Sprudge.com Roundtable Roundhouse
ABCNews Nightline recently aired this feature on third wave coffee. It left Sprudge.com’s editors in desperate need of outside input, and in response we are proud to bring you our inaugural edition of the Sprudge.com Roundtable Roundhouse. We now join a lively conversation between Todd Carmichael (La Colombe, men’s magazines), Marvin Golden (SCAA Steering Committee Chairman), Bonnie Greene (Stay-at-Home Barista) and Carl Mundy (Waterbed Warehouse), as they watch and respond to Nightline.
Daily Grind
“Now we turn now to the Daily Grind – coffee, that is. Caffeinated the lives of millions of Americans. But there is coffee and then there is coffee. For Sharon Alfonsy, the search for the perfect coffee is A Sign of the Times.”
Marvin Golden: Already, differentiating between average coffee and great coffee! How wonderful!
Bonnie Greene: I’d like to know who does Cynthia McFadden’s hair.
Todd Carmichael: Good coffee, like good food, is best when its continually evolving. And like food, it is not a single orderly evolving line like all too often suggested: Sanka -Starbucks-Blue Bottle. There are in truth several different branches, like sorts of cuisine. But just as modern American French Gastro Cuisine is not the only form of great food, nor the furthest reaches of evolution in the kitchen, so is the proverbial third wave.
Coffee Culture of Yesterday
The long, lazy days of that nostalgic coffee culture. Where the sipping was slow, the conversation eternal, and the brew? Well, it was just plain coffee.
Carl Mundy: Yeah, those really were the good old days. 1984, when I could pay 75 cents for a cuppa while waiting in line for White Snake tickets. I saw Van Halen (original lineup, I’m no Sammy Hagar fan) at the Corn Palace, and from what I can remember it was a hell of a show.
Marvin Golden: Having grown up in those nostalgic “long, lazy days,” I remember just how poor-tasting the coffee was. Coffee has changed much, but thank heavens, the conversations are just as eternal.
Bonnie Greene: I don’t know what the big hubbub is about. There USED to be a time when I didn’t even know how to dream about caramel whip macchiato half-caffs. There ONCE was a day when my needs, my emotional needs, for a blended coffee beverage fantasy went unfulfilled. Thank God those days are long behind us, like shoulder pads, Crystal Pepsi, and Tipper Gore.
Todd Carmichael: Coffee is evolving, and surely will continue to evolve. I remember these days too – flavored coffee and the 20oz frappacinno – a no go for us. We’ve come a long way baby, yet more than one “movement” has brought us here. Guys like me are happy to have played, and continue to play, a needed role, even though it is not commonly recognized.
Sign Of The Times
The new espresso culture: coffee’s third wave. Let me break it down to you in the simplest terms possible. First wave (Sanka) Second Wave (Starbucks) Third Wave (Espresso, Pour Over)
Marvin Golden: All hail the Third Wave! It’s important to remember, each ‘wave’ didn’t replace the next; each wave just takes coffee to new levels of appreciation.
Bonnie Greene: Is this “the wave” they keep talking about on the megatron at Shea Stadium? I went to “Meet Mr. Met” family night a couple of weeks ago, and I personally felt that all the up-and-down demanded of me in the name of audience participation was an insult to my osteoporosis.
This Effect
The third wave is turning your every day cup of joe into an insanely pure, incredibly deep piece of artisanal artwork.
Marvin Golden: Indeed, such wonderful coffee can indeed be enjoyed every day!
Carl Mundy: Artisano? Isn’t that the kinda pizza they keep tryin’ to sell me for $20 a pie? The best kinda art I know is the stuff that happens when a real man sets his chainsaw to a 6 by 2 foot hunk of word, and tears away everything that don’t look like a bear or a patriotic American eagle.
Todd Carmichael: Ironically we often use the word “infusion” yet resist doing the same ourselves – since infusion requires recognizing something validity outside ones own realm. For all the artistic brains in coffee, it amazes me how many insist on defining things so artificially simple – and so linear.
J. Peterman
Taste is subjective, it’s possible that your dad will enjoy his Sanka more than he’ll enjoy our coffee. But it’s also possible that he’ll have his eyes open. He’ll like the process, he’ll like chatting to the baristas who are making his coffee.
Carl Mundy: My pappy was a hardworkin’ man. He’d have just about shit himself if you offered him something called “Sanka” – pappy didn’t take too kindly to imports. Maxwell House was all he drank, usually mixed with a liberal belt of Jim Beam. In fact, just about the only liberal thing about my old man was his whiskey pour…
Marvin Golden: Taste is subjective, but quality can often be objective. “Sanka,” you’ll remember, is a decaffeinated instant coffee. In fact, “Sanka” was short for sans caféine, French for “without caffeine.” I’m happy to be reminded of my younger years, with memories of Sanka ads on “I Love Lucy,” but I wouldn’t mind forgetting the flat, unremarkable taste of those brews!
Bonnie Greene: First there was Sanka, then there were Folgers Crystals decaf, and now we have the Swiss Water Process. As far as I’m concerned, they can turn the wave machine off at the water park.
Todd Carmichael: Look outside of coffee for testimony – If you promote the concept of waves it will indeed be accepted (its on Nightline!) and like all waves, sadly, it too will crash. If we insist on being linear and over-geeking and slowing coffee, the fourth wave with surely be – simplifying and speeding up.
Lizz Hudson
[I drink enough coffee] to kill a small animal. So far I’ve had eight cups of espresso and one cup of drip. I’m a very different person before my morning cup of coffee.
Carl Mundy: That ain’t shit. We had an inventory night a coupla months ago over at the old Warehouse, and me, Wayne and Goose drank through a whole can of Bustello each. I couldn’t decide if I was havin’ a heart attack or an acid flashback.
Marvin Golden: Interestingly enough, her little quip may actually be true! That amount of coffee beverage corresponds to a range of about 500-1200 mg of caffeine, which, due in large part to the toxic effects of caffeine in our small furry friends, may very well lead to their demise!
Bonnie Greene: This is why I live on Long Island.
Todd Carmichael: Too much of a good thing, is indeed, a good thing.
Katie Duris
I hope that people would try smaller shops and smaller roasters. And also pay attention to where their coffee comes from.
Marvin Golden: Bravo! Hear, hear!
Carl Mundy: The hippy-dip beatniks at this coffee shop remind me of my 2nd wife.
Bonnie Greene: She seems like a lovely girl, and I’m sure that her parents are more comfortable with this “career” of hers now that she’s been featured on the ABC. Now, if only she could cover up those awful tattoos…
Sharon
All of these roasters are intensely proud of their product. Thousands popping up all over America. They’re smart, aggressive and organized.
Marvin Golden: Proud indeed! Perhaps we can continue working on the ‘organized’ part?
Todd Carmichael: Truer words could not be spoken. I am continually impressed by how this school moves in tandem, like a great complex organism, complete with its own nervous system (the web), and most obvious to me and those like me, its own immunity system.
Bonnie Greene: Listen, my re-run of Oprah just started over on channel 6, I can’t watch anymore of this. I’m really more of an ABC Family kind of gal.
Carl Mundy: (outside smoking, unavailable for comment)
