I have never met David Schomer, but I did worship at the altar of his perfect espresso yesterday. My nephew John and his girlfriend Ellen drove up from Portland to hang out with me in Seattle. The three of us stopped into the new Espresso Vivace on Broadway in the mid-afternoon. We drank cappuccinos and I am here to report that the Godshot is not dead. The syrupy sweetness of the coffee, the cashmere quality of the milk foam makes me think of luxurious hotel linens, pleasure, pleasure, pleasure. We liked the capps, I mean we really liked them, although they did seem to pack an intense caffeine wallop. I am not sure if the caffeine hit was related to our overstimulated neurological states or to the nature and density of the coffee. Former Vida coffee buyer Andrew Daday of Claudio Corallo Chocolates suggested to me that the syrupy texture of the espresso shot may be related to Schomer’s using Robusta in his espresso blend, as the Italians do. In which case, I finally get it about the Italians and Robusta. Because in terms of texture, density and sweetness, this was a memorable shot. And the milk!
….At 6pm, we went to the Stumptown Roastery over on 12th and Madison, where owner Duane Sorenson, operation’s chief Matt Lounsbury and buyer Aleco Chigounis hosted an event introducing two of their Guatemalan producers to customers and members of the local coffee community. As at all Stumptown events there was yummy food and delicious coffee. The Cup of Excellence winner from Finca El Injerto — “like sweet buttery French Toast”, Aleco said.– was a particular standout. It had a surprising African style acidity along with the sweetness.
Luis Pedro of Finca Santa Cruz in Antiqua and Arturo Aguirre Jr. of Finca El Injerto in Huehuetenango met, mingled, spoke, showed pictures of their operations and took questions. It struck me that Luis Pedro might have felt a little bit like Cinderella when Aleco talked about Finca El Injerto as Stumptown’s most important supplier. But as a middle sister, maybe I am overly sensitive to this sort of thing, and I think the relationship between Luis Pedro and Stumptown is an emerging one. I had met Arturo Aguire a year and a half ago in Portland after the SCAA conference, and he had told me then that Stumptown was more than a buyer to him–that Duane and Company had become his mentors and teachers, opening up his understanding of the coffee market and helping him imagine new ways of operating his business and selling coffee, including roasting his own for the domestic market. His broader understanding of the environmental issues, for example, has led to Finca El Injerto using the farm’s impressively clean water supply to raise and sell trout, a product line that Arturo noted wryly is easier to grow than coffee.
The most telling comment, though, came from Luis Pedro, who reported that because of rapidly rising energy, labor and production costs, the current $1.10 a pound commodity price for coffee is leaving farmers worse off than they were ten years ago when C grade coffee was selling for 50 cents a pound!
After Stumptown, I let my overwrought brain chill out in a cocktail glass. My nephew and his girlfriend, Traca Savadogo, Andrew Daday and I, later joined by “Oyster Bill” Whitbeck of geoduck fame, that’s the world’s largest digging clam and it is pronounced gooeyduck, went over to Union …where chef Ethan Stowell prepared a feast of small plates that left us blissed out and floating…
