Kamloops’ Cafe Motivo sent no less than four staff to come participate, three of Blenz baristas poured, one from Vancouver, one from Vernon’s Bean to Cup, and yours truly. In addition, there were those who came to watch and chat, but didn’t particpate in the jam itself. I suspect I may have missed one or two here. The turnout was high, especially as this was a first time event.

In the context of coffee in the Okanagan, I think this event signified a few things:
1) The scattered coffee community here is coming together and enjoying it.
2) There are those willing to put in the effort, time, and money to pull off an event like this.
3) There is a receptive group of people to participate and watch such events.
4) There is some commitment to quality and community.

When I started this blog eighteen months ago, an event like this was essentially a pipe dream, it’s great to see things moving fast here. Especially in Vernon!

The next jam is slated to take place in Kamloops, at Caffe Motivo on May 30th. Check out the Okanagan Barista Jam page for more info.

One thing I would like to highlight is the recent Okanagan Barista Jam that took place last week in Vernon. This was a tremendously positive event, one that I really enjoyed. I will write about my experience and impressions from the event in my next post.

In the mean time I would like to get to something I’ve been thinking about for some time: After much deliberation I’ve made the decision to leave the Okanagan for Vancouver. There are many, many reasons, but the primary one is that I simply can’t make a decent living here. I’ve been chasing potential for the last eighteen months, but have been left struggling for either decent hours, decent pay, or simply a job in which I can use my experience to contribute.

Founding and writing for this blog has been a terrific experience for me. I’ve made so many connections with so many great people. There are many wonderful people that toil in the coffee trenches here for little recognition or barely any pay, doing it primarily because they love it.

The flipside of this is I’ve also seen so many of them leave, whether because they simply can’t make ends meet on what they are paid or because what they bring to the table is for one reason or another not recognized as valuable. If these people were induced to stay -if staying was worth their time and effort- we’d probably see a strong and vital coffee community in the Okanagan.

I’ve gained a ton of confidence in my convictions and experience, and they are now leading me away from the Okanagan. I’ve written here about wages, about respect for experience, about equipping workers with valuable training and skills. I’ve written about quality, about giving people something that is worth paying for, I’ve written about the need for individual businesses to see beyond their figurative noses so that they can help create a vibrant and creative local community. And these things are happening more and more. Since I started writing there’s been barista jams in Kelowna and Vernon (and one planned for Kamloops), there’s been public coffee cuppings, and some great web presence and interaction between coffee people here. I feel like in some small way this blog has planted, or at least watered, the seed for a coffee community here.

So, though this will not be my last post here, this is a farewell of sorts. I’ll be moving at the end of June.  I can’t write Okanagan Coffee Blog if I’m not living in the Okanagan, so I will cede authorship. More on that in the next few days.

I’d like to thank everyone I’ve connected with through this blog. Baristas, shop owners, roasters, coffee nerds and everyone else. I’d especially like to thank those who go above and beyond in their treatment of others in the community, who provide their employees with valuable skills, a decent wage, and a democratic and open workplace. This blog has been a conduit for many good things, and I sincerely hope someone will take up the cause of chronicling and celebrating coffee in the Okanagan!

For more details, and contact information, check out the Facebook event page.

There are ways around this, most of which involve an extra step in the process of brewing french press coffee, such as scooping the grounds off the top or putting them on top of the filter assembly then pulling them all up and out with the filter at the end of the brew.  Another alternative is filtering the coffee through paper after the brew, but this wastes a paper filter, cools the coffee, and removes the oils that give press coffee so much of it’s character (in contrast with paper filter coffee).  All of the above complicate things further.

After I reviewed Kaffeologie’s metal syphon filter, they offered to send me a pair of Coffee Catchers to check out.  I remembered hearing about the catcher from their Twitter feed and website, but was initially pretty skeptical, as it seemed like a gimmick that wouldn’t do much that the above press methods couldn’t do.  I was very wrong.

The Coffee Catcher is a device designed to make the preparation of good french press coffee cleaner and easier.  The catcher is disarmingly simple in both design and use.  Essentially it is a disk of fine metal mesh sandwiched between two steel disks of a slightly smaller diameter with four small oblong slots, along with a detachable metal handle for placing and removing the catcher.

To use the Coffee Catcher, you simply put it in the bottom of your press, add coffee, add water, steep, and press asyou would normally.  The catcher works by trapping fines and “sludge” under the disk and away from most of the subsequent brew.  Fines are pushed through the mesh when water is poured, but cannot come back up (for this reason it’s advisable to add coffee, then pour water fairly assertively on top).  After pressing, decant the coffee and look through the bottom of the press to see that trapped sludge that would otherwise be in your cup.  Cleanup is fairly easy to, simply hook the catcher on it’s handle and pull all the ground up and out of the press.

