I'm for sure leaving on a jet plane this coming Tuesday for Guatemala. I'm pretty excited and will blog more details soon. Again, this trip is mainly possible (and desirable) because of the support and interest of the members of Coffee Illuminati. When I get back, I'll have a lot more information about Guatemalan coffee, info about specific farms and mills, lots of pictures, stories, and hopefully some video. I will have a special session to share all this with the Illuminati, so if you are at all interested you should go ahead and join- it cost as little as $1 or you can pay as much as you want.

While I'm gone (12 days is a long time), the DoubleShot will still be open regular hours. Thanks to the two guys that bear the heavy weight (and hopefully the proud title) of DoubleShot quality. Isaiah will still be pulling shots and slinging milk every day and Jason will be backing him up. And if you're worried about us running out of coffee while I'm gone, fear not. Your coffee beans are in good hands. Jason will be taking my place at the roaster. You don't know it, but there have been a few times in the history of our beloved DoubleShot that someone other than me has roasted. Jason has done it before and has been working with me for the last couple months to pin down the coffees- to get ahold of their roast profiles and a little of the history of how each bean has been roasting. He's a lefty, but even batting on the other side of the plate, he won't do your coffee wrong.

So special thanks go to Isaiah and Jason. Be nice to them while I'm gone.
Wait... I won't be here to abuse them, so maybe you should give 'em hell.

That's a picture of me.
I wanted you to have it because you won't be seeing me around here much longer. That's right, I'm leaving you for greener pastures.
Guatemala, to be exact.
I'm flying to Guatemala on February 5, and I'll be there until February 17. Then I'm coming back to my beloved DoubleShot, so don't worry too much.
This is the first trip I'm taking since the inception of the Coffee Illuminati. Thanks to all the members of the Illuminati for helping me afford this trip. I plan to visit a coffee farm called Finca Agua Tibia in the Fraijanes region, and hope to tour a couple mills and maybe some farms around Antigua, and possibly near Lake Atitlan. A fellow at Royal Coffee (one of my brokers) has been a great help in steering me and contacting people for me. It should be a great trip. I may even find time to see the Mayan ruins at Tikal.
Expect to see new coffee from Guatemala arriving at the DoubleShot in April.
You can still join the Coffee Illuminati and become privy to the inside scoop and lots more coffee education.

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!

I'm sitting here on a Sunday morning, enjoying the relaxation and the sunshine and a presspot of La Minita.
For all the DoubleShot customers who ONLY buy La Minita, I have two things to say. First, you're missing out on some great coffees. Second, you're on to something.
Damn this is good coffee.
A long, long time ago, when I first started home roasting (probably 10 years ago), La Minita was one of the coffees in the varietals I ordered. It was one of my favorites then, and it's one of my favorites today.
A year ago, when I was in Costa Rica, I took some video with my little digital camera. I've finally put some of it together and put it on youtube because it was too big to efficiently fit on the Propaganda page. But there is a link to it on the Propaganda page. I didn't do a very good job of shooting the video or putting it together. But hopefully you'll watch it and see a little bit of what the farm looks like, what the people do, and how the coffee is grown and harvested.
La Minita has been generous enough to invite me down to visit twice since we opened and it has really changed my life and perspective on coffee.