Death Match

Lindsay, Kimmy, Wiggles and Devlin listen to the Death Match rules.



Death Match.

Even the words conjure fear in the hearts of gladiators.

Tonight is the La Marzocco Hand Brew Death Match pitting baristas against each other in a mano y mano fight to the death for prizes. The person with the highest scores for presentation, taste and Extract Mojo scores wins.




A modicum of pilfering accompanies any coffee event.




Almost as many brew methods as Spro Hampden. Almost.



Koach Kimmy and Devlin in a pre-Death Match warm up.



I don't want to know and didn't want to ask.


Lindsay working the Eva Solo.


Counter Culture's Phil Proteau flexing his chops.



Kimmy preps her station.


Almost ready.


A certain amount of concentration and meditation is required for brewing Chemex.


Vince Fedele running the Extract Mojo.


Devlin in perfect Aeropress form.



Mike, Vince and Mike representing Hotel California Tequila.


Spro Girls Steal La Marzocco Banner.

Riding In Cabs With Baristas

Kuidouraku Ramen

La Marzocco Out of the Box

Lindsay, Devlin, Kimmy and Phil work out the kinks on the new Strada.


Back (or front?) panel.


Grouphead pressure gauge on the manual Strada.

We're in New York City for the La Marzocco Out of the Box event showcasing the up-coming Strada. Already I know we're going to buy one. We end up parking next to Chelsea Market, perusing the shops and find the venue. As we stop in to say hello, Mike Lanz and Mike Delgado are encouraging us to jump on the machine and have a go. A quick call later to Devlin and Kimmy and our crew is assembled to play around a bit.

What was meant to be a five minute pit stop on the way to do a cafe crawl turns into an hours long session checking out the machines. I'm grateful because it's quite difficult to get any serious facetime with a machine in a trade show or group setting - and Kimmy seems to be putting the Strada through it's paces.


A cool modded Buono kettle. Seems like I'm the only one who thought it was cool.

Pressure profiling, the possibilities seem immense. So much so that I don't spend much time on the machine because I think that one needs to spend days/weeks of serious focus with the machine in order to discover its possibilities. Instead of trying to evaluate the machine with unknown coffees on different grinders and in a crazy environment, I've committed to buying one, bringing it into Spro and really have a go with the Strada.

While some people have encouraged me to go for the manual model, I think the true potential lies in the electronic version. On that machine, we can "record" the pressure profile and/or manipulate it via computer, save it, download and dump the profile to other groupheads or other machines.

And while I'm certain that our baristas are capable of reproducing a pressure curve manually, I don't want them to do that on a daily basis. A line barista needs to focus on getting the drinks out speedily, efficiently and consistently. By utilizing the programmability of the Strada, our baristas can then multi-task while preparing the drinks - like getting the milk staged, pre-heating the cup, grinding the coffee, wiping the station, and the myriad of other tasks that the professional barista must handle on a minute-by-minute basis.


Industry types watch Kimmy with grand expectations.


The Laser-like Focus.


Pedal this bike and control the espresso machine pressure.

No "Thank You" Ninth Street

Third Wave baristas everywhere are up in arms about the comments La Colombe's Todd Carmichael wrote in Esquire magazine. And while Carmichael's claim to make good coffee might be hollow, is he wrong about Third Wave barista attitudes?

Our stop at Ninth Street Espresso yielded us surly female baristas who choose to toss out simple courtesies such as "thank you."

At least the barista pulling our shots was a hair more courteous than the one at the register.

The Lobster Place

Jacques Torres

This Lid Makes Us Grumpy

We're in New York City for the La Marzocco Out of the Box event and found our way to the Cafe Grumpy in Chelsea where they have chosen lids with a wide lip that are uncomfortable for drinking.

Why? It's levels of finesse that are missing in the coffee industry.

Sniffing The Cap

A nice line-up: Susanna Balbo, Saint Cosme, Charbonniere and Beaucastel.

This evening my father asked me about wines. He was looking for suitable wines for entertaining his friends this Saturday and wanted to know which wines he could use. Hmmmm...

That's when he made the declaration that he only wanted to drink inexpensive wines - like under ten dollar wines. Hmmmm....

Problem is, I don't quite recall how much that bottle of Languedoc was, or that South African with the funny bacon character. Nor do I recall how much that Nero d'Avola from Italy cost, or even that sensuous Cote du Rhone. I just buy them, I don't think too much about what they cost.

