I've really only been into coffee since February 2005. I'm 16 now and I have been completely consumed from head to toe by the coffee bug and baby am I lovin' it or what?! I started out finding recipes for Starbucks Caramel Frappuccino, and soon, thanks to espornographers, I had a Gaggia Espresso in the house. Later, I bought a Super Jolly and have been doing some minor tinkering ever since. I now work at the Elysian Room in Vancouver. I hope you all enjoy reading my blog and leave some comments!

Thursday, June 01, 2006

serious this time

Well, I'm sure you all got the point that I wasn't exactly "back". I've been having great coffee at work lately and been brewing some good coffee at home. I finally put my espresso machine back together after I found that the over pressure valve i ordered not only had to be adjusted internally but also was a TWO-WAY valve. I couldn't find a place to properly mount the two way valve unless I dismantle the malfunctioning OPV and attach it to the end. I soaked the malfunctioning OPV in vinegar, I'm hoping that'll help. I'll pick up some teflon tape soon to fix the leak that is coming from the plastic plate that screws onto the pump housing. I'm also restarting the espresso machine build as a summer project. I'll have lots of time to DRIVE out there and check on the progress... since I got my license!

Anywho, for those who haven't seen it... I'm amazed about this recent Panama CoE auction's results Panama CoE auction's results, the top coffee going for US$50.25 per pound! This narrowly broke the old record of $49.75 per pound, held by Brazil Fazenda Santa InĂªs. In that auction, the record more than doubled the previous record, held by a previous lot of Panama Hacienda la Esmerelda, if my memory serves me right. The next highest bid in that Brazil CoE auction was just US7.80 per pound, just over one seventh of the cost of the #1 coffee, despite scoring just 3.2 points less than the winning coffee. In the Panama auction, the #2 coffee finished at US$10.75, about one fifth of the winning coffee's score (#2 cupped at 89.80 points). This demonsrates improvement in quality assessment... the highest scoring coffee didn't rake it in as much as at the Brazil auction (average price per lb at the Brazil 2005 and Panama 2006 auctions: US$4.75 and US$4.72, respectively. That was a milestone auction and seems to have opened the doors to high priced coffees. Bidding wars are perhaps more likely as people are beginning to realize the true value of great coffee. This Panamian coffee scored a 94.60, compared to the Brazil Fazenda's score of 95.85. I'm just happy Sweet Maria's got it... I look forward to ordering a pound or so... oh... that's gonna be costly... oh well, it should be nice coffee... I sure hope Mark Prince is as excited as I am! (hint, hint... nudge, nudge)

Well, i got a bit more on my mind but I gotta go to bed now... hopefully I'll post again soon.

party on, fellas (hope nick is reading)

2 Comments:

Blogger Nick said...

Word. You're on my RSS-feed list.

In my opinion, crunching numbers from the auction in that sort of way isn't really relevant. You're trying to apply science and statistics to something that has more in common with who's gonna ask who to their high-school prom than, say, baseball batting averages, or the stock market.

Party on, JTCL.

5:38 AM

 
Blogger The Artist Formerly Known As JakeTheCoffeeLover said...

Yes, although I agree that crunching numbers may not be the way of EVALUATING an auction's success, it still demonstrates some simple truths. People MAY be beginning to pay more for good coffee and there is a huge gap between the best and and the second best. Also, I am once again intensely curious about this coffee.

P.S. wow i'm on nick's RSS-feed list.

7:49 PM

 

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