Thursday, March 28, 2013

"Fine Dining" & Coffee

New York Times coffee columnist Oliver Strand just posted this interesting article about coffee in high-end restaurants:

http://sprudge.com/oliver.html

I don't think Strand has ever worked in the coffee business, and I have no idea whether he's ever worked in a restaurant, but having spent extensive time working in both worlds I'd like to share a few thoughts. 

The first and most obvious point, that doesn't seem to get made nearly often enough, is that coffee is for the most part (and probably from a health point of view should only be) a morning beverage. Breakfast places, be they the neighborhood coffeehouse or a greasy spoon, are the restaurants that do the volume in coffee and have the opportunity to offer high quality while also taking full advantage of commercial brewing equipment such as the urn and satellite brewers that yield coffee of superior quality in meaningful quantities. 

From a business perspective, any wholesale roaster knows that one high-volume coffeehouse or diner is worth a couple of dozen high-end dinner places, not only for the volume they do but for the huge pleasure of not having to deal with a dozen pain-in-the-ass egomanical chefs who think they know something about coffee, must have a custom blend or single-farm coffee chosen and roasted just for them, etc. while almost invariably not being willing to invest in the equipment and dedicated staff required to deliver exquisite coffee in what is, at the end of the day, a setting so ill-suited to coffee that home brewing methods are really the best solution to the non-existent "need" for caffeine at 10 or 11 p.m., after a complex meal accompanied by lavish quantities of wines and spirits. 

For those customers who do want coffee after an epic meal, what's appropriate? It's going to take a lot of depth and intensity of flavor to register, given what's come before, so the last thing you'd want is a thin, acid, under-extracted and tepid cup of coffee like the light-roasted Kenya in a Hario that Noma takes pride in serving. 

Strand says:

It seems the ones who are going to get the most out of Noma’s coffee are Noma’s waiters and cooks. The customers might be the immediate beneficiaries of the new program, but the legacy will be the culinary professionals who will go on to start their own restaurants, and carry this expertise with them.

But I think the reality is more like this: Noma's staff are pretty much the only ones who are going to get anything out of learning how to prepare and serve coffee so utterly at odds with both the time of day and cuisine on offer, and what they'll take with them is not expertise but a narcissistic focus on what pleases them rather than what delivers pleasure and is appropriate. Those are ideal qualifications for a barista job at any number of today's 3rd wave coffeehouses, but they're lousy qualities for a chef or other food professional. 

That kind of boneheaded choice only comes about when chefs or staff are choosing what pleases them, rather than thinking about what would please the customer or work with the sequence of courses and time of day. 

One would think given the time of day that a savvy chef's first thought (or that of his or her coffee supplier) would be about how to provide as deep and rich a cup of decaffeinated coffee as possible, yet this is hardly mentioned, despite the fact that custom decaffeination of small lots by methods that retain nearly all of a coffee's flavors has long been possible. 

Regarding coffee varieties and brewing methods, the obvious need is for rich, complex coffees with fruity, herbal and/or earthy flavors and a great deal of body. Examples: Yemen Mocha Ismaili or Mattari; a choice lot of Vienna-roasted (or darker) dry-processed Ethiopian redolent with blueberry fruit and bittersweet chocolate; an Aged Sumatra taken well into the full city roast range. Brewing methods of choice: the Aeropress for individual servings, a French Press for the table. 

What about espresso? Well, quoting one famous coffee expert who probably should remain nameless, "there's only one problem with an espresso machine [from a coffee appreciation perspective]: espresso comes out of it." By design it's a brewing method that trades power and concentration for finesse and nuance - it's 100 proof spirits vs. the fine wine of an ideal drip-strength cup. 

Now there's no denying that late in the evening after a large meal such power in the cup is not only welcome, but arguably may be the only coffee that really registers with some diners. That fact and the consistent quality and ease of service are the exact reasons why it makes all of the sense in the world that such a high percentage of Michelin-starred restaurants are using the Nespresso system. And it's not just a question of convenience or consistency: Nestlés top blends are elegant and subtle, and the ratio of grounds to water and final yield are classically Northern Italian - a welcome respite from the undrinkable bitterness and blazing acidity of the under-roasted, massively-dosed über-ristretto espressos found at most of today's supposedly cutting-edge boutique coffeehouse chains. 