The result of all of this is a startlingly better cup of press coffee, with tons more flavour definition and clarity, and a far extended cup life, all with essentially zero extra effort.  The cup quality easily competes with filter coffee, while still retaining the oils that give press coffee a distinction in body and mouthfeel.  If I was a cafe that served press coffee I would hurry to outfit every press with one of these things.

Of course, as coffee nerds are apt to do, we can complicate things by using the catcher in a variety of different ways, including the use of two at once.  This is something I may explore in future posts, but for now I’ll leave that for you to explore.

To order or further explore coffee catchers, check out Kaffeologie’s website and blog, order now, and 50% of the price will go towards tsunami relief in Japan!

Grey Canal coffee is the project of my friend in coffee and fellow Vernonite, Andrew McWilliam (along with his family).  Grey Canal is an importer of sorts, making available to Okanagan residents great coffees from roasters outside the area.  Thus far they’ve featured great coffees from Vancouver island company Drumroaster, including an Ethiopian Yirgacheffe (Koke) that I pulled as one of the best espresso shots I’ve ever had.

It’s great to see some locals taking the initiative in bringing in some great coffee, especially when Vernon is so sadly deficient in this regard.  I’m not sure what their plans are, but I’d love to see Grey Canal Coffee grow into something bigger (how about a cafe Andrew?)

To check out Grey Canal and place an order for coffee, go to their facebook page or website.  Support them any way you can, everyone involved deserves a ton of credit!

The turnout for the event surprised me, as there were many membersof the general public .  It was nice to see something like this attract and hold the attention of people outside the industry, -especially in the Okanagan.  The success of this night is a precursor for nights to come, and shows that there is support for such events here.

I was told that Bean Scene Kelowna is looking at holding barista jams on a frequent basis as a way to get their baristas excited about and ready to compete in the Coffee Fest Latte Art Competition, held every few months.  There is some interest on the part of at least two Vernon shops to hold barista jams as well.

I had camera in hand at the jam, and was able to get a few shots while I wasn’t busy talking shop or pouring (click on thumbnails for larger picture)…

Moka Pot/Stovetop “Espresso” Maker:

The stovetop is available in many iterations, pretty much a everywhere, from the simple Melitta style shown above, to complicated contraptions with portafilters and steam wands. The common thread is that they go on your stove (although a few electric models are available) and use the heat to push hot water through a bed of coffee. It is not possible to make real cafe style espresso using one of these devices. However when used carefully, the stovetop can produce a good cup of tasty, near espresso strength coffee. The key with the stovetop is, counterintuitively, to use a course grind approaching what one would use for a press pot. A fine grind will resist percolation of water through the ground coffee until the water approaches boiling, resulting in a burnt tasting cup.

The Moka pot isn’t terribly hard to use, it is relatively cheap, and pretty fast.  However what sets it apart from the methods I described in earlier posts in the difficulty in making a really good cup.  The Moka pot requires constant attention to make sure the coffee is not burned, and it’s all to easy to ruin a cup.  Ideally, the water should be preheated then put into the Moka pot, and at the end of the brew, a chilled towel should be used to stop extraction.  This is quite a bit of work for what is rarely an exceptional cup, and in my opinion your effort is better spent using a manual drip, press pot, or Aeropress.

If you decide to purchase a stovetop brewer, go for stainless steel,rather than aluminum. Aluminum conducts heat to readily, making it to burn the coffee.

Vacuum Pot/Siphon:

The vac pot has achieved near mythical status and is perceived as esoteric and mysterious brewing device, in spite of the fact that it was for some time one of the most popular home brewing methods in the United States.  It has a reputation for producing coffee with outstanding flavour clarity and acidity.  Recently the method has achieved a resurgence among baristas attracted to the prospect of terrific coffee married to an intriguing and often flashy presentation.

For the home barista, the extent to which syphon brewing appeals depends on one’s willingness to put up with the method’s eccentricities.  Syphon brewing demands a fairly high level of commitment and attention to the process, and requires somewhat more thorough cleanup and preparation than most other methods.  However, for all this, it provides arguably the greatest reward of any method.

Steep and Relase/Clever/Ibid:
<a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/tonx/4418129887/” title=”clever by tonx, on Flickr”><img src=”http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4024/4418129887_4a944bf10a.jpg” width=”375″ height=”500″ alt=”clever” /></a>

Steep and release brewers combine immersion brewing (eg. press pot) with filter brewing (eg. pourover).  They resemble a pour over cone, but with a stopper at the bottom.  Coffee and hot water are added to the cone (lined with a paper filter), then allowed to brew for a set period, after which the cone is set on a cup or other vessel, releasing the stopper and allowing the coffee to percolate out of the grounds.  These brewers are very easy to use, and more simple than a standard pourover as the barista does not have to worry about about the flow rate of water through the grounds.

