TASTE Coffee

BY LEE GERSTEIN

When did I have my first cup of coffee? Was I in college? Did I really like it? Isn’t coffee a step towards a certain type of surface maturity, in the same vein as, say mixed drinks or cigarettes?

These days, kids are exposed to the oh so glamorous life of coffee at toddlerhood, as moms and dads bring their kids into retail chains, so they can enjoy their expensive coffee drinks, while their kids get a juice and a cookie. Soon, however, these kids will grow up, and ape the lifestyles of the adults, which means more gourmet coffee drinks.

We all know Starbucks has turned the nation into a caffeine-addicted horde, willing to spend four times what they used to for a cup of coffee. What you may not be aware of, however, is their success in promoting milk. Their lattes, cappuccinos, and ready-to-drink bottled Frappuccinos don’t really advertise the fact that much of the beverage is milk based. In fact, from 2000 to 2001, the ready-to-drink coffee product market grew by 23.1 percent.

More...

Freight Train Engineer Blocks Traffic To Get Coffee

(Kingston, New York-AP) -- Apparently, there's no law against parking a train and blocking traffic to get coffee.

So a railroad company won't be fined for tying up traffic in Kingston, New York, last month when one of its freight trains made an unscheduled stop.

The CSX train blocked six crossings while an engineer picked up coffee for his co-workers.

More...

Coffee For The Birds

Written By: Jacques Buffett

If you’re a bird lover the type of coffee you consume can make a big difference in the lives of our feathered friends. There are two main methods of coffee cultivation. Shade-grown coffee is grown beneath trees while sun-grown is grown in open plots.

The traditional shade grown method is much friendlier to local bird life.

More...

Kenya to start direct coffee sales to US

By SILAS NTHIGA
Kenya is soon to start direct sales of coffee to the United States.

A government delegation, led by the Cooperative Development minister, Mr Peter Njeru Ndwiga, leaves for the US in a week to finalise the plans.

This will be the first time for the Kenyan coffee to be auctioned abroad.

Currently, all the commodity is sold at the Nairobi auction where brokers buy it for resale to world consumers in their own brand names.

The Kenyan crop is sold raw and later processed and mostly blended with that from other parts of the world due to its superior quality.

More...

Globalization is pushing coffee prices to historic lows and brewing poverty

By JOHN OTIS
Copyright 2003 Houston Chronicle

LA DALIA, Nicaragua -- Bibiano Mendoza has spent much of his life gingerly plucking crimson coffee cherries by hand at their peak moment of ripeness.

Now, instead of pondering retirement, the sunburned, 60-year-old grandfather frets about where he'll get his next meal.

Mendoza and 82 other field hands have been squatting illegally on this coffee plantation in northern Nicaragua ever since their employer defaulted on loans and lost the property to the bank. With no job prospects and nowhere else to go, they have survived for the past two years by growing a little rice and picking wild fruit.

"In good times, we didn't make much money," says Mendoza, who used to earn a daily wage of $3 -- about the price of a grande latte at Starbucks.

More...

Indian Coffee Goes Global

S R Kasbekar

Has Indian coffee regained its aroma? Ten coffee growers from Karnataka won the prestigious Italy-based illycaffe’s first Indian Coffee Quality Prize for Espresso coffee instituted for growers of quality Arabica Plantation A coffee beans. The award also means they can supply to illycaffe. It is a recognition that Indian Arabica coffee growers can match the best in the world in terms of positive bitterness and excellent aroma. Now is the time for the Indian coffee industry to move ahead and develop ‘global’ brands like Barista in coffee or Tetley in tea.


More...