This should be even less surprising given that Nestlé, like Illy and unlike the typical local microroaster, understands the occasion and realities of high end dining. Meanwhile, the kinds of coffees, appropriate degrees of roasts for them and the brewing methods that showcase their qualities that I listed above are not even on the radar screen of today's leading boutique roasters, who with few exceptions offer a monochromatic menu of lightly-roasted, manicured washed-processed coffees that leave the consumer and restaurants alike with a range of choices that if we were talking wine would amount to all whites, no reds and forget the fortified wines for after dinner. No wonder Nespresso and Keurig are kicking ass. 

26 comments:

  1. Kevin,
    I don't disagree with you on the Nespresso end of things. IMO restaurants just shouldn't bother with espresso unless they can do it repeatably with consistency and like the end product or not, Nespresso does the trick and fits what most normal (read: non 3rd-wave) consumers consider espresso.

    However, I'll differ with you on drip. While the economics don't make sense for most roasters as high-end dining spots are typically 5-10lb/week customers, there exists a niche for a guy like me to take care of that. I'll personally work with the chefs/staff on tastings and service, and provide the kind of attention that those accounts deserve. I use coffees (typically from Shrub) that I can get an $11/lb wholesale price and still make money.

    The first high-end restaurant I did was a revelation. I was willing to do it at a wash for the prestige as I owned a retail/roaster cafe at the time and it would be good 'prestige' (sold that a year ago). And then every week I'd get one or two customers coming to my shop in a different part of town to buy a bag of the coffee they had at that restaurant.

    I had posted a blog on the process ages ago. The chef had come down to the cafe and we brewed a couple of coffees several different ways so he could figure which mouthfeel/presentation was most appropriate. He went for press pots (less "delicate", which aligns with your points, and also easy to maintain & multitask while brewing), but we never went very dark, always went SO, he trusted me to do the right thing. It worked. And then I learned there were other top chefs willing to do the same.

    It's a niche business for sure, but there's not need to approach restaurant drip dogmatically as you suggest.

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  2. Kevin,
    Strand does not work in coffee. He has never worked in coffee. And I think it's unlikely that he's worked in restaurants either.

    The most significant thing I've noticed about Oliver Strand and coffee over the years is that he's a decidedly Third Wave Fanboy - which means he loses objectivity in his writing. And an NYT journalist without objectivity? Ugh.

    I read through your article and while I can agree on a number of points, your position is as arrogant as those chefs and staff you label as boneheaded for choosing what pleases them.

    As someone who has dined at a number of Michelin starred restaurants, I am interested in being taken cared of and being treated with hospitality while also experiencing the particular vision of the chef patron, chef or establishment. This inherently means that I'm expecting something interesting, unique and different than other places - and a far cry from the menu at Applebee's (which I equate to your high-volume coffeehouse or diner).

    The use of Nespresso pods to produce cups of coffee may maintain consistency but it truly is akin to using Cuisine Solutions vac-bagged food in a Michelin starred restaurant.

    And like the stuff from Cuisine Solutions, it's good, consistent and simple to prepare.

    Somehow, if my meal at The French Laundry were made up of a bunch of bagged and rethermalized food from a manufacturer, and podded coffee, I think I'd be a bit disappointed at the $500 per person price tag...

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  3. Thanks Rich for your comments. I can see it working as a niche business and have seen it work, but I don't think that having one's coffee served at high-end restaurants is really a brand or business builder except for roaster-retailers who already have a strong brand identity through excellent execution in their stores.

    Regarding your comments, Onocoffee, Mr. Strand informed me that he did in fact work in high-end restaurants, so we both stand corrected there.

    My comment regarding the boneheadedness of chefs was aimed at those who don't make informed decisions about what kind of coffee they offer. If you're going to take on coffee you ought to know at least as much about it as you do about chocolate or truffles, and just going with what the staff likes or what a roaster buddy recommends is not what I would consider an informed decision.

    The coffee in those Nespresso capsules (they are NOT pods) is certainly as carefully-selected and usually much fresher than that supplied by one's local groovy microroaster. I'm no fan of corporate behemoths like Nestlé, but I also don't buy the argument that the large number of top chefs who choose to serve Nespresso have bad palates or are lazy at sourcing their coffee. And no matter what, it's a far better choice for after dinner than the light-roasted Kenya on offer at Noma.

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    1. "The coffee in those Nespresso capsules (they are NOT pods) is certainly as carefully-selected and usually much fresher than that supplied by one's local groovy microroaster."