That's not to say that my cellar is filled with expensive wines, they most certainly are not. However, I tend to buy what I like and not worry too much about the price. Thirty bucks isn't "too expensive" for a wine, and I do start to balk when the prices cross the $50 mark - even though I've been caught spending a bit more than that for a bottle of something luscious.

Truth is, all those "special" wines, like those bottles of 1976 Auslesen, are hidden in the wine cellar to age in quiet cool humidity. They're ensconced in darkness surrounded by cool moist air until the day comes when they can be opened in victorious celebration.

My dad is worried about taking the "wrong bottle" meaning the bottle which costs "too much." But really, none of these bottles at hand cost "too much" but rather, their cost is commensurate with their enjoyability. "Take whatever you want," I tell him. There's no wine here that cannot be replaced.

As we're perusing the collection, I suddenly feel very much like James Carpenter. I'm animated and enthusiastic about each wine as I describe my experiences with them. With some I'm giddy with delight. Others I want to lick the bottle but only go so far as to sniff the foil cap covering the cork - as though I can savor the wines aromas. My dad has that look of restrained disdain on his face as I put the bottle back down.

"What do you have that's only ten bucks?"

In the end, I set aside a nice Tempranillo and a classic Chianti, along with a couple of French whites for him and his friends to enjoy.

Visiting The Bread Baker

Paper Tickets - Huh???

Paper tickets from RailEurope.com.

This is just silly.

I finally received our train tickets for Europe and they're a throwback to yesteryear. Paper tickets. In ticket booklets. What the hell am I going to do with these???

After years of flying around the world, suddenly I'm scared. These are tickets like we used to use years ago. Lose them and you're screwed. I've gotten so used to paperless e-ticketing that I no longer think about "bringing my tickets" with me. Gone are the days worrying about leaving your tickets on the desk.

Gone, that is, until you decide to take the train in Europe.

RailEurope does not currently offer ticketless travel. One must be issued and carry paper tickets with them for validation at the stations and to use in the railcars. Now I must concern and worry myself over not misplacing them for the next two and a half weeks until we leave, and then I must not lose them in the midst of traveling.

The world of electronic travel means that nowadays, I hardly even print itineraries out anymore. Sent electronically? I got the iPhone, just in case. Need a reservation number? I can pull it up on the phone and show it to the clerk. I barely even think about traveling or keeping track of documents. Soon, I'll have the passport chip embedded under my skin so I can simply sleep on a cot while being hand-carried through immigration.

So much for travel in two thousand ten...

83 Market Report

Two Tons

The Path To Nowhere

In our grading, we've excavated a mysterious brick walkway that dead ends into nowhere. A long ago forgotten detail covered under two inches of dirt for a generation. The brick is old, the path is old and it looks tre cool. I'm struck with images of being rich, white and languishing in the garden sipping sweet iced tea in the penalizing summer heat while a cadre of white-jacketed servants attend to my needs. Very Martha Stewart.

Of course, the reality is that I'm sweating like a pig in the agonizing heat, coated in grime, back muscles aching from the constant shoveling, I'm drinking marginally cold water in a days old styrofoam cup from Chick-Fil-A, fielding phone calls on an iPhone whose touch screen doesn't work when it's coated in hot sweat, and it seems like everyone and their mother wants me in 37 different directions.

Oh, to be rich and white...

Spro Website, Finally.

Not so cheesy anymore, Kimmy.

Cheesy.

Or something along that line. Maybe amateurish was the word.

It was one of the first comments Kimmy said to me about Spro Coffee's website back in October.

First thought that came to mind: "Fired."

Second thought that came to mind: She's right.

For a long time, the Spro website has been lacking. It was unimaginative. Uninspired. Bored. That site had been up for a couple of years and was looking tired and old. Fuddy-duddy. It needed help - bad. But really, there's just too much going on for me to give it the attention it deserved and write another site.

But finally, I got off my butt and coded a redesign in one evening. Gone are the multiple pages. Gone are the outdated photos. Gone are the garish colors. In their place is a site that I think is clean and simple. Just a bit of information you need to know about Spro and nothing more.

Have a look and tell me what you think. Maybe even Kimmy will like it...

Full Immersion

Losing My Language

Richard beating it until it's dead.

Once upon a time I could speak the language of my people. Sort of.

Years ago, when my trips away were measured in quarters rather than weeks, I used to spend months at a time in Manila living The Good Life. Fast living, fast women, not too fast cars and the necessity to actually speak the language in order to work the bars and clubs.

Sadly, it's been years since I've been to Manila and lived that life. Which also means that my ability to speak the language has waned along with my extended stays at home in Maryland.

