Good read @Mañ'O'Green I would definitely agree you are a coffee snob! I am a Dirty Chai kind of guy myself, but the roasting your own aspect really makes things interesting.

And I should note the medical info is really interesting, glad you are willing to share it. My grandfather had a very early version of an AICD (automatic implanted cardiac defibrillator) which you are probably aware of, but others may not know, it is like a pacemaker, but only zaps you when in arrhythmia.

And my dad had a double lung transplant at Stanford, so medical stuff has always been quite fascinating to me. I won't elaborate though since this is supposed to be an appetizing thread lol
 
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Hummmmmm.......... I cannot believe I have not talked about coffee in this thread. Ok take a seat this is a long winded story. I used to suffer from tachycardia - an electrical problem in the heart circuitry. The circuit had extra connections that allowed a pulse to travel in a circle instead of the normal horse shoe shape. So the electrical pulse that causes the heart to beat would just travel round and round causing a heart rate of 200 plus beats a minute. The heart is not efficient beating like that and it can cause a whole host of problems including stroke and detached retinas even death. A lot of time I could stop it by just bearing down like trying to shit a big one. Other times I could lie on the ground and put my arms and legs up in the air and the increase in blood pressure on my core would stop it. People really stare at you when you pull off the road and lay down on the ground and put your arms and legs up in the air :rofl:. The slightest bit of caffeine could trigger these episodes so for many years I did not drink coffee, tea, sodas or anything with caffeine. Talk about Pavlov's dogs - I was properly trained. The medical condition got to the point where I had a catheter ablation done. They go into your heart with probes One from the neck and one from the groin while you are totally awake. You need to tell the doctor when he stimulates the spot that triggers the event. Then they burn a small spot in that electrical circuit opening a spot making it a horse shoe shape instead of the circle. The procedure was a complete success and the Doctor told me I could drink coffee again. Well that was all fine and dandy but that conditional training was strong. Several years passed without a tachycardia and I stumbled across a web page talking about roasting coffee in a popcorn popper. It intrigued me so I went to the thrift store and picked one up. I ordered some green coffee beans form Sweet Maria's because they were close to me in Oakland CA. I roasted some beans. Ground them up in a spice mill and made a cup of coffee with it. I could not believe how good it tasted. Far better than any store bought pre-roasted pre-ground coffee ever tasted. This sent me down the path to coffee snob. I built several iterations on the popcorn roaster. Then I built a computer controlled fluidized bed roaster. By far the best roaster I have owned but an electrical surge fried it. I have a Behmor drum roaster now but it is not as good as the one I built. I have pictures somewhere?

Any how as my pallet improved so did my equipment. The heart of gourmet coffee is the grinder. It is particularly important (pun intended) that the grains be precisely equal in size for a perfect brew. I use a Baratza Vario $500. Then I went through a couple of espresso machines and settled on the Rancilio Miss Silvia $750. It is not the best machine out there but it fits in the space I have available on the counter and does a good job on both the extraction and frothing milk for my wife's Lattes and Cappuccino. I drink 1 Long Black a day. A long Black is a double espresso (15 grams of ground coffee) with a 2 oz extraction pulled into a cup that has 2 oz of hot water in it, 4 oz. total. This is not to be confused with a double Americano. That is a 2 ounce pull into an empty cup and then 2 oz of hot water is poured into it. I know you are saying same thing right - wrong. An Americano tastes like a cup of strong coffee and a Long Black tastes like espresso huge difference. If you do not believe me try them side by side some day.

Sweet Maria's turned out to be the best source for green beans. The buyer travels the world continuously seeking small farms and co-ops to buy the best beans. They pay the farmers a better price than they would get elsewhere and I like that idea of supporting the farmers! I buy blends and Single Origin to blend my own. I really like African beans blended with Brazil. The possible combinations are endless. Sometime single origin is very very good. I like my beans roasted to just past Full City (just into second crack) for espresso. Occasionally I roast for french press coffee and I roast to city + for most of those. After much experimentation I have determined that coffee 8 to 10 days off the roast stored in bags that allow off gassing of the co2 is prime. It can be a little too bright prior to that and then stales quickly afterwords.

I am quite sure I qualify as a coffee snob.

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Yay!!! Story Time with Greeny!!

You are definitely a coffee snob....in the bestest way possible. Bubbles. In. Love. I would die a happy man getting schooled in the Jedi art of coffee making from scratch by you. I am gonna kick it down a level and try your baby step into the world of snobs...I also have a popcorn cooker, and just the first step with roasting the beans and grinding yourself seems like a mile above anything from the hypermart. It sounds like a lot of other things....the first few steps done right will get you 75% there, and that last 25% of ultimate coffee snobbery is trial, error and $$$$.

Any tips for the would be roasters/grinders out there (ME) drooling over your rig? And by popcorn cooker, do you mean the clamshell iron ones that go over a fire with the holes in em?

I can think of a tip: don't use Coffee Mate "creamers" when making coffee of this caliber. LMAO. Sorry to hear about the tachycardia on top of the food antibody thing...I'm sure you've had a tough time passing up so much delicious food over the years and having to know exactly what's in everything blows.

THEY'RE called KAAAAHBS Joe's dad's stuff
 
Yay!!! Story Time with Greeny!!