      I'm sorry, interesting article, but I have a hard time with this statement. There seems to be a lot of opinions floating around the internet these days pertaining to coffee in restaurants-michelin rated in particular.

      Are you a roaster? It doesn't seem so, yet there seem to be a lot of opinions on the business of one. As a small local Brooklyn roasting company I assure you there is no way a company like Nestle is putting as much care, thought and craft in the selecting, roasting and handling of their coffee. We supply coffee to a two star michelin (since we're on the subject) restaurant that very luckily, takes great pride in their coffee program. This is a rarity.

      Yet there does seem to be a shift in restaurant coffee awareness these days. Many people do desire coffee after their meal and why would one want to end a lovely experience with a poorly pulled espresso? It is hard to expect a server to be a barista as well, and that is understandable.

      We have a long way to go but I'm happy to see more restaurants taking an interest, and hopefully more of an interest in "groovy" local efforts and support as well.

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    2. In answer to your question Camille I worked for many years for two prominent roasters (Starbucks and Allegro Coffee) and was in charge of buying, roasting and QC for Allegro.

      Your statement about Nestlé not putting as much care into the selecting, roasting asnd handling of their coffee as you do reflects both prejudice about and profound ignorance of the the sourcing and manufacturing practices that companies like Nestlé (or for that matter Illycaffe, Starbucks and many other industry bogeymen) possess, and is typical of the "chip on the shoulder" comments I've seen from many small roasters who are passionate about quality while having very little knowledge of what quality actually is.

      Nestlé employs a team of highly skilled green coffee buyers, has precise standards in place from farm to roasting plant to finished package, roasts on state-of-the-art equipment, uses water-cooled roller mill grinders (each of which probably costs more than your entire roasting plant) that preserve coffee aroma, and packages their capsules and other coffee in an sub-1% oxygen environment. From green coffee moisture content to texting for ochratoxin and pesticide residues to precision roasting, grinding and packaging all of the variables that go into delivering quality are monitored and documented.

      At the craft roaster level, which I am very familiar with, "quality" is usually a passion or an aspiration, not a reality. A handful of such companies employ buyers who've done the kind of extensive apprenticeship and cupping training necessary to be a skillful selector of green coffee, but most places wing it with self-taught buyers whose skills aren't remotely comparable to even a junior taster at a place like Nestlé. Spot buyers of a few bags of coffee at a time who access maybe two or three green coffee importers don't have access to the kinds of coffees full container buyers with blank checkbooks routinely access, nor do such companies usually have the capital required to own state-of-the art roasting, grinding and packaging equipment. In my experience most of the passion goes into buying single origin coffee of widely varriable quality from a tiny handful of farms, which certainly guarantees that the customer is going to pay top dollar but very little else. Most of the coffee I've seen from the better-known and larger craft roasteers is packaged either in roast dated tie tie bags or heat-sealed with no vacuum drawn and no nitrogen backflush in pre-made valve bags and is consistently stale at the point of sale. The money squandered on farmer photos, farm GPS coordinates on bags, extensive travel to farms, slick websites and florid prose about the taste of the coffee would be far better spent in delivering actual, measurable quality and freshness in most cases. Quality that cannot be quantified and measured is a vague passion at best, a fantasy at worst.

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    3. I know some nespresso buyers, they buy some woody coffees. As long as they are "voll" und "chocolade" they are happy. Its really another world they live in. And for quality, try filling up 15+ containers with a microlot or just consistent quality. Thats just not possible.

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    4. Obviously Nestlé buys a wide range of qualities of coffee, thought that's equally true of U.S. roasters. I know of any number of roasters in the U.S. who use their purchases of commercially meaningless quantities of microlots, COE auction selections etc. as a marketing smokescreen for the large quantities of commercial-grade dreck going to their wholesale accounts that actually pay the bills. Another well-known case is the prominent supposedly "specialty" roaster who touts its large purchases of fair-trade certified coffees while paying its bills with sales of godawful flavored coffee in ecologically-disastrous K-cups to convenience stores.

      Much more important though is your compeltely baseless comment that one can't fill up 15 or more containers with consistent quality, or that "microlots" are necessarily superior in quality. That's complte bullshit.

      A "small" coffee farm in Guatemala is producing 4-6 containers of their first-quality coffee a year, and the same holds true for many other countries. They may have a few old margagogype trees from which a 5 bag microlot could be put together, or an experimental Gesha planting, but the microlot thing is really more a product of buyers who are too small to buy commercially-viable quantities (which is to say containers) looking for something different, as well as the well-known Cup of Excellence program, which people forget is a marketing program, not a price or quality discovery mechanism.

