Who will win the cup?! Holland or Spain? 
All throughout the month of May our head roaster, Keith Tomlinson, will be touring the Twin Cities pulling FREE rich & sweet espresso shots of a very limited run Brazilian coffee from the phenomenal Poco Fundo Co-op. This coffee will make your mouth happy with upfront hints of floral, hazelnut and orange marmalade with a long clean finish. 
Stop by these locations to taste this extraordinary espresso:
My first North Star Roller Girls bout was exciting, intimidating and confusing. So, like the first time I cupped coffee, I had to break it down and simplify it. I started by picking out something that was easy, something that stood out and was fun, something I could latch onto. That was Tin Lizzy. She was graceful and present and, where others seemed to either be skating in circles or getting knocked around, she simply glided around and through everyone else as though she wasn’t even aware of their presence, or they her's. She was simultaneously like an apparition and the only thing I could see or make sense of. I watched her the whole bout, even when she wasn’t skating, even when her team wasn’t skating. Maybe it was the camouflage skirt, maybe it was that she was brutish, arrogant and yet still had a sense of calm and kindness. One thing was for sure, she was fun to watch. The rest was a mess. Whistles blowing at seemingly random times, multiple refs that made bizarre hand gestures, women getting hit and that sometimes being okay and sometimes they would get kicked out of the jam for it, someone with a star on their helmet… for some reason. And yet, despite all the chaos, between Tin Lizzy and the greatest collection of weirdos and misfits that I have seen since my group of friends in high school, I was hooked. I wanted to understand it all. Incidentally, Sumatran was the first coffee I clung on to. Amongst all the other coffees it was immediately unique and interesting with its earthy soil smell and lingering tobacco. I could always, from the beginning, identify Sumatran coffees.
The next bout was a little easier, but I still walked away confused. The tutorial helped a lot. Blocker, pivot, jammer. Got it. Lead jammer is in control of ending the jam, scores points, passes people. I even recognized some of the team members from the last bout I had been at. The refs were still a mystery, when and why they blew their whistles and what on earth those hand signals meant. But I was getting it and it was fun and embracing and everyone was willing to answer questions when I had them. Repetition and dedication is key in understanding and appreciating something. Cupping coffee every day is imperative to really understanding the coffee you are drinking and how it slowly changes over time, and how it can abruptly change with just a few extra seconds in the roaster.
It’s the Pollinator Blend and we think we’re going to get along. In fact, if we can hurry spring along by drinking some, we’re confident we’re getting closer—we’ve been drinking cup after cup (after cup after cup) around the roastery. 
In early September, as part of grant work with Cooperative Coffees and Catholic Relief Services (CRS), I traveled to Oaxaca City, in the state of Oaxaca, Mexico. Traveling with me was Brad from Larry's Beans, Joe from Third Coast Coffee and Monika with Cooperative Coffees. The work that we were doing with Catholic Relief Services involved several days of workshops followed by two days of visiting coffee farms in Oaxaca. Peace Coffee for the last year has been roasting coffee from the Michiza cooperative in Oaxaca, Mexico. We have in the past carried coffee from another organization called Maya Vinic located in Chipas, Mexico, the state directly east of Oaxaca. Maya Vinic, as you may remember, is the cooperative to which we donated the Probatino roasting machine that my team won at the Roaster's Guild Retreat three years ago. The three days of workshops all took place at Michiza's offices. Maya Vinic as well as two other organizations affiliated with CRS were in attendance. The purpose of the workshops was to offer advice, dialogue and demonstrations in the areas of roasting, quality control and marketing. Each organization has endeavored to pursue roasting and selling their own coffee in local markets, and we were there to provide our collective experience on the roasting side of things.
Essentially, roasting can be reduced to some very simple terms: Don't burn it, don't bake it, don't start a fire! Of course, from there, there are a million nuances that we expend all of our energy into understanding and using to our advantage to make the best cup of coffee possible. But, if you aren't getting those first three correct, you're not going to make it anywhere. The most common mistake that I see with producer groups roasting their own coffee is the tendency to bake the final product, leaving it flat, tasteless and boring. This invariably comes from putting too much coffee in the roaster, resulting in roasting times sometimes reaching into the hour and a half zone. Too much coffee in the roaster also results in too much coffee in the cooling tray, overloading its capacity pushing the cooling time anywhere between fifteen to twenty minutes. A typical roast at Peace Coffee last around fifteen minutes with a four to six minute cooling time, so in order to illustrate the difference, their head roaster and I together roasted three batches of the same green coffee. The first batch was twenty kilograms and took forty-five minutes, the second sixteen kilograms in twenty-four minutes, and the final was eight kilograms in eighteen minutes. We weren't able to drastically change the cooling temperature because the motor running the cooling fan was barely functional. I think ultimately the optimal batch size would have been six kilograms, but our intention was to leave everyone with the tools to figure those things out for themselves. And since the ultimate feedback loop is to taste the coffee that you roast, the next morning we set up a cupping of the three different batches of coffee. Everyone was in agreement and astonished at the major jump in quality between the twenty kilogram batch and the eight. It was lively, nutty, cleaner and had some pleasant chocolate notes as oppose to the flat wet cardboard flavors of the baked coffee.