You are definitely a coffee snob....in the bestest way possible. Bubbles. In. Love. I would die a happy man getting schooled in the Jedi art of coffee making from scratch by you. I am gonna kick it down a level and try your baby step into the world of snobs...I also have a popcorn cooker, and just the first step with roasting the beans and grinding yourself seems like a mile above anything from the hypermart. It sounds like a lot of other things....the first few steps done right will get you 75% there, and that last 25% of ultimate coffee snobbery is trial, error and $$$$.

Any tips for the would be roasters/grinders out there (ME) drooling over your rig? And by popcorn cooker, do you mean the clamshell iron ones that go over a fire with the holes in em?

I can think of a tip: don't use Coffee Mate "creamers" when making coffee of this caliber. LMAO. Sorry to hear about the tachycardia on top of the food antibody thing...I'm sure you've had a tough time passing up so much delicious food over the years and having to know exactly what's in everything blows.

THEY'RE called KAAAAHBS Joe's dad's stuff
I went down a lot of rabbit holes to get where I am today. The first serious purchase has to be the grinder - period. If you are not going to do espresso the Capresso Infinity Burr Grinder is about the least expensive at $100. If you are going to do espresso the Virtuoso Conical Burr Mill by Baratza is the least expensive ~ $230 I would consider.

The popcorn popper is a hot air popper Just put a soup can cut open on both ends pushed down into the chamber to keep beans from blowing out and roast coffee. The poppers that duct the hot air in from the sides work a lot better than the air coming in on the bottom. You are going to want to graduate from that in short order though so don't spend money on a new one. go to a thrift store and find a used one cheap. This is a fairly inexpensive roaster that will do a good job for 4 oz. batch.
https://www.sweetmarias.com/fresh-roast-sr500.html

I gota tell you you will not believe how good coffee can be.....................
 
Alright the good stuff got pillaged out of the main pot originally, so it looks somewhat meager, though I am cool with lots of broth and just some veggies. Everyone begged for more, incredibly, so I am thawing the frozen bucket and am going to doctor up extra veggies with it for dinner. @LordGreenWood now you happy buddy? :smoking:

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Alright the good stuff got pillaged out of the main pot originally, so it looks somewhat meager, though I am cool with lots of broth and just some veggies. Everyone begged for more, incredibly, so I am thawing the frozen bucket and am going to doctor up extra veggies with it for dinner. @LordGreenWood now you happy buddy? :smoking:

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When there is just a lot of broth left over, I will add noodles or rice or lentils or........................
 
Alright the good stuff got pillaged out of the main pot originally, so it looks somewhat meager, though I am cool with lots of broth and just some veggies. Everyone begged for more, incredibly, so I am thawing the frozen bucket and am going to doctor up extra veggies with it for dinner. @LordGreenWood now you happy buddy? :smoking:

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very nice my man :pass::d5::cheers:
 
I made some brownies from scratch!! I have honestly only done that a couple times in my life because Ghirardelli brownies are bomb and cheap. I was dying for something desserty and did a little pantry diving.

I found a full tin of Hershey cocoa powder and did a little beard scratching till a light bulb lit. Turned out to be Nurse B turning on the kitchen light asking what I was doing in the dark scratching my beard. I dusted off my trusty Better Homes & Gardens spiral bound cookbook. Not the most exotic book on the market, but I've actually learned some cool things from it, like how to start your own proper NY cheesecake, and how to make peanut butter cookies from their heirloom recipe.

So I followed their brownie batter recipe and made a cream cheese marble out me noggin and combined the two and did the draggy knives. It worked lovely.

Had the last of the sourdough meatballs and made a little powerhouse sammich out of it with some melted mozz and some noodles.
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THEY'RE called KAAAAHBS Joe's dad's stuff
 
Hello Mr. The King, are you still here, because last I heard, Elvis has left the building?

Did y'all make that jumbo gumbo or is that from a restaurant? Reason I ask, is that I am a blue point fanatic (who isn't?), but they hold a special place in my heart from when I was a kid. My folks would take an annual camping trip to Tom's River NJ and bring the crab pots and THE crab pot...lol. This is how I learned about Old Bay and melted clarified butter. Anyway, we would go crabbing there, and fill up a 5 gallon bucket, bring em back to the campground to our little Starcraft Pop-up camper. My dad would brave the little bastards trying to end him and grab em outta the bucket with his bare hands!! They would be holding their claws straight up in a VERY defensive position and use them like one super claw. It's terrifying when you're only six!! He would flip em onto their shells and dispatch them with one quick blow that cleaved them in twain, right through their brain and everything else with a crazy big bladed hatchet. Making a left and right half. My momma would get the halves and clean out the gills, lungs and weirdos under running water and repeat. Put THE crab pot on the fire and wait for the steam. Drop in the basket and load her up with Old Bay dusted halves. Then the smell hit the crowd...like a runaway log truck coming at you at a hundred miles an hour. Our 'neighbors' LOVED us as we would always share. (Ya think? Lol) We didn't miss a year for 10 years or so until we did. [emoji20] It's been awhile. I need to go again soon and bring my kin. Maybe this summer???? Getting my gears grinding...lol.

Reason I was wondering about those, is they look different from any blue I've seen, is that by chance a softy w/ a fresh moult? I've never had a soft shell down the gullet, let alone caught one...we must have been there in the wrong season for that. Thanks King.

THIS....this is how those fuckers would be. They want to straight up grab you and feast on your dead body. (They would too)
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THEY'RE called KAAAAHBS Joe's dad's stuff
No im still here more in and out! :pass:
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