Albina Press (North PDX)

The show Portlandia has been in the news a lot lately (it will probably show up a few more times in Caffeinated PDX in the near future), and it would not surprise me if the show’s writers hung out at Albina Press while coming up with ideas for the show. Located a short walk north of the Mississippi district, Albina Press has a lot of Portland(ia) to offer you.

If you were to go online and read through the reviews of the café, you would find that it gets a lot of love (and plenty of hate) for being the best (or the most pretentious) café in Portland. People seem to think the world of it or they seem to detest it.  I don’t think you should believe too much of what you read on the internet (yes, I am aware of the irony of that statement) so I went to check it out for myself.

Albina Press in North Portland

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Friday Links-January 21

Friday is upon us once again, so it's time for a few links to round out the week. 

This week Starbucks announced a new size for its beverages, the Trenta, a 31-ounce cup. What they didn’t tell you is that “Trenta Frappucino” is Italian for “fat American”. The joke’s on us. link

With coffee prices so high, it’s a hard time to be an independent coffee shop, according to Inc.com. Will we see a lot of independents go out of business in 2011, or will coffee drinkers just get used to paying more for their coffee? link

It’s no secret that coffee grounds are good for a garden’s soil, and a pair of former UC Berkeley business school students have started a company that sells mushrooms grown in leftover coffee grounds. Sounds like a business that could fit in well in the Portland area. link

This guy is trying to drink coffee at every Starbucks on the planet.

A Cuban blogger discusses her culture’s connection to coffee and some of the innovative ways families and the government have stretched the limited coffee supply. link

Police have apprehended the alleged accomplice of the robber who was shot and killed when he tried to rob a Dutch Bros. kiosk in Eugene. link

More details about the attempted robbery and the barista’s retaliation came out this week. link

A bikini-clad barista at Twin Perks on NE Killingsworth chased down a man who tried to rob the café’s tip jar. link

I know I've been doing my part to keep the coffee economy running smoothly in the new year, but according to Seatlle Times bloggers Melissa Allison and Amy Martinez, January is still the worst month of the year for coffee sales.  link

Coffeehouse Five-Fighting Portland Syndrome

For those of you who haven’t heard of it, Stockholm syndrome is a condition where prisoners start to feel affection for their captors. It gets its name from a robbery that took place in Stockholm, Sweden in 1973. Upon their release after being held inside a Stockholm bank for six days, the hostages publicly defended the robbers’ actions, having established some sort of emotional connection with them.

In the Portland version of the syndrome, the rain is analogous to the bank robbers. After a while, you get used to it and may even start to like it. The other day, I was actually glad it was raining as I made my way over to Coffeehouse Five. I needed some good coffee to get my mind back in order.

CH5

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Airport Coffee Hacking Tip

When you travel, one thing you may get tired of is airport coffee. It’s true that most airports these days have Starbucks or Peet’s (or some other large coffee chains) in them, but even if you do like their coffee, you probably don’t like the high prices they charge. Airport cafés have limited competition and they know it, so they charge way more than they would on the street.

There is a way to beat the airport coffee cartels and still have great coffee.

Zachary Gray, owner of Paper Tiger Coffee, gave me some great advice for getting great coffee when you’re traveling, without being treated like an ATM.

Here are the steps:

Step 1-Right before you leave for your trip, grind some coffee beans and put the grounds into a Ziploc bag. It is very important that the beans are ground extra-coarsely—more coarsely than for a French press. Grind out enough coffee so that you have at least two tablespoons of grounds for each six ounces of coffee you are going to want to drink. Put them in the bag and remove as much air as possible. Seal the bag and throw it in something you are going to carry onto the plane.

Step 2-When you get to the airport, look for a Starbucks—not to buy coffee, but to get a cup of hot water. Starbucks has great water. They triple-filter it so there is nothing in it to add or detract from the taste of the coffee. Order the size you want, making sure to match the quantity of water with the quantity of coffee you have.

Step 3-Dump your ground coffee into the cup of hot water. Gently stir the grounds to make sure that they all come into contact with the hot water. Let sit for 3-4 minutes, then pour just  a little cold water over the grounds to help them sink to the bottom. The coffee should be ready to drink.

As you drink the coffee, you have to be gentle with the cup so that the grounds stay at the bottom. If you do this, the grounds are less likely to release some of the bitter compounds they contain (i.e., they won’t over-extract) and you won’t get a mouth full of sediment when you drink it. As long as you’re careful, you will not taste much more sediment than you would with a French press.

It’s not rocket science—high-quality fresh coffee + good water has always been the recipe for great coffee, even if the method is somewhat primitive. In Gray’s experience, this ‘farmer coffee’ (a.k.a. ‘cowboy coffee’) is better than nearly all the coffees you can get at the airport. The fact that you don’t have to spend so much money also makes it taste better. Enjoy!

(Feel free to pass this on to your fellow travelers/coffee lovers)