      If a farm has good growing practices, expertise and excellent wet and dry milling capabilities quality and quantity go hand in hand. Consider Costa Rica La Minita, the original defect--free specialty coffee, which has been produced by the container load since 1987 with a record for consistent excellence that is probably unrivaled. Not far up the road from them is probaly the world's highest-quality coffee cooperative, the Dota co-op, which probably sells 20 containers or more by now of gorgeous coffee. Then there are the 200 year old family-run farms in El Salvador doing the same thing, the big, great Huehuetenango estates, farms like Ipanema in Brazil, on and on.

      Small roasters passionate about quality who think in terms of buying 10 or 50 bags as big business certainly might like to believe that they are buying higher quality or doing a better job of roasting than larger peers, but all they can know for sure is they are paying more for coffees that for the most part are what's left after the larger players make their choices.

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  4. Thanks for a very entertaining post Kevin, some of your sentences made me laugh... which is good! :-) I think you are spot on in many of your remarks but there are some assumptions on your part that are wrong.

    1: Stating that the coffee Noma is serving is under-extracted: Acidic, sure, Thin, perhaps? but how can you judge that it's underextracted? They dialled in method/ratios and trained the staff for 3 days using several good trained palettes and refractameters, You can not state that incorrect extraction has taken place.

    2: You have clearly not been dining at Noma or studied their cusines/menus, do a simple google picture search and I think also you would understand that the coffeeprogram discussed is well suited and that a Yemen might not be a great choice for Noma. Noma is not a "good", one star michelin steak house or french restaurant with heavy,fat food and sauces, they have very unique light dishes with extraordinary Scandinavian tastes/flavors/textures that I can imagine works well with lightroasted, washed, acidic Kenyan coffee.

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  5. Kevin,
    Yes, I heard from Oliver through Twitter regarding his kitchen experience. Definitely corrected on that one!

    I agree with you on the informed decision position. Though I do posit that while these chef patrons know a wide range about cuisine and the different departments, they do rely on their department heads when developing menu items and I think that can translate into their coffee program as well through hiring experienced - for lack of a better term: barista, to execute their coffee program.

    It is only now that chefs and restauranteurs are starting to see the possibilities of coffee in a restaurant environment. This includes both from a culinary standpoint as well as a profit center. $7 cappuccinos, $15 brewed coffee and more are possible, depending on the approach, can lead to a coffee program that is actually suited to a Michelin-starred environment. I've seen this burgeoning in a number of restaurants around America.

    Currently, the culinary world is in a discovery period about coffee. They know very little and have been exposed to very little - which is why, in many respects pod/capsule coffee is a safe step for them. They're getting something safe, something expected and something unsurprising.

    However, when you're talking about restaurants on the level of Noma, TFL, Gagnaire or The Fat Duck Bray - safe, expected and unsurprising is not the expectation. It's a detraction.

    That said, there is still a ways to go with the education of chefs and restauranteurs to the possibilities of coffee. Only recently have even the culinary books started to grasp what is possible. Books like Francisco Migoya's "The Modern Cafe" and the massive multi-volume culinary bible that is Modernist Cuisine are just scratching at the surface of what is possible with coffee.

    With regards to the freshness aspect of Nespresso pods and that light-roasted Kenya at Noma, I seriously doubt your assertion that pod coffee is fresher than the micro-roasted - especially knowing the practices that Tim Wendelboe takes to produce his coffees.

    And while I do not have any real grasp on the offerings of Nespresso, I have seen the quality of some of the beans that Nestle purchases, and it's not quite what I would think Coffee Review would grade admirably.

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  6. Hi Oscar, thanks for your comments!

    Thin, acid and underextracted (and tepid) are pretty much guaranteed with the Hario and many other small capacity drip brewers. I've written about this extensively in the past so I won't belabor the point except to point out one last time that brewing less than a liter of drip coffee is a fool's errand. If one insists on brewing coffee by the cup, full immersion methods such as the Aeropress, Clever or French Press are far superior.

    I haven't dined at Noma but have looked at the menu, and while I can certainly see that their food is far lighter and more refined than any other restaurant of this sort there is surely still substantial palate fatigue after all of the courses and the wines. A light-roasted Kenya, well-brewed, is one of my favorite coffee experiences but it's analogous to a grand cru Chablis or Riesling with steely acidity and minerality. Those are not the wines with which one would conclude a meal, and ditto for Kenya coffee.

