut around cakes to loosen.  Turn out onto plates.  Serve cakes warm with whipped crème or ice cream.

I like to drizzle raspberry sauce on the plate before plating.

Keep an eye out for an opportunity to purchase a bit of my personal stash of coffee.  (Tchembe is about to take the stage for the last run up to Christmas.)

My dad* has always been the key influence in my life when it comes to work.  He installs floor covering.  And the man is a workhorse.  I remember when I was a kid, my dad would lift a huge roll of carpet onto his shoulder and walk up stairs.  He seemed to work interminably, sweating, breathing hard, and moving things in ways I couldn’t budge.  Not only that, he makes extremely precise cuts, very rapidly.  He measures in ways I don’t understand, makes calculations in his head, and cuts things upside down and backward, perfectly.  His patterns are uniform and square, and somehow bend around curves.  He wields a carpet knife, with its reversible razor blade, penetrating to the exact depth needed, ripping down a row of yarn, so square that his trimming is minimal and his waste almost nil.  

He has the patience to work on cars.  Completely disassembling and reassembling three in my memory: a Model A Ford, a Model T Ford, and a Falcon Knight Speedster.  These came apart rusted with friction that breaks and busts even calloused knuckles.  But they went back together smooth and lubricated, painted and polished, pinstriped, upholstered, and running like they did off the early 1900s showroom floor.

The man can fix almost anything.  So much so that he took to collecting antiques, some of them relinquished to the junk pile, because he could see the beauty in a worn out, beat up cabinet or dresser.  I grew up using restored antique furniture with names like “hall tree” and “pie safe.”  The patience and precision and vision that he has can transform wood and marble and brass.  And boy can he swing a hammer.

The peak of his antique restoration came in the form of a run-down, dirty, two-story Victorian house with a carriage barn and, once completed, a round brick patio.  Layers of paint and wallpaper and old newspaper came off with sweat and toil, and beneath it all he found the wood that once again brought class and refinement throughout their home.  

His product is meticulous. 

And he drinks a lot of coffee.

Coffee is a curious thing.  Like corn, it’s a huge commodity.  Coffee trees grow and produce fruit, while the farmer toils in the equatorial sun to keep them healthy and productive.  Margins fluctuate but the work is constant.  During harvest, hand picking is followed by milling (sometimes by hand) and drying (oftentimes on patios where people rake the coffee to ensure consistency) and sorting (sometimes performed by women who pick through every coffee bean to remove defects) and bagging (almost always controlled by men who dispense the coffee into a bag and then sew it shut).  And amongst these commodity beans, occasionally an experienced cupper will pull out a specific lot because they recognize that it surpasses the quality and flavor profile of its peers.  But true exceptional coffees are not the result of luck or happenstance, rather the product of concerted effort, focused methodology, and fastidious performance.  People produce high quality coffees on purpose.

I roasted a batch of Nekisse a few days ago and it was one of those roasts where I just knew I nailed it.  It was beautiful.  I set the damper on par to restrict the airflow just right, bringing the temperature of the coffee up at the precise timing I intended.  I felt like the temperature profile of this roast should be recorded on canvas and placed in the Philbrook.  The coffee coalesced at first crack and became one mass of popping, drumming, hip-shaking rhythm to the drone of the roaster purring like a huge metal lion.  And I manipulated the intake and outflow until those precious few seconds arrived at the end of the roast where the coffee and I speak to one another.  

Because I’ve worked with coffee a lot and I care about coffee a lot, something happens between the coffee and me.  There is a personification of the coffee beans.  They become a living entity, the embodiment of all those who toiled on the their behalf.  The coffee is like the star of the show, who couldn’t be where it is if it weren’t for so many people behind the scenes who worked hard to propel it to greatness.  And all those people who had a hand in the coffee come with it to the DoubleShot, from the ones who nurture the coffee trees from seedlings to transplanted mature adults, to those who fertilize and prune and pick and carry the coffee cherry down the mountain.  The people who process the coffee and turn the coffee over on its drying bed.  Those who manage its production and sort out the premium quality beans for us.  The baggers, the shippers, the cargo ship captain who delivered our coffee in port.  They’re all in there with the coffee, because this coffee couldn’t have become what it is without all those people striving on its behalf.  And their spirits cry out in those final moments of the roast and I can feel it.  And they are happy, proud, excited.

