Hi Jeff,

I've enjoyed his books also. (Its Jared Diamond)

Yes, I stand corrected - honestly, sometimes I cannot remember my
wife's first name when I introduce her to people - I never address her
by it myelf.

Perhaps it is because my formal
education was in Zoology that I find him interesting but I admit to
being disappointed that he made no mention that North Americans have
only descended from the trees more recently than the population in the
Antipodes.

??? Are you claiming that Aborigines are an earlier branch of
primates and not the same species as Homo Sapiens? (I'm sure you're
joking here.)

I was indeed jesting. I intended to portray that we (all peoples of
the Antipodes) were higher, more developed and more sophisticated
forms of being due to our greater familiarity with espresso coffee.
Neither the Australian Aborigines nor the New Zealand Maori crossed my
mind. If they had perchance attempted to do so, they would have become
hopelessly lost as I myself do sometimes during thought.

A century ago people throughout the US home roasted and thus drank
quality coffee. Then the large companies started "improving" it,
first with pre-ground, then percolators, and as the final insult,
instant coffee. Instant was developed for the soldiers in WWII, where
anything warm was appreciated. It unfortunately created a generation
of Americans for whom percolator coffee is a step up. Then we
suffered through a wave of flavored "gourmet" coffee, and now
over-roasted, over-priced, milk based concoctions are in vogue.

As a general statement, during my childhood, only we Greeks in New
Zealand drank coffee - not espresso but the heat and wait for the mud
to settle type. But we were Wogs and had wierd dining habits such as
the eating of squid and octopus, eating rotten milk (yoghurt), cooking
in olive oil instead of beef fat and prefering wine to beer. Everyone
else, being of English origin, drank tea - brewed/ stewed in a
teapot. The reason for the popularity of espresso coffee machines in
Australia - the cities especially, was due to the huge influx of
Italian migrants after WWII. as Australia could not get enough of the
prefered northern Europeans to come.


However, that said, there has been for the last 30 years a small but
growing cadre of true coffee lovers in the US. In every area of the
country there is a high quality roaster, producing coffee that is the
equal of any in the world. Every city has several cafes that serve
high quality coffee and European style espresso.

Here's a roaster local to me:

http://www.terroircoffee.com/

George Howell was the founder of Coffee Connection years ago, and more
recently created the Cup of Excellence program, where small farmers
are encouraged to produce the highest quality beans with country wide
competitions and small lot auctions based on the results.

Thanks. An interesting site.
I had heard of programmes like this in countries such as Costa Rica
where small famers are resisting growing Cocaine crops. They are being
encouraged to grow high quality, high value specialist coffee crops.
I know that I would pay extra if I knew that it was in a good cause.

Most of Jared Diamond's works are still in print and available at
Amazon, etc. I found "The Third Chimp..." interesting, but a warmup
from "Guns, Germs, and Steel" which goes into great detail in the
question of why Western civilization evolved on a different track from
Native American, and ultimately dominated.

Yes, I enjoyed that book also.

cheers
Peter

* Peter Hendra wrote, On 4/29/2007 10:10 PM:
....
As a general statement, during my childhood, only we Greeks in New
Zealand drank coffee - not espresso but the heat and wait for the mud
to settle type.

Was that Turkish style coffee? (ground very fine, boiled lightly in a
small pot, served in a small cup.) I've tried to reproduce this on my
own but its never palatable. I suppose I'll have to go to Greece or
Turkey to sample it made properly.

....

http://www.terroircoffee.com/

George Howell was the founder of Coffee Connection years ago, and more
recently created the Cup of Excellence program, where small farmers
are encouraged to produce the highest quality beans with country wide
competitions and small lot auctions based on the results.

Thanks. An interesting site.
I had heard of programmes like this in countries such as Costa Rica
where small famers are resisting growing Cocaine crops. They are being
encouraged to grow high quality, high value specialist coffee crops.
I know that I would pay extra if I knew that it was in a good cause.


The "Fair Trade" movement gets a lot of publicity today. Ordinary
small farmers get around $.65 a pound, whereas Fair Trade is paying
about double that to coops, which use some of the money to provide
basic services and schools. Starbucks gets mixed reviews for only
partially participating in the program, but to its credit, when the
bottom fell out of the market a few years ago, Starbucks insisted on
paying above market value, thus saving a lot farmers.

Fair Trade does have a few problems. There is absolutely no incentive
for any individual farmer to produce higher quality than the standard
set by the coop. Thus, it becomes both a price and quality ceiling,
not a floor. The "Cup of Excellence" program allows individual
farmers to get a serious premium - sometimes double the Fair Trade
level or even more. Of course, these farmers are only producing a
tiny quantity, sometimes 10 bags or less, so they have no impact on
the general market. If you want the best, you have to seek out the
small roasters that are looking for the best offerings each year.

Here's a list of vendors that purchased through the Cup of Excellence
program last year:
http://www.cupofexcellence.org/About...1/Default.aspx

And while I'm on a rant, the "Organic" movement is also a mixed
blessing. Its generally impossible for small farmers to be certified
organic, even though they don't generally use significant amounts of
nasty chemicals. Much of the organic is is from large plantations
that have been created by clear cutting rain forest. This is
especially true in Peru, so buying "Organic Blend" with "Peruvian and
other coffees" from Trader Joes just supporting clearcut agribusiness.

Hi Jeff,

Was that Turkish style coffee? (ground very fine, boiled lightly in a
small pot, served in a small cup.) I've tried to reproduce this on my
own but its never palatable. I suppose I'll have to go to Greece or
Turkey to sample it made properly.

Yes, the product is the same whether it be Greek or Turkish. At the
risk of being flamed in enternity by a legion of irate Greeks who
still remember bitterly the Turkish atrocities of the '23 war and
neglect to remember their equally horrific misdeeds of that same war,
much of what is so proudly kept as their culture today actually comes
from the Turks. All my relatives and 95% of the Greek population of
Australia would deem this statement sufficient to warrant my sudden
demise - I'm very serious. You should be aware that Crete in
particular, where my family originate from, was Turkish until 1912.
That famed Greek national dish - mousaka - is Seljuk Turkish in origin
in both the recipe and the word. Essentially the food is pretty much
the same apart from the more devout Turks not eating pork. Same with
the coffee. In fact, in Sydney, most Greek homes I have visited use
packets branded in Turkish.

You obviously like your coffee. In Australia and New Zealand we can
buy at a reasonable price, Espresso coffee machines that come standard
with a steam attachment for heating and frothing the milk for
cappucino. I don't mean the one I have on the boat in which the finely
ground coffee is but in a sealed sieve like funnel in between the
water which is heated to greated than boiling point which then erupts
through the funnel up into the top receptacle (I'd make a lousy
technical writer). I mean smaller versions of the cafe type that pump
the water to pressurise it. - I wrote all of these words so that I
could ask if these are not available in the land of the free.
...

http://www.terroircoffee.com/heers


cheers
Peter