Milwaukee Specialty Food and Coffee

Snapshots: McCafe Holiday Cup

I happened to pass this cup while walking the streets of the Third Ward. I think it demonstrates why Clown & Co. will continue to both pose stiff competition to smaller businesses and bedevil environmentalists. They hire marketing people who are damn good--indeed, the best in their field. After all, as a filmmaker documented not too long ago, they're getting people to eat something that has a less-than-salutary effect on their minds and bodies.

The marketing message creates a specific connection to the consumer's reality. Moreover, it proposes something the consumer *wants*. Concern with third-world farmers is definitely a noble message, but arguably not a marketing message. Concern about the world's problems--including the plight of local businesses--is free and abundant. Why would I buy a share of it?

Snaphots: Make Mine Decaf (Happy Halloween)

Snapshots: Make Mine Decaf, Please (Follow-up)

I'm sure this will be spoon-feeding, but I realize that my Halloween post was more of a parable than I intended. I listed a few sources of anxiety that I encountered over my day, one of them being the fire alarm in my apartment building--which goes off all the time, so I'd just ignored it. Aha! Of course, anxiety is nothing so much as my body's malfunctioning fire alarm. 

Snapshots: Make Mine Decaf, Please (Happy Halloween!)

I'm drinking a decaf cappuccino at Brewed Cafe. Today has been one of those days that reminds me that someone with my central nervous system has no business drinking regular coffee, much less blogging about it! Every six weeks, I have Merry Maids clean my apartment, and today they arrived about fifteen minutes before I was ready for them. Fortunately, the fire alarm went off, which bought me five minutes--that happens so often in my building that I just put in earplugs and ignore it. Then, about 4 p.m., I happened to pull out my iPhone: "Pretty nasty blog about you, no idea who started it" read the Twitter DM, "pushed" to my phone's main interface. It then provided a gibberish-y Twitter link, which had been disabled. I try to stay focused at work, especially as I start fading in the late afternoon, but of course this unleashed a few moments of panic. It took even fewer for me to realize that this was most likely an instance of someone's Twitter account being hacked. 

Just last night, I blogged: "If we allow them to drive a wedge into our identity, that is harmful." And boy, did I get a wedgie this afternoon. Which makes me wonder: Why? For the past month, I've been writing blog entries that are mostly unflattering towards myself, along with several posts that might lead one to believe that I'm aspiring to be a low-rent version of someone who hosts those PBS specials they show during fundraising drives. (Because, you know, I am--there would seem to be worse hobbies, after all.) Any infuriation I've earned with this blog is likely to have been years ago. It's dismaying that on some level, all of this self-improvement isn't registering with my central nervous system, which seems to be occasionally living in some parallel universe. It'd been a good while since I had anything so far in the direction of the full monty--and if you don't know what I mean, I hope you never do.

Of course, there's a chance there might indeed be a "pretty nasty blog about" me. If not now, maybe someday. I hope not, but if there is, I will pull myself through it somehow. I hope that someday soon, I can bring myself to a point where I wouldn't lose a minute's sleep over it.

Snapshots: Bay View Breezes: Hi-Fi Cafe

There's nothing worse than a policy or philosophy that doesn't allow for exceptions. When our civic officials decided to make indoor smoking the bogeyman o' the month--in principle, rightly so--they ought to have made exceptions for places such as the Hi-Fi Cafe. I hope hipster retro moves on to the late 1970s/early 1980s (maybe I should start a trend). I hear the bells of nearby Immaculate Conception ringing, so I think I'll duck into Mass.

Snapshots: East Side/Riverwest: Rochambo

I had a lovely time this evening at Rochambo. I'd stayed away for a few years due to a stupid grudge, which, like all of my (albeit few) grudges, had outlived the statute of limitations by, well. . .almost three years. You may recall that I had been treated gruffly by a counter staffer when I tried to order decaf coffee and only had enough cash on me for the price of a regular drip coffee. Tonight, the counter staffer was as friendly as the one in the previous encounter had been unfriendly. What's more, he again proved his agreeableness when he came to gently rouse me from my chair at 12:20, some 20 minutes after closing time. (I was oblivious as there were other patrons still there also, and I was enjoying their speedy free Wi-Fi.) Considering my pet peeve about the "just so you know" warnings long before closing--which are often gruff enough--to be approached cheerfully long *after* closing seems rare indeed. "I had a nice time," I offered sincerely, spontaneously but somewhat awkwardly, as if I were out on a date.

Snapshot: Bella Caffe

The past few days have been marked by some incredibly outstanding and some incredibly mediocre specialty coffee experiences. It's interesting to explore the characteristics that define each. This is a theme that I will elaborate on over the next couple of days and weeks. Yesterday, I stopped around noon at the Bella Caffe in the Third Ward. I overheard the conversation between the employees, which, as it so often does, turned to hours and scheduling. At the risk of making a superficial judgment, they didn't seem very happy to be there. Maybe not ever. And lo and behold, it was hard to suppress the thought that an attitude adjustment would have shone forth in better product quality--fresher-tasting coffee, for example.

Snapshots: Cedarburg Coffee Roastery (Milwaukee Public Market) (Part 2)

Sorry for having to start a new post, but blogging on my iPad is a little awkward. Here are some observations about the cappuccino:

- It wasn't just good like some Fiddleheads soy lattes I've had, not bad like some of the best Stone Creek/City Market drinks I've had, or not terrible like some McLattes. It was really and truly good in the way that Alterra espresso beverages almost always are.

- The taste of the espresso, even through the milk, suggested espresso coffee beans that were not as darkly roasted as the conventional Starbucks formula.

- The drink was created on a three-group (I believe ) Nuovo Simonelli machine. Using the one-banana two-banana method, I timed the shots at 23 seconds and 45 seconds between the end of the pull and when the milk was added. Only one barista crafted the drink from start to finish--the way it should be, in my opinion.

- The cappuccino did not feature latte art. I have mixed feelings about latte art on capps. Primarily, I wonder if pouring latte art does not tend to make drinks lukewarm (by exposing more milk to room-temperature). This is merely speculation, though.

- I will post more as things come to mind. By the way, I also brought a half-pound of Market Blend beans that are doing great things for me. I'm pretty sure that one of the three varietals in the blend is Mexican Chiapas.

Snapshots: Cedarburg Coffee Roastery (Milwaukee Public Market)

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of enjoying this cappuccino at Cedarburg Coffee Roastery's Milwaukee Public Market location.

Alterra: East Side/Riverwest: Nelson Melo Coffee Tasting

I'm currently enjoying a vacuum-siphoned cup of the limited-edition Nelson Melo coffee. I was able to capture a couple shots of it being brewed before my eyes. If you can, come over here by 6 p.m. and try it out for yourself!