I relate this because I recently asked Richard to come and do some work for me and his Tagalog is better than his English, which means that I've been struggling to speak the language of my people once again in order to communicate my wishes. The difficult part has been remembering the vocabulary and not mixing it too much with the crazy language I pretend that is Spanish. It's tubig instead of agua, and bumalik ako instead of yo regreso, something that I'm still struggling to translate instead of "beat it until it's dead!!!"

In the end, there's a lot of English, a modicum of Tagalog, a sneaking bit of Spanish and TONS of hand gestures, but the work is getting done.

Sort of.

Nori Wrapped Arare

The irony of my daily existence is that I work all day but seem to never get much done. Today I'm doing my thing, getting things in order and decide to swing by and visit some friends. We chat, we laugh, we dance, we sing. Then the wine rep stops by for a sampling of new wines. I'm looped into the tasting (I would be lying if I told you I was looped in reluctantly) and we start tasting.

From there it's the usual litany of pouring, swirling, looking for "legs" and sloshing moderate to expensive wines in the mouth. I've never done a "real" wine tasting before and I'm watching my friend do his thing and I notice some curiosities. In some ways, wine tasting is like coffee cupping. There are rituals and styles, and I'm watching my friend execute his. I wonder if there's a particular method that I'm not employing and missing out on some aspect of the wines. The sloshing in the mouth is particularly long. The method of expectorating is stylish. I'm the neophyte and I think it shows.

It reminded me of the 2007 Taste of Harvest cupping in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia when I cupped 75 coffees alongside some truly talented experts in our industry. Long rows of coffees waiting for serious scrutiny by some of the top buyers in the world and here I am trying to keep up. I really didn't know what I was doing at the time and I don't really know what I'm doing today.

The only thing that separates me of today from the me of 2007 is that my taste buds are more experienced and I'm tasting and experiencing interesting nuances in the wines. But the one that's most striking is the one from Sierra Madre Vineyards. In the nose I'm immediately reminded of nori-wrapped arare crackers. I'm thrown off a bit by the smell. It's weird. And mildly disconcerting. Wine that smells like rice crackers wrapped in seaweed. Fantastic.

Truth is, I don't know if I like it, but I do know that I'm fascinated by the smell and take a taste. Nori Wrapped Arare Crackers. It's amazing how this wine tastes like that too. What is going on in California? Are they dumping bags of mochi crunch into their wine casks?

The progression continues as we sample twelve wines. For the most part I've expectorated (in a decidedly un-stylish way) all the wine I've tasted, until the last one. The Prisoner is a celebrated wine that's big, fruity and large. I drink it greedily. It's good, but fleeting. And I've got to get back to work. At least the drive back will be pleasant.

London Calling

Tools of the Trade: ekitV520, iPhone 1G, MacBookPro.

Slowly, I seem to be amassing a collection of phones.

One of the biggest challenges of travel is chatting on your cell phone. Travel anywhere in the world with your iPhone and ATT will give you a discount but it's not difficult to quickly run your monthly phone bill into the hundreds of dollars (don't ask me how I know). Beating the system of exorbitant roaming fees is a game that I've just started playing.

In Nicaragua, I was able to secure a VeryKool phone from Claro. Cheap rates, easy to use and very small. Unfortunately, the phone is also locked and my Spanish isn't good enough to call Claro and ask them how to unlock the phone.

Europe, even with its declining Euro, can be wildly expensive. Even if you grab a phone in the UK, taking it elsewhere will cost you the other leg. Dial a number and toss in your arm as well.

While purchasing my EuroStar tickets, RailEurope asked me if I wanted to purchase an unlocked, ekitV520 for use across Europe for $39, including $20 in calls. Hmmm, not bad. An unlocked phone means that if the rates are too expensive, I can dump it for a SIM card from another service.

Twenty-one days and counting before takeoff...

Now That's Geeky

Hoping Admiral Adama will be in the C.I.C.

Golf Cart One

The text came just a few moments after 12 noon: "Golf 5:30 today. Longview."

Crap, and I still have a bunch of stuff to finish today.

I often wonder what it must be like to be a "regular" person. Someone who works a nine to five job, wears a suit, collects a paycheck and goes home to a house, wife and 2.5 children. These are the people who go to soccer in the afternoon, have off on weekends and for whom Sunday Brunch really means something.

They're also the people who can plan a round of golf after the working day ends at 5pm.

