Some of my friends banded together behind my back and got me a "Christmas present." I've been wanting this for a really long time- since before we opened. But never wanted to spend that much money on it. And it is awesome. I love it.

I'll tell you what it is, since (if you come to the DoubleShot at all) you'll probably see me playing with it a lot. It's called "Le Nez du Cafe," which means "Little Bottles of Alcohol" in Cherokee, and coincidentally, "The Nose of Coffee" in French. It's a set of 36 little vials of aromas from the coffee flavor wheel. They're all numbered and it comes with a little book that has a lot of information about coffee and it's various characteristics.

So far, I'm having fun smelling each one and trying to make a mental path between that scent and the name that belongs to it (e.g. garden peas, black currant, honey, roasted almonds, rubber, etc.), and testing myself to see how well I can identify one after another. It's harder than you might think. I think it's a little bit difficult for me because I'm smelling them in a base of alcohol and I'm used to smelling things in a base of coffee- or in reality on their own as I'm munching them down (except for the rubber one). (Or maybe I just suck at this.)

I'm so grateful for this kit and I hope it improves my ability to taste and identify flavors in coffee. And improves my palate for choosing the coffees we buy and sell here at the DoubleShot. God knows, I'll take all the help I can get!

If you'd like to check it out sometime and test your "nez" you should join Coffee Illuminati ( www.CoffeeIlluminati.com )- that's where we play with such things.

Thanks Isaiah, Audra, Kari, Bob, April, Candice, Raye, Aimi, Christie, Matt, Mark, Megan, Jason, Curtis, and whoever else might've been involved in this that I don't know about!