LAT 09.02.12

It’s time to put up or shut up!

L.A.T. is back for the new year with guns blazing!

The scene is set for the 9th of February 2012 at 20:00 at TCC Torvehallerne. We’re looking at two hours of steaming, pouring madness and fierce competition. The competion will start at eight and end when the final cup’s been poured and last bottle opened. Anybody can enter wether your a working barista or just a homegrown milk-slinging bandit. The machine will be available an hour before the competition starts if you want to familiarize yourself with the beast. A 10 kr. entryfee will get your name on the board and a simple draw will point out your first opponent. It will be a one-on-one format, three neutral judges will point out who will get to proceed while the loser gets to hang back and drink beer. At the end the latte art champion will run away with everything – being the entry fee pot.

So, get in gear, grab your milk jugs, steam skills, steady hands and join us for a night of cheap beers and milky goodness.

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Napa Cabbage, Asian Pear and Carrot Salad

I'm guest blogging over at Kitchen Corners blog. Damaris is one of my favorite bloggers and she started off 2012 with 31 days of salads!

I made a Napa Cabbage, Asian Pear and Carrot Salad. Check it out on Kitchen Corners! ;) - mary

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20 Cups of Coffee

Jeff puts himself on the line when he attempts to drink 20 cups of coffee in 20 minutes. Willy continues his search for a new On The Road vehicle. Phoebe the Philosopher Cat takes on the universe and Terry interviews author Susan Kaye Quinn about her new book Open Minds. all this and more on the comedy show known as Sunday Morning Coffee with Jeff!

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Chocolate Breakfast Muffins - King Arthur Flour

Chocolate Breakfast Muffins

Chocolate for breakfast. Sign me up!

This is pretty much a cupcake without frosting...so that makes it totally legit for breakfast. ;)

This recipe is super duper easy and from the fine folks at King Arthur Flour. You can throw the ingredients together in the morning and bake them while you are taking a shower. The muffin has Dutch-process cocoa and some chocolate chips for a double chocolate punch.


My friend Racheal came down with the dreaded cold... Have you had it yet? It is going around like crazy. I dropped this care package for Racheal and her cute son, Caden to get the healing started. Chocolate is medicinal, right?! Believe me, this is much better than a get well card.


Look what I bought myself for my birthday! A little stamp that says "From the Kitchen of...The Food Librarian." It's made by Three Designing Women. You can pick one up on Amazon - they mail you a blank stamp and a certificate to order the design online.

Recipe:

Adapted from King Arthur Flour's website

Chocolate Breakfast Muffins

2/3 cup (2 ounces) Dutch-proces cocoa 

1 3/4 cups (7 1/4 ounces) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour

1 1/4 cups (9 3/8 ounces) light brown sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon espresso powder, optional (I used the espresso powder...coffee punches up with chocolate flavor) 

1 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup (6 ounces) chocolate chips (I used Nestle semi-sweet chocolate chips)

2 eggs

1 cup (8 ounces) milk (I used whole milk)

2 teaspoons vanilla

2 teaspoons vinegar

1/2 cup (4 ounces, 1 stick) butter, melted

Optional: coarse pearl sugar, for topping (I didn't have any pearl sugar (must get some, it is so pretty on the chocolate muffin)...I used some sanding sugar instead)

Prep: Preheat oven to 400°F. Prep muffin tin (I sprayed mine with Pam with Flour spray).

1. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the cocoa, flour, sugar, baking powder, espresso powder, baking soda, salt and chocolate chips. 

2. In a large measuring cup or medium mixing bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, vanilla and vinegar. 

3. Add the wet ingredients, along with the melted butter, to the dry ingredients, stirring to blend, just until combined. Do not overbeat.

4. Scoop the batter into the prepared muffin tin. King Arthur makes 12 muffins with big tops, but I made them a bit smaller and got 16 muffins. Sprinkle with sugar. 