As for myself, I'm trying to compress my work day into four hours. Total. At least I'm trying to make it look that way. The truth is that it's all-consuming. A true 24-7 obsession. While I was in California, it was not unusual for me to check in at opening to see how things were going. And considering the time-difference, opening is 4am in Los Angeles.

Regardless of what tomfoolery I had been engaging, or who's flat I ended up, the morning phone call to see how things were going, then another call a couple of hours later to see how the day was progressing caused my staff to ask me when I actually slept. Truth is, I sleep very little. Ready to crash at 4am, a call to check in, about three hours of sleep and then another call around 9am L.A. time.

So, while I try to make it look like I'm working a twenty-hour work week, I'm actually working non-stop.

Which brings me to today's round of golf. Three hours of no phone calls. Amazing. Not one phone call or issue to address in three hours. Hard to believe. I work with great people. And once in a while, these great people give me the chance to have a few hours to myself to do whatever I want.

14 holes, 1 birdie, 2 bogies and lots of water later, it was time to put it all away and go back to work. Afterall, there are strawberries in need to my attention...

Somewhere Out There

Dog Days of Summer

New Shoe Madness

The Day's Bounty

Pickling Daikon & Carrots

A test batch of daikon and carrots.

My family is from the Philippines, which means that I'm SouthEast Asian. The question is: can a SouthEast Asian guy like myself recreate the flavors of Vietnam - another SouthEast Asian nation?

Already I'm playing with the ingredients and adding a little coconut sukang maasim to the mix to see what will happen. I guess we'll see what happens in five days.

Still Got The Chops

Ruth reliving old glories.

Ruth stopped by Spro Hampden today to hang out a bit. She'd been a Towson barista since 2007 and spent the fall of 2009 working at Philadelphia's Spruce Street Espresso while attending Bryn Mawr College. She's back in Baltimore getting ready for her teaching job in the "real world." And as any first-time teacher, she's excited to hit the classrooms this fall. She stopped by to visit and we promptly threw her on the old La Marzocco to pull a few shots and serve a few surprised customers probably wondering who "the new girl" was.

County General

Hangar, mixed greens, rice, Malbec and cigar.

Some of my friends are constantly trying to get me to move into Baltimore City. I think they're crazy. Out in the county, life is good. I get to escape the city life and return to quiet and peacefulness. No people banging on doors, no more tomfoolery. Just greenery, forests, rolling hillsides and horses (along with other miscellaneous wildlife). I can even have a car.

Some of the nicest moments of living out on the edge of the country is that on a nice day I can pull out the grill and have a nice meal al fresco. Out in the open sunshine I can open up a chair, unfold the table, torch up the grill and enjoy myself a grilled steak, a nice wine and a flavorful cigar.

This evening's menu consists of Springfield Farm hanger steak butterflied for quick grilling, a quick side mixed greens salad, a bottle of Trapiste Broquel Malbec 2008 from Argentina, and a punchy PG unlabeled cigar. Add a couple friends and a little Crissa, and life is good in the suburbs...

Battle Bahn Mi

The Menu at Nhu Lan.

I'm slightly embarrassed to admit that despite living in Honolulu, with a bahn mi shop a half block from the lobby of my flat tower, I never really got into bahn mi or Vietnamese food in general. Now, years later, I'm stuck playing catch-up.

For a variety of reasons, bahn mi has been on my mind lately but it's something that I don't understand. What makes a bahn mi a bahn mi? While I do love our little city of Baltimore, it still lacks the ethnic culinary diversity of other cities and towns (sadly, a little town such as Portland, Oregon tends to best Baltimore when it comes to ethnic cuisines), which means that for serious forays into ethnic cuisines, one typically has to venture outside of Baltimore to other cities. A shame, really.


A Pile of Bahn Mi - ridiculous.

During my online research on bahn mi, the only place that seemed worth exploring were the myriad of Vietnamese shops at Arlington, Virginia's Eden Center - a mecca of everything Indochina. Also from my reading, it seems that the little, tiny shop inside Eden Center at stall number fourteen called Nhu Lan is regarded as "the best" bahn mi shop in the region.

On the way to Eden Center I must...

Nhu Lan is a small, modest and unassuming shop that's barely 200 square feet and it's jam-packed with refrigerators, three tables and a work area where Vietnamese and Latin women churn out what is truly bahn mi wonderment. Toasted french bread stuffed with pickled daikon, pickled carrots, cucumber, mayo, liver pate, jalapeno peppers and some sort of meat of some kind or another.


Thit Nguoi - Assorted Cold Cut Combination.