I didn’t include steep and release brewers in prior posts have I have little experience with them, however I encourage anyone looking for an easy and effective method to research these brewers.  If you own a pourover cone, you can approximate this method by brewing in a separate vessel, then pouring the brew into the cone (with a filter of course) to filter it.

There are of course many other coffee brewing methods and devices available to you -from flip pots to bag coffee, to cupping, to cold brew methods, to Turkish- though most are permutations of the ones covered in this series.

If you would like to further research coffee brewing methods and methodology, there are a number of online resources to be found:

Coffeegeek is probably the best known consumer coffee site, featuring years worth of equipment reviews, tutorials, and discussion on everything coffee related.

Brew Methods features compiled brewing tutorials aimed at everyone from beginners to professional.  The tutorials are sourced from a wide variety of web sites, and are a terrific gateway to the wider world of coffee nerdery.

Scott Rao’s incredibly thorough book Everything But Espresso is a terrific, if somewhat intimidating reference for professionals and home baristas featuring step by step walkthroughs of most common brewing methods, and tips for troubleshooting brews.

Finally, if you have any suggestions or further questions about home brewing don’t hesitate to ask away by leaving a comment or sending me a tweet or email!

Since that time I’ve had the chance to use the filter for several brews on my five cup Yama syphon.

Syphon brewing is a lost art that seems to be catching on once again in North America.  At one point, the coffee syphon was the brewing device of choice in many a kitchen.  In recent years the syphon has staged a comeback of sorts in cafes, and is now a mainstay in some cafes in cities like Vancouver and Portland.  However,it seems like home syphon brewing is still consigned to the lunatic fringe of coffee lovers.  After all, considerable effort is required, as the process is a bit labour intensive and has the reputation of being pretty finicky.  The rewards of a well made syphon however, are well worth the effort.  These include intense aromatics and crystal clear flavour definition that have much in common with the delicate notes of a finely brewed tea.

I hadn’t used my syphon in some time, as I was frustrated with maintaining the cloth filters usually used with the device.  While the filters help produce a sediment free brew with the aformentioned terrific clarity, they are also very hard to keep clean over an extended period.  A dirty filter, even one that does not look dirty, will completely ruin a pot of coffee.  I’ve heard it recommended that a cloth filter not be used more than a few times.  Even cleaning the filters leaves them susceptible to contamination from mildew or mould as they dry.

When I saw Kaffeologie’s design i was really intrigued.  The filter is a fine metal mesh cut and crimped around a standard Yama filter assembly (frame and spring), fastened with metal wire.  The web site describes it thus:

“The filter is folded tightly and stitched with non-tarnish Argentium silver around the frame. As a final step, we crimped the edges of the mesh to ensure a perfect seal against the glass lip of the siphon.”

After receiving the filter I proceeded to use it for several brews over the course of the last couple weeks, using a variety of coffees including a Kenya, a New Guinea, and a Guatemala.  As I expected, the Kenya was the best, with terrific flavour definition and all the promised notes of fruit and citrus.  What surprised me was in fact the clarity.  I expected more of a heavy press pot style brew, but this was very close to what I was used to with a cloth syphon filter.

The following brews were similarly terrific.  Another benefit for me was a speedier and more predictable drawdown, something I had been frustrated with in the past.

What had originally gotten me so excited about the filter was the potential ease of cleaning.  A simple rinse would do the do the job with metal mesh, or so I thought.  This is in my mind the sole problem with this filter:  It isn’t really easy to thoroughly clean.  At first I thought I had cleaned it well with a simple rinse under the tap, but on closer inspection I saw many grounds trapped between the mesh and the filter frame. I worked the mesh and rinsed several more times to get rid of them, but a few always persisted.  I didn’t wish to remove the mesh, as it was carefully sewn onto the frame, so I just resigned myself to having a few maverick grounds in there.  I have no idea whether or not those grounds affected the taste of subsequent brews.  Of course, this is no cloth filter.  I didn’t have to scrub or soak or wring it out.  I don’t have to worry about mould or mildew.  I can reuse this filter indefinitely.

The ideal would be for the design to be modified so that the mesh can easily be removed from the frame, then the whole thing rinsed and cleaned in a matter of seconds.  Whether this is easy to accomplish or not is a question I don’t know the answer to.

Overall, I was really impressed with this filter.  It is an innovative device at a very good price.  In fact I think it’s a real step forward for syphon brewing and deserves to find a home in any cafe that frequently brews syphon coffee.  The cleaning issue is the only flaw, but one that shouldn’t be tough to address and won’t even likely be a big deal for anyone who is not a bit obsessive compulsive about their syphon.