George & Bin Laden, Part 2

Where were we... oh yes, just getting the two of us out into the drive way ready to rock some coffee... and meet some neighbors. We managed to be out there on an unusually warm, and quiet Saturday in September. After a few hours of drinking our own coffee, and doing some yard work. We began to talk about throwing in the towel. Maybe this wasn't going work. Just as we were thinking about packing up our coffee supplies... two guys turned the corner down our street. One of the middle aged men was on a bike, and one on foot. My gut was feeling this was not going to go well (preconceived notions will get you every time). As they got closer I could see them trying to figure out what we were doing, but would they engage with us? As they crossed the driveway, Josh said hello. They acknowledged, and there was a brief pause... They wanted to ask what the heck we were doing, we wanted to offer a cup of coffee... but would either of us act?

The pause was just enough to open the door for Josh to blurt out, "you guys want a cup of coffee?" They responded, "How much?" When we told them it was free... The two men shrugged and said, "yeah, we'll try some coffee." Game on. We fumbled around making a new brew of a tasty Ethiopian Yirgacheffe. We explained what we were doing out there, and they thought that was pretty cool. Somehow the conversation turned to the word "organic". One of the men mentioned how he was watching a show the night before about organic growing practices, and how what we put into the ground when we grow our food, ends up in our bodies. We agreed and related that to our desire to have sustainable growing conditions for the coffee (hopefully yielding better coffee). We finally got around to introducing ourselves. "My name is George," the first man said, and then the other said a name that I couldn't quite catch, followed up by, "but people call me Bin Laden, its the beard". Of course our first success of bringing people together through coffee would be with, George and Bin Laden... by then the coffee was ready. They were baffled when we asked if they could smell the blueberry notes coming off the cup, and to their surprise they could, "I never had coffee that smelled like that!" were the words that jumped out. They grabbed their cups and set out on their way... half way down the street when they could finally get a sip of the hot brew, "Its good... like Tasters Choice and S*%t!" The two men waved and walked away. We were both fed by the interaction, we made a connection, coffee was enjoyed... our first taste of success for Garage Coffee.

George & Bin Laden, Part One

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Originally uploaded by TreeBed

Well... this post is WAY late... but it needs to be written... so here it goes.

Josh and I were talking in the kitchen way back when (the kitchen in the Hammac Hostel is a breading ground for strange conversation), and somehow we got to kicking around the idea of making coffee in the garage... and giving it away. What? Yup, the idea was basically, share our love of great coffees, and spark some interaction in our neighborhood. Think of it like a grown up lemonade stand with a social experiment twist.

Why would we feel the need to do this? Vallejo suffers from a bit of a... shall we say... PR problem. You might have seen it on the news for going bankrupt, or heard about a crime happening here (or who knows what). However, that doesn't mean that people walking around the neighborhood aren't technically still neighbors. Why should we buy into the idea that everyone walking around who doesn't look like us is to be feared? And from a coffee standpoint... why should we buy into the idea that beautiful coffee is only for a certain demographic? So, we decided we would try a coffee/community experiment. Josh had to go it alone on a number of attempts, as I was all over the country doing whatever it is that I do when I am all over the country. There was not instant success. One, people don't walk around all that much anymore, and two... those who do are a little suspicious of a grown man sitting in his drive way giving ANYTHING away... much less coffee made on the spot. Our hope was that this Saturday when we both could open up the garage... we would finally serve up some coffee, and a little community interaction.

Stay tuned for the rest of the story...

Garage Sale Coffee Says...

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The Fun Begins...

Coffee Fun
Originally uploaded by TreeBed

I have been meaning to get the ball rolling here... and now that I am stuck in an airport... it seems as good a time as any. Rather than try to explain Garage Sale Coffee, or define it... I am just going to jump right in:

A few weeks ago while day-dreaming during my "non-coffee" job... I had an idea spark my interest. Could you take the pieces of a crappy old drip brewer, and make something that could deliver more acceptable brewing parameters (water temp, saturation, etc)"? To have these types of questions rolling around in my head are not out of the ordinary. However, having someone around to act on them... is a bit out of the norm. When I mentioned the idea to Josh, his eyes lit up... and I knew the experiment was on! The home coffee maker that I had earlier examined (but quickly gave up on), was pulled back out of the cupboard... torn apart, and off we went.

For me this captures a wonderful trait of the coffee industry at the moment (well, the part of the industry that I most frequent anyway)... why rip apart a coffee machine that gives you a perfectly, mediocre-to-bad cup of coffee... when you have plenty of brewing systems at your disposal that you know give you a beautiful cup? Why not? Why not dive in and see if you can turn the "ordinary" into something more... who knows what might be learned, and what fun might be had in the process. In the midst of this new wave of coffee folks, I often feel I am in good company to learn, push limits and question why we do what we do.

I am happy to report that our brewer is still a work in progress... it is not likely to be the "next big thing" purchased by Starbucks (unless starting fires becomes a crucial part of coffee making)... probably not going add a new dimension to the brewing scene... nor will it inspire millions of people to destroy their trusty "mr. coffee". However, it HAS added to our own experience, knowledge and enjoyment of our relationship with making coffee... and we had some good laughs as an added bonus.

Let the Fun Begin...

A garage + coffee love + curiosity = Garage Sale Coffee...
lets see what happens.