In the moments of teaching, and learning as well, the goal is simply to provide new pieces of the puzzle, and this is hopefully what we did; bring a new set of eyes to a process that is very familiar to us. Next month I'll get into more depth about the Michiza cooperative itself and the trip that we took to see some of the farms and some of the great obstacles that they face, how they are dealing with them, and what support we will continue to provide. One last thing to mention, as it pertains to CRS and a project they helped provide financial and technical support for, is the seedling nurseries that Michiza recently constructed. These simple structures are shelled in black plastic netting and have their own irrigation system that maximizes the use of rain water but protects them from getting too much water during the recent rains. Each structure, there are now three of them with plans for more, holds 30,000 seedlings. Currently in order to address low yield issues, they are sprouting the Typica varietal of coffee exclusively, as it has higher yields and is more disease resistance, but has a shorter life span. Ultimately, they will be incorporating the bourbon varietal which has a longer life cycle and lower yields, but will be creating a more diversified and stable farm.
The first orders of the Snowshoe Brew went out today with our bike deliverers. Starting this Thursday, October 1st, you can find these beans in most natural food stores bulk sections across the Twin Cities. It will be more widely available on Nov. 1st, just in time for the first snowfall! Derek, our quality control roaster, brewed up our first pot of this coffee & we were all blown away by its sweetness & delicate spice. He explains that the perfect balance in this coffee is created by roasting the same Michiza Coop Coffee from Oaxaca, two different ways combined with small amount of our Dominican Republic Roast from the Fedecares Coop.
Our roasters have been working hard this month to craft a delicious new blend. The Snowshoe Brew is a sweet, smooth blend with a robust, spicy flavor. Warming for blustery days. 
On Wednesday the Peace Coffee Crew cupped 4 roast variations of our newest coffee, a Ugandan Peaberry, from the Gumutindo Coop. We were evenly split between two of the roast profiles in terms of taste preference. So as an experiment the roasters combined the two roasts into one coffee to produce an extremely robust and complex coffee. Because of it's amazing versatility we might tweak the profile of this coffee while we have it in house. We will let you know each time we do this by changing the roast profile online. We promise it will be nothing drastic. 
At Peace Coffee, we think that part of our work as committed fair traders is making connections between the global chain of people who work to deliver your morning (or afternoon, or midnight -- we don't judge) cup. Part of the larger picture of Fair Trade is drawing those connections between the amount of work that goes into a product and the livelihoods of its producers. While the ultimate way to do that would be to take every one of you coffee drinkers on a trip to visit the coop who grows the coffee in your favorite blend or single origin, that's a little beyond our scope. And, if you went to Indonesia when the coffee flowers were in bloom while the Minnesota winter was in full swing, we might lose a customer.
You can trace your favorite coffee selection across the globe, get some fast facts on the farmer coops, see some faces, and hear the words of some fellow travelers. If you want to know more, we've got links to in-depth farmer profiles, and, if you want to dig still deeper, all the contracts, invoices, even bills of lading and organic certificates for your favorite coffees (and maybe a few you haven't tried yet) can be found. We're posting these documents in collaboration with our importing partner, Cooperative Coffees -- it's part of our effort to change the face of trade from mysterious valleys and top-secret pricing to open sharing of information all along the supply chain -- in a word, transparency. In a global trade like ours, realistically, you can't go talk to the coffee farmer whose tree grew your pound of coffee the way you might shake hands at a farmer's market or visit your CSA's field. Take this as a virtual hand-shake, our way of bringing you into the transactions that make up our supply chain and make us proud to come to work everyday.
Many of us Minnesotans think about the winter months as a time to hibernate, hunker down with a good book and wait for the Alberta Clippers and subzero wind chills to give way to warmer weather. Some of us find ways to enjoy the winter weather by hitting the frozen lakes for some pond hockey or ice fishing. Despite the frigid temperatures and snow-packed streets, a few bold and dare I say "passionate" Minnesotans are still riding their bikes. This is my second winter season as a Peace Coffee Bike Courier and my tenth winter as a year-round bike commuter. I can safely say that so far, the winter of 2008/2009 has been the harshest that I can remember. After all these years, I think I've finally figured out the key to staying comfortable and having fun on my bike in nearly any kind of winter weather.
• Increase caloric intake. Cold weather makes your body work harder to stay warm so you have to keep the tank full. At a minimum, my breakfast consists of toast, 1 egg with cheese, fruit, coffee and juice. If I have it, I will also drink a large glass of whole, raw milk before I head out. I generally "graze" throughout the day because big meals tend to make me tired, so I'll have a couple small lunches and a few pieces of fruit or energy bars. For dinner, I'll eat whatever I can get my hands on.
Overall Impression: Full flavored and robust with nice acidity and a clean finish, the perfect segue from a medium roast to a light roast. 
There are many philosophies about the best combination of bike and gear for winter biking. Your best options will be different depending on what type of riding you plan on doing. Your terrain, length of ride, and your budget will be large influences on your choices. When starting out, do some research and get advice, then customize and experiment to find out what works for you. Lastly, have fun! Winter biking can be a great adventure.
For those who demand year round clipless riding, there are several biking-specific winter riding shoes. Consider getting a size or 2 larger than normal so you have space for extra socks.