Milwaukee Specialty Food and Coffee

Arizona: Snapshots: Cartel Coffee Lab

Even on Christmas Eve, the sun is strong here, and after walking from Scottsdale to Tempe, I'm stinky, though happily not sweaty.  I'll probably walk back in a t-shirt (sorry, didn't mean to throw in that detail).  I've reached my destination, Cartel Coffee Lab in Tempe.  It's in a very unassuming neighborhood of this university town.  I walked around the residential streets briefly, and for some reason, it reminded me a whole lot of Germany.  The houses are very low-slung here (relatively few have second stories) and are made of some different building material that I can't quite identify--they're not frame houses like in Wisconsin.  I'm enjoying a double espresso, which was amazing, and a manual pourover-brewed CZE coffee, which tasted too much like tea for me.  As in February, the prices are mind-bogglingly low: my ticket total was $2.75, which I wankerously put on my credit card.  Sorry, no cash with me on this trip!

Editorial: Merry Christmas!

I'm in Scottsdale, Arizona, where it's 60 degrees and sunny.  I've stopped at the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, a haunt from my last visit around Valentine's Day.  I plan to get in a little more online time later today at Cartel in Tempe, but if I don't have the opportunity to extend more personal greetings:

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Stone Creek: Stone Creek News

Stone Creek Coffee owner Eric Resch tweeted today:  Cupping coffee from two industry leading brewers today, making significant investments new brewers in 2010 - grab your mug
To which I can only reply: Yee-hah!

Shorewood: Snapshots: Starbucks

Astute readers may note that it's been a while since "Starbucks" has, um, graced the headline of one of my posts.  I actually have had a few Starbucks experiences this year.  Most have been better; this one is reminding me why it's been a mostly Starbucks-free year. As I tweeted earlier:  "

  

At Starbucks calibrating the Suck-o-Meter before I leave for Arizona. Yep, still sucks real bad". (Ironically, it doesn't suck as badly in Arizona, as I'm sure I will be posting soon.) 

I think I will actually start a list of possible suck factors for a coffeehouse:

1) Regularly patronized by people talking loudly in some language that is grating to English-speaking ears--why is it never, say, French?  (In this case, I think it's Arabic, Farsi, Pashto or some similar language that would make me financially set for life if I were able to translate it for our governmental agencies.)  I feel bad for the employees--I get to leave; they don't!

Mequon: Snapshots: Panera

I did come back to Panera in Mequon, but I really do think this is the last time.  Sitting on the West side of the dining room along the wall, I noticed this low-level odor that I couldn't quite put my finger on. (Not my own--I think I can recognize those!) Now, I'm getting waves of this really bad meat garbage smell, like at Pizza Shuttle or the outdoor parts of Bayshore in Summer.  I'm not really a delicate person, but yeech!  Time to hit the hiking trail.

Snapshots: Cedarburg: The Java House

I'm at the Java House in Cedarburg, where I'm having a soy latte.  It's. . .OK.  Two employees are working behind the counter, and the one that is the better barista is working the register.  The soy latte is not up to Java House par, while the better barista pulled me a great double espresso a month ago.  I don't know how to tactfully request that a certain barista make my drink.  I know people who can pull that off, but not I.  Maybe that will have to be one of my personal development goals for 2010!

Ristretto: UWM

Excited about the possibility of taking a course called "Editing and Publishing" at UWM in Spring.  I emphasize the word "possibility", as the class meets once a week in the early evening, and I have to e-mail the professor and ask her if it would be acceptable for me to miss one or two classes while I'm in Arizona (yet again!) in February.  I hope it works out.

East Side/Riverwest: Snapshots: Roast Coffee Company

PHX - 8. Very hard to even coax my fingers into typing mode. It's cold!  Would this be a bad time to mention that I'm going down to Arizona for Christmas?  I've stopped at Roast Coffee Company, as I saw that barista Brett Felchner is manning the bar this afternoon and evening.  I'm glad I did--not only for the purpose of escaping the weather, but also because Brett is pulling Intelligentsia's Black Cat Espresso.  My medium latte was the best I've ever had here.

Glendale/Whitefish Bay: Snapshots: Stone Creek in Glendale

I'm at Stone Creek Coffee's location on N. Port Washington Rd. in Glendale. Last week, I had the Holiday Blend at City Market and enjoyed it very much, so I picked up half a pound.  I have to admit that the last two times I've bought coffee at Stone Creek, I've gotten half pounds just to avoid the punch card dialog.  Today I actually wasn't successful in avoiding it, but the friendly barista played it a little better than others.   She asked if I wanted a punch card for the beans.  She didn't ask me if I had one--which is nice for two reasons: (a) if I had one, I'd probably present it (right?), and (b) it didn't make me feel like I hadn't done my homework for this transaction by not bringing a card.  I also enjoyed a mug of the drip coffee of the day, the Tanzanian Peaberry.

It's all holiday music, all the time here.  All of it has been rather annoying with the notable exception of "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing" from A Charlie Brown Christmas.  The contrast illustrates the difference between Christmas and the holiday season.  I'd love to not have to endure another holiday season, but would never want to live without Christmas.

Blog News: Spirituality Forum

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