The entire life of this coffee has come to this.  All that came before was for this moment in time.  Everything that has happened to this coffee along the way allowed us to fulfill Nekisse’s mission by roasting it properly and delivering it to you for your ultimate enjoyment.  That’s what this coffee was made for.  

And at the moment I dropped that Nekisse from the roasting drum into the oversized stainless cooling bin, all of my life had led to this.  All the hours of roasting and learning and listening and reading and hauling bags of coffee on my shoulder.  All the lessons my dad taught me through his actions about working hard and doing my best, about learning a craft and becoming good at it, about the value of transforming raw materials to make something beautiful.  All of that work by my father carried forward in me, like the work of the coffee producers which carried forward in the Nekisse.  And it all came together for one purpose:  To make delicious coffee.

Nekisse is moving fast.  (get it here:  DoubleShotCoffee.com/nekisse) The response to this coffee has been outstanding, and we love the appreciation you’ve shown to our efforts in providing coffees of this caliber.  With fantastic fruity aromas of strawberry and peach, the brightness of Nekisse glows through in the cup past a sea of milk chocolate that will linger on your palate.

Two more exciting things will happen this Tuesday.  We will prepare two food pairings that accentuate the amazing qualities of Nekisse:  a blueberry-lemon drizzle bread and a chocolate lava cake.  You will have the opportunity to let us make you a pourover of Nekisse and purchase one or both of the food pairings with it.  This is a one-time offering, happening Tuesday, December 10.  

The second thing you need to know about this Tuesday is that we will be releasing a new chocolate bar.  I’ve once again collaborated with the chocolatier who produces our MADURO bars to create a new bar featuring our NEKISSE coffee in a darker chocolate from the Ivory Coast.  It really makes a rich melange of bright, fruity, coffee flavors in that bed of amazing, silky dark chocolate.  A great gift for the holidays and a special treat for you.

Tuesday will be a great day at the DoubleShot.

* If you look around the DoubleShot, most of what you see was made by or restored by or at least inspired by my dad, Steve Franklin.

My college football coach, who we called "Big Red", would remind his players on a regular basis, "Every day, you either get better or you get worse; you never stay the same."  I've remembered that through the years, and found it to be true about everything.  Nothing stays the same.  In fact, it's virtually impossible to do something twice in exactly the same way, and it's especially improbable that you'll ever attain exactly the same outcome twice.

In my younger years, I listened to and read a lot of motivational leadership books and speeches, and it's really shaped not only who I am, but the way in which I believe.  Not just what I believe.  But there was a guy named Zig Ziglar, who I used to get a kick out of, and he was full of sayings about this and that.  One of the things I remember him saying, in the course of convincing his listeners to change the way they do things, is that "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result."  I've since heard other people say this, and I couldn't disagree more.  To me, it's not insanity, but it is lunacy (is there a difference?) to think that you could do the same thing over and over again and get the SAME result.  Things just don't happen like that.  But I do agree with Zig (and so many others) about the idea that you should institute your own change.  Change your mind, change your actions, change your outcomes.  

And that's what we strive to do here at the DoubleShot.  I know we're not going to pull the exact same shot of espresso twice.  I know that we're not going to brew the exact same cup of coffee twice.  I have no doubt that your experiences here are different every single day.  And I'm ok with that.  Since change is inevitable, I feel that it is our duty to try and get BETTER every day.  

With that in mind, we've been working on three different projects in an attempt to brew better coffee. 

