Walking for Water in the Rain

Despite the cold, rainy and windy weather, there was a good turnout for the Walk for Water in downtown Portland yesterday. The official figures are not in yet, but from my estimation, approximately 800 people gathered at the covered plaza at the World Trade Center to take part. We were there to raise money to build a well in a village in either Kenya or Malawi.

Walkers enjoyed free coffee from Portland Roasting and some snacks provided by local businesses. Five members of Boka Marimba, a marimba and percussion group, enthusiastically entertained the crowd with their energetic music.

Boka Marimba

Several non-profit groups also set up informational booths to let people know what they were up to and to sign up new members. Upon seeing the booth for PHLUSH, an organization that campaigns for the construction of more public toilets in Portland, Bill Mikesell, who was photographing the event, quipped that “in Portland, even the public toilets have an advocacy group.”

Of course they do. . . is that weird?

Click to read more ...

A few links and a picture

Coffee economics: The Wall Street Journal has an article about how even the big coffee companies are having to pay above-market prices to make sure they have a stable supply of quality coffee beans. link

Coffee roasters in Spokane, Washington are doing their best to deal with high green coffee prices. link

The alleged accomplice of the robber who was shot and killed at a Eugene Dutch Bros. Coffee kiosk was acquitted this week. link

In an example of how attitudes change year to year, a poll by the National Coffee Association found that the amount of young people who drink coffee on a daily basis rebounded significantly after a one-year dip. link

The Street has a report and analysis of all of Starbucks’ recent news. link

If you want to be successful in the coffee business in Sydney, you cannot stop moving. Just ask Salvatore Malatesta. link

Drought is severely affecting the coffee crop in Tanzania. Geography enthusiasts will notice a pretty big mistake in the last paragraph of the article. link

Don't forget! The Walk for Water is happening on Sunday in downtown PDX! 

And finally, some bumper sticker philosophy:

Well said--normal people worry me too. Enjoy the weekend.

Kombucha - a new (and kind of weird) way to drink tea

Once in a while, if you drink enough coffee, you are bound to need a break. At least that’s the case for this coffee drinker. When you hit the ‘coffee wall,’ as I did the other day,  you have lots of other beverage options available, some of which seem stranger than others. For example, I recently posted a picture of cucumber soda that I thought was strange (I still haven’t tried it). Yesterday, I drank something out of the ordinary—kombucha.

Kombucha is a fermented tea beverage that is sometimes sold as a healthy alternative to other drinks. Proponents of kombucha say that the live cultures in it are good for your digestive system. The doctors at WebMD say there is no conclusive evidence that kombucha is that good for you, especially commercial varieties that have been pasteurized and no longer have the live cultures.

Some of the kombuchas have a small amount of alcohol in them (usually less than 0.5%) that give them an extra punch. It is common to add some fruit juice to the mix too, as was the case with the “superberry” kombucha I drank. It was a bit sweet and had a slight vinegar taste—an acidity that exploded on my tongue.

Click to read more ...

Checking out the Naughty Supermodel at Jim & Patty’s Coffee

The rain can make the winters seem awfully long in Portland, so I was looking for signs of spring on Fremont Street when I visited Jim & Patty’s Coffee, a café in Northeast Portland.

The baristas were having plenty of fun the day I was there. When I told the barista at the counter that it was my first time to the café, he told the other barista to make sure to do a good job with my espresso. He didn’t want any bad first impressions.

I found a place by the front window where I could watch the rain fall and hope for the clouds to break. To my delight, they did, at least for a little while.

Jim & Patty's

Click to read more ...

March 18 Links

Another week has come and gone,
Alas, the rain’s still here.
So grab a cup and read the links
And pray that spring is near.

Here's a selection of coffee news for the week:

A group of rebellious Swedish senior citizens has been asked to not come back to the dance hall unless they agree to stop pouring coffee grounds on the floor. link

Have you tried an AeroPress yet? The LA Times has a great article about the technology and the people who swear by its coffee. Sounds to me like the cult of Apple. link

Philadelphia’s “Third Wave” coffee movement is picking up steam, and it sounds quite a bit like Portland’s. link

Tuition is rising in Canada, where a government minister recently said that students could afford the increase by drinking less coffee. link She later backtracked on the statement. link

Howard Schultz, Starbucks’ CEO, has learned many lessons over the years, and according to the New York Times, one of these is humility. link

Schultz recently blamed ‘speculators’ for coffee price increases. One wonders if he blamed speculators when the prices were low too. link

Nespresso’s CEO also blames speculation for coffee price increases, but expects them to come down soon. link

From the ‘strange lawsuits’ category, a Missouri family is suing Starbucks for keeping the tip jar too close to the cash register. I bet this one gets dismissed. link

Another one from the lawsuit category. The Aspen barista who was sued for turning off a café’s espresso machine the last night he worked at the café will not have to worry about missing anymore ski days. The suit has been dismissed. link

Many workplaces provide coffee for their workers, but these days some are providing stronger beverages too. link

Sustainable Harvest - Changing the way coffee business gets done

Whenever you buy something, it is easy to forget that your transaction goes beyond the store where you purchased it. Whether you think about it or not, what you choose to buy affects other peoples’ lives, and these purchase decisions have economic, social and environmental consequences.

The coffee we buy, for example, is at the end of a long and complicated supply chain that begins in some very remote places. There are over 25 million coffee growers in the world, many of whom have very small plots of coffee trees. Trying to make a living off a small coffee farm is very difficult, especially if the companies purchasing the coffee are solely motivated by profits.

To learn more about how the system works, I visited Sustainable Harvest, a green coffee importer based in Portland. Dane Loraas, a Quality Control Manager for the company and Katie Gilmer, a Relationship Coffee Manager, were my hosts when I visited the company at its Pearl District headquarters. They spent an hour with me explaining the company’s business model and answering my questions.

Click to read more ...

Keeping it.....seen around PDX

A few pictures from wandering around Portland lately:

First, proof that it does really rain a lot in Portland. This guy's yard is moss instead of grass.

Probably doesn't need to be mowed very often

Click to read more ...