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  7. Further clarification of my position on some of these issues (thanks Oliver Strand for suggesting that I post this):

    I think for small to medium roasters the thing to do is to really look at the quality control that companies like Nestlé have and then selectively adopt only those things that can improve delivery of coffees that should remain idiosyncratic, handmade and personal. Hi-tech but not automated, sophisticated but not standardized, and as with starred restaurant food such coffees should be the reflection of the palate of one informed and passionate person, not a committee and above all not of the marketing department!

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  8. "With regards to the freshness aspect of Nespresso pods and that light-roasted Kenya at Noma, I seriously doubt your assertion that pod coffee is fresher than the micro-roasted - especially knowing the practices that Tim Wendelboe takes to produce his coffees."

    Excuse me - are u suggesting that Tim Wendelboe's coffee is less fresh than Nespresso?

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  9. I have no doubt that Mr. Wendelboe's Kenya is roaster-fresh on delivery to Noma. That's one roaster and one restaurant, and my comments about freshness are more global in scope. Unprotected whole beans have an optimum shelf life of 7 days from roast, drip ground coffee is stale in a day, espresso-ground coffee is stale in an hour. If the roaster is truly local (within an hour or so's drive of every client) they can get away without protective packaging and procedures; otherwise, the usefulness of methods like Nestlés and Illy's that keep coffee roaster-fresh for months is obvious. I prefer the locally-roasted, minimalist packaging model but what I see at retail in the U.S. is a ton of stale locally-roasted coffee on the shelves in places like Seattle and Portland that are supposedly cutting-edge coffee markets.

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  10. Kevin,
    I have to wonder if your commentary isn't a bit off-point. Strand's article dealt with the top-tier of Michelin-starred restaurants and their choice in coffee purveyors and that's pretty much what you seemed to be commenting on above. Yet now your comments are "more global in scope"?

    I think there's little argument that companies such as Nestle and Illy place a tremendous emphasis on analysis and the science of quality and delivering an amazing level of consistency. Afterall, their bread and butter is dependent on their product tasting the same any day, any year and in any locale - regardless of the distance and time that the coffee has endured since roasting. These are companies with products that are quite different than that of the niche specialty coffee industry.

    What we're talking about is the placement of coffee within a Michelin-starred restaurant. These are places where the chef and restauranteur go to extreme lengths to source the finest and freshest ingredients - at any price. In his magazine Finesse, Thomas Keller continuously features his suppliers, from Schramsburg winery, Island Creek Oysters, Elysian Fields Farm, Ingrid Bengis to Diane St. Clair. Even in his book The French Laundry Cookbook, Keller shares profiles and perspectives of a number of his other purveyors and producers.

    A common thread amongst these providers is their quality and commitment to producing/sourcing the highest quality product possible. Their interest isn't in large-scale commercial production. You're not going to places like The French Laundry and finding CAFO products like Andy Boy Lettuce, Purdue Chicken or Tyson Pork or Cargill Beef - all of which are companies that spend tremendous amounts of resources on analysis, quality and R&D.

    Despite all that expense, the quality difference is discernible.

    And like coffee, fresh proteins don't last more than 7 days either.

    Or at least, no respect worthy chef or restaurant would keep their fresh proteins that long.

    One Roaster, One Restaurant - that's true for Noma/Wendelboe, however, for every high-end restaurant (or even "normal" restaurant, for that matter) out there, there is a quality coffee roaster nearby - even in places like New York City or Salt Lake City.

    I don't know about you, but if I'm going out to eat (and it doesn't have to be at Alinea), I prefer not paying for what is, essentially, CAFO Coffee...

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  11. Thanks onocoffee for your thoughtful comments, with which I'm generally in agreement.

    The original article that got this all started in Grub Street contains this quote:

    As Marc Forgione's Conway says, "They’ve taken something extremely variable and made it foolproof." He compares the consistent quality of Nespresso to Krug Grand Cuvée: Better bubbly exists, but "everyone agrees it’s the benchmark for Champagne across the world."

