As you can imagine, given the title of my blog, I’ve posted about coffee before.  It’s used in lots of dessert recipes, but you don’t think of it for savory foods.   You need to alter that.  Think of it as an ingredient in rubs, sauces, marinades, and braises.  Redeye gravy has been a long time favorite of mine, along with mole’, both are coffee applications from way back.

Marlene Sorosky Gray, writing in the San Francisco Chronicle, produced the best article on savory coffee applications I’ve ever stumbled across.  She includes tips, recipes, and some reallt good wine pairing suggestions.

Slashfood has some coffee recipes to get your creativity in gear.  Stop into Kate’s Global Kitchen for another informative post with menu suggestions and some recipes.

OK, now fire up your Google search and get started on coffee cookin’.

P.S.  I ran across this little nugget,  (scroll down), about hickory smoking coffee beans prior to brewing.  Your call.

“This coffee falls into your stomach, and straightway there is a general commotion.  Ideas begin to move like the battalions of the Grand Army of the battlefield, and the battle takes place.  Things remembered arrive at full gallop, ensuing to the wind.  The light cavalry of comparisons deliver a magnificent deploying charge, the artillery of logic hurry up with their train and ammunition, the shafts of with start up like sharpshooters.  Similes arise, the paper is covered with ink; for the struggle commences and is concluded with torrents of black water, just as a battle with powder.”

Honore de Balzac, “The Pleasures and Pains of Coffee”

At home I buy inexpensive ground coffee. I dress it up after brewing with cocoa and sweetener. It seems to induce palatability and I like the mocha flavor; the sweetener cuts the bitterness.

I’ve always been mystified at the amount of money people are willing to spend at Starbucks and other boutique coffee shops. In fairness I must say my expertise as a trend forecaster is less than stellar. I predicted the short lifespan of bottled water and karaoke back in the early 90′s.

I ‘ve been able to cruise through life happily sipping away at my mocha and taking great satisfaction at how much money I was saving. Until recently – that is. Two trouble makers, ( okay, make that coffee afficionados ) have given me grounds to rethink the issue.

One of them is John Cooper at the Apthorp Commons Cafe, a bit of New York chic in the village of Littleton, NH. He’s a former Starbucks manager with a serious passion for coffee and the mechanics of brewing it.

The other culprit is Jim Clark, who, along with wife Annie, owns and operates Black Bear Micro Roastery here in Center Tuftonboro, NH.

It was a pleasant enough afternoon the day my dollar saving equanimity was shattered. I had driven up the hill to introduce myself to the coffee couple and chat about the business of brewing. I wasn’t aware that I was about to be ruined for life; the trap was subtle and cleverly laid. It came in the form of an offer of a cup of coffee whilst we spoke. Nonchalantly Jim set about producing the beverage and I asked for sweetener for it. They had none. Sugar yes, but I’m diabetic. I summoned all the courage I had and calmly said I’d take it black. This was going to be tough but I’d try really hard not to noticeably grimace as I drank it.

Then the moment came. Innocently I brought the mug to my lips. The exquisite aroma should have been a warning. The slight foam on top, another. ( Mine doesn’t do that. ) Had I been thinking I could have stood and left with my ignorance intact. But I was now curious – I sipped.

I’m pretty sure my incredulity showed on my face as an involuntary WOW!! slipped from between my parsimonious lips. NO sweetener and it was wonderful. I rolled it around my mouth like a Napa Valley vintner with a glass of first growth Bordeaux. I swear it was strictly an involuntary action. The entrapment was complete. My bean innocence gone forever.

During the following conversation I learned a lot about coffee. Jim is a man obsessed with the perfection of the dusky brew from purchase to table. No one does justice to the process like Jim and Annie.

I still imbibe in my old coffee standby but it pales in comparison and there are two bags of Black Bear wonder in my freezer that I visit at least three times a week. I’m hooked.

** ** **

“I believe that the American coffee industry is doing itself irreparable harm by mass marketing mediocre coffee at a low price. I think that what is happening today in the coffee business is just a foreshadowing of the eventual indifference of the total American public to the world of coffee drinking.” ~ Edward Bransten,1969

“A cup of coffee – real coffee – home-browned, home ground, home made, that comes to you dark as a hazel-eye, but changes to a golden bronze as you temper it with cream that never cheated, but was real cream from its birth, thick, tenderly yellow, perfectly sweet, neither lumpy nor frothing on the Java: such a cup of coffee is a match for twenty blue devils and will exorcise them all.” ~ Henry Ward Beecher
Eyes and Ears