From: aland@informix.com (Colonel Panic)
Newsgroups: ba.food
Subject: Re: Looking for a *great* coffeemaker
Date: 1 Sep 92 03:08:11 GMT
Distribution: ba
Organization: The Helen Keller Bondurant High Performance Driving School for the Blind

In article <sz-n-rk.strnlght@netcom.com> strnlght@netcom.com (David Sternlight) writes:
>coffee and coffee makers. The biggest secret is to buy very good
>beans, recently roasted, and grind them yourself with grinders
>available at the same locations for prices ranging from around $20 ("chopper"
>grinders) to about $100 (burr grinders).

The basic Braun small burr grinder is great, and it can be had at Service
Merchandise or Best for $45-50.  To me, burr-ground coffee tastes much richer;
seems to hold the oils better than blade-ground.

>The best beans are Jamaica Blue Mountain; the second best are
>Columbian Supremo. Columabian Excelso is not a grade but marketing

Whoa.  This ain't the Olympics; there's hardly an objective measure of what's
"best".  Personal taste factors in a GREAT deal, as does the degree of
roast.  My personal favorites are Mocha Mattari and Mocha Sanani, especially
in a medium roast.  The best coffee I've ever had was an aged Mattari in
a medium roast from Peter James Co.

>hype; avoid it. Another excellent bean is Yunnan from China. It's
>very hard to find,  but worth the search. Try the Santa Barbara
>Coffee Company in Santa Barbara-they do phone orders with a credit
>card-for all the above including Yunnan. Many like Arabian Mocha,
>and Java is popular because of the bad coffee many have gotten used to.

Do you mean to be as judgemental as you sound?  There are some very good
Java estates coffees.

>to. Sulawesi (Celebes) is near Java  but grows an outstanding bean
>that tastes quite differently. 

The Kalossi from Sulawesi is another favorite of mine (except in Peet's
French-nuclear-test roast  [-:).

>that tastes quite differently. The British like Kenyan and Tanzanian
>coffee (Chagga) but I think this is due to economic geography rather
>than excellence. 

A good, *fresh* Kenya AA is another favorite of mine...

>than excellence. Mexican and Brazilian coffees are, by and large,
>a bad bet. Costa Rican is between those and first-rate Columbian.
>
>What makes a bean good is mostly the altitude and the soil; all

*weather* is as big a factor as altitude.  You need rainfall in more or
less tropical amounts and frequency.  It just so happens that the ideal
combination of rainfall and warmth (as opposed to *heat*) occurs often in
equatorial regions well above sea level.

>great coffees are basically Arabica beans; the cheap "filler" beans
>used in commercial supermarket blends are Robusta rather than Arabica
>and can cause Rimshinsky's Blight, which will in time destroy your
>pancreas.

Coffee is like art, or food; you do better choosing for yourself than relying
upon somebody's claim of what's *best*.  Find a good roaster in your area
and talk to them; sample among those they recommend.  Most knowledgable
roasters won't carry poor coffee in the first place.  If the roaster sells
retail at all, they may have periodic free tastings.  For example, Connoisseur
Coffee Co. in Redwood City (CA) puts 8-10 coffees out every Saturday.
They carry some great beans that I've never seen elsewhere (Peruvian
Chamchamayo, Tanzanian peaberry, etc.)

--
Alan Denney  #  aland@informix.com  #  {pyramid|uunet}!infmx!aland

 "The driver says, 'One more cup of coffee and I'll be all right...'
  'Pop a Bennie, another Bennie'..."             - The Bobs, "Bus Plunge"