5. Bake the muffins for 20 to 25 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted in the center of a muffin comes out clean. Remove the muffins from the oven, and after 5 minutes remove them from the pan, to cool on a rack.

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Coffee And Nature

Early morning in the cold woods looking for nature! We look at chicken, eggs, DinoChickens, used cars, comic books and more. Check out all the laughs with Willy, Fritz, Phoebe and Jeff. Warning, this show contains laughs, music, cats, old men, snow, car shopping and a scary monster. Can you guess the celebrity on "It's Not Fred" and what I learned form the movies!

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Bean Temp. Rate of Rise **BT RoR** an approach to roasting and analysis

I've been interested in BT RoR for several years. First, to consider a different way to drive a roast and second, having something more detailed for post roast analysis.
Through the efforts of the amateur/home roaster community, various types of monitoring and also controlling systems have been developed over the past couple years. (see posts below for more info.)

As amateur home roasters we tend to play with small amounts of various lots of different beans. Our stash is not a "production" stash. It's collection of a couple/few lbs of various great coffees. We can't mess around with several roasts of a bean trying to nail the preferred roast profile. But instead buy known great lots and learn as much as we can about them before we roast.  Then create a profile and try to nail it the first time. If we spend big bucks on a couple batches worth of a Gesha coffee to roast, the pressure is on. Beans I get from Sweet Marias have Tom's very detailed descriptions and info. Pretty much all a roaster needs to know about a lot to develop a good approach to the roast.

Having an approach and driving dead center with how the beans are actually reacting on the first roast is the next trick. This is where the addition of live BT RoR readings are useful. The trend of the bean temp rate of rise allows a quicker heads up that changes need to be made(factoring in ET/MET,Time). RoR allows easy calculations of upcoming arrival times for key points during the roast. The focus needs to be on the senses sight, smell and sounds.  With quick glances at BT RoR needed changes can be considered and made faster to be keep that focus on sensory monitoring. If the beans are telling you they could stand more heat transfer and your looking for speed in that segment for hoped cup results, than the quicker you can realize that and make adjustments the better.

green line is BT RoR (vertical readings without the 0 = degrees rise f/min.)
Red-BT f
Yellow-ET f
Tan -Voltage to electric element (juice)
The list on right are most recent readings per 5 sec.
.csv file per sec. of readings saved

BT RoR graphing substantially adds detail to post roast analysis. It is basically what I try to gather together in my mind by looking at a typical time/temp ET and BT graph. Instead the BT RoR line becomes the focus graph showing how the beans reacted to the other conditions shown. It's what completes this different approach to roasting. It's been an enlightening experience that does take some time to get used to.  Adding  BT RoR can also really help when wanting to communicate a roast profile and to transfer profiles between 2 different roasters.

 BT RoR readings have been used in various ways in the recent past. It's when combined with the graphing ability that a complete approach shift can be considered. ET RoC monitoring ET rate of change may be useful for high heat mass roasters with a proper TC placement.

If the 1st. World Roasting Championship could add BT RoR graphing of the roasts it sure would make it more interesting in analysis.

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Quartre Quarts - French Fridays with Dorie

Quartre Quarts

I'm back! I'm back on the French Fridays with Dorie circuit! This week, the French Fridays with Dorie group made Quartre Quarts from Dorie Greenspan's cookbook Around my French Table. 

It's a snacking cake with no frosting. Um, I'm sooooo there!

This is totally delicious. I just made it afternoon and am trying to save some to bring into work tomorrow! It reminds me of the Swedish Visiting Cake sans the nuts. It is light, not very sweet and goes perfectly with a cup of coffee or tea. I used vanilla (you can also use rum) so it has a great warm, vanilla taste. It's topped with just enough brown sugar to give it sweetness.

Be sure to check out my fellow French Fridays with Dorie members and see their creations!

Please note: French Fridays with Dorie will not be posting recipes. Please support Dorie and purchase the book or find it at your library.

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