Some love for Toronto's coffee culture

From The Expeditioner:

This week the NY Times hailed London, England, as the next city for the coffee craze. Although the major corporations, like Starbucks, are pervasive in this international city, there seems to be a movement towards the smaller, independent shops that see coffee as an art.

The NYT listed 4 or 5 places where you can buy haute-espresso in London, but I would like to give some Toronto recommendations. I am going to stay away from where to buy beans as most of these espresso bars have the option of purchasing high-grade, ethically-sound, freshly-roasted buds of deliciousness. 

Click here for The Expeditioner's list of Toronto's best, indie coffee houses ("shop" doesn't feel right).

Running on fumes. Coffee fumes.

This is wrong on so many levels.... Le Whif, makers of inhalable chocolate, have now launched a coffee inhaler. David Edwards, a Harvard professor of biomedical engineering, and Parisian chef Thierry Marx developed the breathable coffee and chocolate. From the NY Post:

The coffee hits consist of powder inside lipstick-like containers that are pulled open, inserted in the mouth and inhaled.

The sticks are sold individually for $3 or in boxes of three for $8 -- and each stick delivers 100 milligrams of caffeine, the equivalent of a cup of espresso.

Indie Baristas on the coffee war between Tim Horton's and McDonald's

BNN speaks to Matthew Taylor, co-owner, Mercury Expresso Bar and Sam James, owner, Sam James Coffee Bar. They talk coffee and perform a blind taste test to determine which of the battling fast food giants has better coffee. Will you be surprised by the results? View the video here.

This is how you start a weekend.

Morning coffee.

Today's something or other #53

Weekend mornings are perfect for drinking coffee. You often have a little more time to enjoy the taste of the coffee instead of focusing on the caffeine injection that is often of primary importance on workdays. If you're feeling adventurous maybe you could add a little something something to your weekend up of joe? Or, perhaps, it is better to just live vicariously through the blog Putting Weird Things in Coffee.

Today's something or other #49

From the New York Times

Man With 5-Inch Knife Stuck in Chest Orders Coffee

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: December 22, 2009
Filed at 9:28 p.m. ET

WARREN, Mich. (AP) -- A 52-year-old man complained only about the cold weather before walking into a diner with a five-inch knife sticking out of his chest. The unnamed man called a Warren 911 operator on Sunday night to ask that an ambulance be sent to Bray's, an eatery in neighboring Hazel Park. He said he had been stabbed during a robbery attempt half a mile away, then walked to the restaurant and called 911 from a pay phone.

On a recording of the call, the man gives a vague description of his attacker before saying, ''I'm gonna sit down at Bray's 'cause they got a chair and it's cold out here.''

Restaurant employee George Mirdita told The Detroit News the man calmly ordered coffee.

Police said Tuesday that the man is recovering.


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Information from: The Detroit News, http://www.detnews.com/

Toronto stuff from the web

A bunch of random Toronto stuff found on the web this week:

The Sorauren Park Pumpkin Parade was the biggest ever this year, with organizers counting an amazing 1,620 Jack-O-Lanterns. Read more and see the pictures here.

Tourism Toronto Getting its Butt Kicked by the Canadian Tourism Commission on YouTube. The Canadian Tourism Commission has done a great job putting together what I think are rather honest and compelling depictions of some of the finer aspects of life in Toronto. Two dozen high quality YouTube videos of decent production value and great content are a lot more than Tourism Toronto can say they've done in this realm (they have zero videos to share on their YouTube channel). [Note: The Canadian  Tourism Commission's You Tube channel is definitely worth checking out, and I love that they feature Mercury Espresso Bar in the Leslieville segment. Best coffee shop in town.]

The Samovar Room - a Russian-themed bar - takes over the beautiful space in the Winchester Hotel that was formerly the Laurentian Room. The place looks really cool. What is it with Russian-themed bars when you go east of Yonge?

Bored with wine tasting? Try coffee tasting at Te Aro.

See Toronto Fall colours captured in all their glory at blogTO.

New life on Dundas?

Perhaps Dundas isn't over just yet after all? Maybe it is just evolving differently than originally envisioned. And, let's face it, did we really need a hip bar/resto strip on Dundas when we've already got the College, Queen West, West Queen West and Ossington strips nearby? Dundas Street, across the entire city, has long been a street remarkably resistant to gentrification.

From the Globe and Mail:

Suddenly teeming with indie coffee shops, Little Portugal is also becoming a little Left Bank. Emily Thomas pays a visit and gets the down-low on the boho joe. Dundas spills the beans.

Coffee with legs does not always mean 'coffee to go'

Many years ago I was visiting a friend in Santiago, Chile and he took me for "coffee with legs". I didn't really know what I was in store for but I had an inkling he wasn't just talking about take away. So we end up in this coffee shop just off the main downtown square in the business district where he had his office. And guess what, the coffee was served with a fair helping of legs, and boobs and butt for that matter. It was sort of a Starbucks if Starbucks was a strip joint.

There were mirrors everywhere and the waitresses served you while walking behind a rail where they would set your coffee. I guess this makes it sound a bit like that renowned family restaurant, Hooters, but for coffee, except... some of the customers also disappeared down a mystery stairwell and did not re-emerge while we were there [note: insert own French Press joke].

Coffee with Legs - it certainly would put a different spin on your 15 minute coffee break. But that's South America, right. Could never happen in Canada or the US, right? Well, that is what I thought until very recently.

Apparently CWL (coffee with legs) has infiltrated the Pacific Northwest. How long before it takes over all of Cascadia and then marches east where they'll get us even further hooked on caffeine and we'll be forced to do the bidding of the coffee overlords?? Whoa, where was I? Right, scantily clad babes serving sweet, delicious and sexy coffee. At Cowgirl Espresso, a mini-chain of 6 espresso cafes in Seattle/Tacoma area you get your caffeine fix from scantily clad baristas.

There are also a few other spots and a topless coffee shop is being proposed for Maine of all places. Enough that a term has been coined, "sexpresso" (yes, I know it is actually espresso, not expresso, but it is sex, not ses. Enough).

According to the Randomly Generated blog, there are quite a number of coffee stands in the Seattle area who not only employ young, hot, women but encourage them to dress very scantily. Some wear short skirts, some wear lingerie, others little more than thigh-highs and panties. They act provocatively and succeed in seducing their patrons into tipping generously.

In addition to Cowgirl Espresso, there is also the Natté Latté where baristas sport hot-pink hot pants and tight white tank tops, and other spots with less clever names like Java Girls.

[Side note: For some reason I now have Groove Armada's "I See You Baby" playing in my head. Weird....]

Said one customer quoted in a Seattle Times article, "If I'm going to pay $4 for a cup of coffee" said one male customer, "I'm not going to get served by a guy."

Today's Something or Other #5

What's in that tall, non-fat latte anyway? Find out here.

Coffee - a love affair told in beautiful fashion

http://niemann.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/02/coffee/index.html?8dpc

Are you getting enough caffeine?

I'm not sure if this was the intent of this article, but this is how I took it: Click on this link to find out the relative caffeine content of some of your different beverages? Are you getting enough caffeine in your diet? Perhaps you need to ice your coffee and mix it with Red Bull? Feeling sleepy is no way to spend the day.

Are those hints of vanilla or vanilla extract in my coffee?

Have coffee lovers finally lost their minds?

Starbucks has nothing on this: $11,000 for the Clover?! This thing pulls down the French Press' pants and mocks it.

Is coffee the new wine? Is life too short to drink bad coffee?

Of course, no fear for most of you. The main answer remains the same, 'yes, it still contains caffeine'.... Sweet, sweet caffeine, giver of life....