When we opened the DoubleShot in 2004, it was very important to me that we have great drip coffee, even though I couldn't afford to invest in a high-end machine.  So we brewed through your standard commercial brewer, and in order to make the coffee taste extra good, we also brewed a french press of the coffee, and added it to the airpot.  (Interestingly, as a side note, I found that most coffee, when dispensed through an airpot, aerates as it comes out and has bubbles on top; but coffee brewed with a french press will not aerate.  You cannot aerate french press coffee for some reason.  Maybe because of the heavy oil concentration.)  The second phase of our coffee brewing came when I finally upgraded to a Fetco brewer.  The brewed coffee was markedly better, and the need to add a french press to the pot was negated.  We suddenly had so much more control over the brewing variables, and a large shower head that saturated the entire bed of coffee grounds in the basket.  For around 8 years we used that brewer, switching about a year ago from 85 ounce airpots to 1 gallon dispensers.  But our volume has actually long outgrown it.  And so it was that last Friday we installed a new, larger Fetco coffee brewer.  With new control and sensitivity, we began to experiment with all the brewing variables, changing the brew time, the water temperature, water volume, coffee grind coarseness and weight, and pre-wet volume and time (This is the period at the beginning of a brew cycle when the Fetco dispenses hot water onto the dry coffee grounds, saturating the bed, and then pausing to let it bloom before commencing with the brew cycle.).  These variables, working in tandem, each change the coffee in some way, and when they are all put together right, the coffee produced can be really good.  And, well, after a lot of trial and some minor palate burn-out, we are currently satisfied with the results.  I know you're going to love the new recipe, so be sure and come by for a cup soon.  (Incidentally, if you'd like to buy our smaller Fetco brewer, it's currently listed for sale on ebay: http://www.ebay.com/sch/franklin527/m.html

The other things we've been working on here at the DS are akin to building a better mouse trap.  As an exercise in creativity and brewing science, I asked all of the baristas to come up with an idea for a new brewing method.  The future of coffee brewing.  How will we be brewing coffee in 5 years?  As you can imagine, the results were interesting and sometimes a bit amusing.  I recorded a podcast about it, which you can hear at aacafe.org.  If you've never listened to our podcast, you should go check it out.  I started it in July 2005, though some of the earlier episodes are no longer available, and you should thank me for that.  Since its inception, the podcast content and format have gone through more changes than the… well, suffice it to say, if you don't like it, just wait til the next episode; it will change.  Mark Brown, former editor at This Land magazine, and author of Argentfork, is my cohost for the podcast.  We talk about coffee, but mostly we talk around coffee.  Take a listen sometime, and pass it on.

Our other mission is concerning how you make coffee at home.  Or on the road.  Over the years, we've worked hard to find the best products for home coffee brewing, and we offer those in the store and on our website.  The baristas are all well-versed in different brewing techniques and are happy to help you figure out what best suits your situation.  Soon we will publish our own manual for various brewing techniques, in a pocket-sized booklet that you'll want to buy and keep handy when making coffee.  

Some of our efforts through the years have resulted in unique products for your home, such as the V60 Filter Crib (check out the new, updated version).  And some have been about making coffee during travel, like the CONNECT3 Adaptor Ring (now available as a complete set!).

But what about making it easier to brew coffee at home without investing a lot of money in equipment?  That's our next assignment.  If you listen to the TED talks, or are part of the "maker" community, you know that things are trending toward simplicity, sometimes through extremely technologically-advanced machines, like 3D printers and the like.  I'm interested in open-source, simple to construct coffee brewing devices.  I'm both interested in something you could print with a 3d printer, as well as something you could adapt from things around your house in order to make a great cup of coffee.  Hopefully someday there will be so many ideas about ways to make coffee that the only reason you could have, no matter where you are, for not making coffee, would be if you didn't have any fresh-roasted DoubleShot Coffee beans.  Stay tuned for these ideas as we develop them over the next few months.

Lastly, I have some good news and some bad news.  The Ethiopia Natural Sidamo Korate is all gone (though watch for the commemorative tshirt).  This coffee has been a huge favorite around here with employees and customers alike.  But this is how things go with coffee.  Out with last year's favorite and in with the new favorite.  Tonight I'll roast the inaugural batch of a new natural Sidamo called Adem Chilcho.  This coffee is different from the Korate, but absolutely delicious.  It's grown in the Sidamo region of Ethiopia, near a town called Dilla.  Three indigenous groups took part in growing this coffee on small plots, and then the coffee was dried in the sun on raised beds before it was cleaned and sorted and made ready for me to roast it.  Read more about it here: http://www.doubleshotcoffee.com/products/ethiopia-natural-sidamo-adem-chilcho

And BTW, if you've been trying to come in the wrong door for the past three years, you're in luck; I finally built and installed a sign over the café!