    I think the Krug comparison is much fairer than "CAFO Coffee" for what Nespresso is offering - and, clearly so do the presumably discerning Michelin starred chefs who choose it. As I said earlier, it isn't just a question of QC and QA procedures but of having access to coffees of a quality that many microroasters cannot access. For sure there are lots of passionate, committed small roasters out there but the number who employ buyers who are as skilled at what they do as Thomas Keller is at what he does can be counted on two hands with fingers left over. That said, I'm all for supporting the local, the handmade and the persona whenever possible, but excellence comes first.

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  12. Kevin,

    I appreciate your insights. I tend to agree with you. I have never dined at Noma or tasted Tim Wendleboe's coffee so I am ignorant on those matters. But, I do work as a coffee master for one of your former employers I agree wholeheartedly with your points about brewing drip and full immersion coffees.

    Thank you for sharing your coffee knowledge and experience.

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  13. Kevin,

    I've been a fan of your writing and insights for years. I worked as quality control and roasting with Mr. Espresso back when you were with Allegro. Trying to get even the top tier restaurants in the Bay Area to maintain good quality espresso was a daunting task. As you know, Carlo's product is top notch. But there were times I felt a super-auto was just a better idea for some of my customers than all the rigor required to make good espresso beverages. The bartenders hated the espresso machine (they made no tips from it and it was a nuisance interruption) so often the busboy makes the coffee. I totally get why a discerning chef would opt for Nespresso. Better to serve something that will at least please the customer than to attempt to wow them and fall flat, as so often happens. And remember, often espresso is the last flavor on the tongue when leaving the restaurant.

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  14. Hi Robert,

    Thanks for your kind words. Yes, Carol and Mr. Espresso are legends in the business, and rightly so. And yeah, as a practical matter, spending 15K or more to equip a high-end dinner place with a decent commercial espresso machine and doser-grinder plus invest in and monitor the freshness of at least two coffees (regular and decaf) and spend on extensive initial staff training plus perpetual follow-up for a volume of maybe 5 pounds of coffee a week makes the Illy pod or Nepresso capsule option look very appealing. For chefs who really are gaga over coffee and want to do something exquisite with locally-roasted coffee I have seen both the Aeropress and Clever dripper work well, but you still end up pissing off a lot of customers who've just spent big bucks and can't understand why they can't have the decaf cappuccino they expected.

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  15. It's so great to have your voice back in the coffee world, Kevin, and I missed it from your previous blog.

    I'm also glad to finally hear someone from the coffee industry say what has been on my mind for a while: that pourover is a fundamentally flawed brewing technique. After having underextracted, sour $6/cup boutique coffee inflicted on myself many times over (caused entirely by my own optimistic hope of "That must have been a one-time mistake by the barista"), and thinking about the physics of coffee extraction, that conclusion seems clear to me.

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  16. I think it's also important to remember the Scandinavian coffee culture. There tends to be much less espresso, decaf is almost non-existent, and it is not rare at all to have coffee well into the evening. I'm sharing this as one who has learned these things having moved here recently.

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  17. These are all very valid points Luke. Thanks.

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  18. I have eaten at some Michelin star restaurants in London and most of them serve poor coffee with grinders that are set incorrectly and under trained staff. I fully understand that Nespresso provides an exact cup every time but each espressso is little more than a strong americano. Nespresso tends to have too light a crema. I have been working with the Lavazza Blue capsule system with coffees brewed using Wega traditional machines. It produces a very close match in strength, crema colour and style to an espresso made with beans.
    Michelin star chefs are frightened of getting a poor review by serving variable coffee. Nespresso is their safety net. The Lavazza system is becoming more popular in the US and here in the UK is growing fast.

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  19. Thanks Lance for the interesting comments. I've had some decent Nespresso ristretto shots but as you say their main orientation is cleary towards Swiss-style caffe lungo. Lavazza clearly has invested in excellent technology but rightly or wrongly the first thing I think of when their name comes up is a strong robusta aroma and flavor. Same problem with the authentically Italian espresso blends in the Nespresso capsules, and when I complained of the overwhelming robusta flavor to one of the Nestlé green buyers years ago he said, "but we're only using 5%." That's 5% too much, IMHO.

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  20. Thanks you share with me this awesome information.Keep it up..

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  21. I know this discussion has long since expired but I wanted to address the issue of pour over coffee as a brewing method. In my opinion I don't think you can blame the method or device so much when most flaws come not from the fact that one may be using a V60 or Chemex but they come from the barista. Sure immersion brewers do produce a vastly different result than pourover brewers but not so big that either can improve a bad barista or vice versa.

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