The most traditional of meats filling the bahn mi are the Vietnamese forcemeats, either a form of headcheese or some sort of terrine style meat. Happily, these sandwiches about the size of a 20oz bottle of soda are only $3.15 each, with a Buy 5, Get 1 Free special for $17 - meaning that we could go to town for cheap!

And go to town we did. With only eight choices on the menu, we ordered one of each, which ended up as seven bahn mi because they were out of the Nem Square Sour Pork Sausage.


Ga - Chicken Sandwich

Ordering the entire menu means that one must employ certain strategies in order to not feel bloated from the experience. With borrowed knife in hand, we cut off 1/4 of each sandwich as our samples, leaving a half sandwich for late night snacking or lunch for the next couple of days.

After eating the equivalent of 1.75 sandwiches, the surprising part was that I didn't feel bloated. The light and fresh aspect of the bahn mi left me feeling fresh and without the heavy burden typically associated with gorging oneself. Perhaps it shouldn't be surprising since the bahn mi is heavy on the veg and lighter on the meat.


Xiu Mai - Vietnamese Meat Ball Sandwich.

How was the Nhu Lan Bahn Mi? Amazing. Light, refreshing and fresh tasting. Balanced and nuanced with the exception of the chicken which was kind of bland and uninspired - as commercial chicken normally tastes. The favorite? The Cold Cut Combination of headcheese and what looked like compressed ham.

The Ham Pate reminded me of Spam in texture without the heavy saltiness. In reality, this is sandwich perfection: the pickled daikon and carrots combined with the house mayo offered a sweet and slight tartiness that balanced well with the meat. Fresh and refreshing. I know I've said that several times, but it's remarkable how balanced and light this bahn mi turned out.


Pate Cha - Vietnamese Ham Pate Sandwich

Probably the hardest one for most people to fathom (beyond the headcheese) is the fish bahn mi. A simple canned sardines in tomato sauce reminded me of the sandwiches my father used to make when we were young for breakfast. I wanted more and made a mental note to bring the remaining half of the sandwich to my dad for a taste.

Now that I have a base understanding of bahn mi I feel comfortable experimenting at home...


Bi - Shredded steam pork & pork skin.



Thit Do - Vietnamese Red Meat Pork.


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Ca - Fish Sandwich



The Aftermath, and lunch for Sunday and Monday.

PG Heaven

PG Belicoso Maduros, 20th Anniversary and 15th Anniversary cigars - Ahhh!

Today's afternoon quest is for PG Cigars and bahn mi. If only I could fill my humidor with the PG Belicoso Maduro, I would be a happy, kept man.

Problem is: I smoke them as fast I source them...

Going Metal

Vac Pot filtered coffee going to head-to-head.

In Japan, sophisticated syphon bars utilize a type of metal filter in their vac pots that screw together allowing you to use either cloth or paper filters with quick change ability. In America, intrepid baristas have found a way to use a La Marzocco dispersion screen in lieu of the cloth or paper filters. An intriguing idea but an unusual challenge to find a U.S. based source of these seemingly elusive metal screw filters.

Finally got a (small) stack of these filters with the thought of them replacing our cloth filters for vac pot service. Matched with new metal dispersion screens, these contraptions promise the hope of simplicity and ease of cleaning - which should make bar life slightly easier.


Metal filter on the left, cloth on the right.

The experiment is simple enough: take one metal filter and one cloth based filter and brew head-to-head comparison coffees and see which one is best. For the test, we used the Honduras San Vicente Micro Lot from Origins Organic Coffee of Vancouver. Same ratio, same technique, same coffee - different filter. I was surprised by the results.

In a perfect world, the metal filter would produce the exact same results as the cloth filters without the mess or fuss of cleaning between usages. In this world however, the results were surprisingly different.

Looking back in retrospect, it probably should be a surprise since the La Marzocco dispersion screen is not as fine as the cloth filter and one should then expect sediment. Whatever the case, the resulting sediment was unexpected in my mind resulting in a coffee with more body that reminded me of press pot coffee and a distinct departure from the clarity typically found in a vac pot brewed coffee.

My initial reaction is that I didn't like the resulting coffee. I prefer the clarity of vac pot when brewing vac pot. If I wanted the body and murkiness of pressed coffee, I might as well use a french press. That said, some of the Spro baristas liked the alternative results of the metal filter and we're giving it a run this weekend to see how it performs in a service environment and check feedback from customers.

So if you want to see the latest in vac pot brewing by intrepid baristas, have a visit this weekend.