Sunday, August 12, 2012

Putting on your Sunday best.


MUG: Contigo travel mug, with carabiner-handle and positive snap opening. Sitting atop is a Melitta Ready Set Joe one cup (#2) filter holder.

COFFEE: Barrett's Colombian Supremo.

NOTES: Is there worse coffee than church coffee? AA meeting coffee perhaps, and gas station coffee. But church coffee, for whatever reasons, is usually made from poor quality (never pour-over quality) coffee, and normally made too weak. It's primary purpose seems to be to serve as a warm lubricant for stale donuts. My church serves great, fresh donuts, but the Folger's we serve is another matter. Perfectly acceptable to most. But I'm spoiled.

Because we have a balancing act at home involving making enough coffee to satisfy my 89 year old mother-in-law's afternoon cravings, without my having to make coffee all day long, I've started making an extra mug (a.k.a., three cups) of coffee to take to the Jesus party. This newly acquired filter holder holds the required amount of fresh grounds, and two and a half pours makes great joe. Notice the very convenient (and highly appreciated) open viewing port at the bottom of the filter holder so you can keep from over-filling the mug.

It's a great device, and it's cheap, too.

Thursday, August 09, 2012

I heart Cocoa... and June Anne.


MUG: Made in Thailand for Crate&Barrel, purchased at their outlet store in the third ring of Hell (San Marcos Outlet Mall) for use by my grand daughter June Anne for hot cocoa.

COFFEE: Not coffee, but Ghirardelli Double Chocolate Cocoa Mix, with mini marshmallows added (but not in the mix).

NOTE: As featured previously, our eldest grand daughter spends the night with us once a week to give our youngest daughter a bit of a break caring for her new baby (while our son-in-law's band "practices"). In the early morning before my wife wakes up, June Anne comes downstairs and joins me while I drink my coffee. I make her a cup of hot cocoa with added mini-marshmallows... even on the days it's going to be 100°F outside.

Wednesday, August 01, 2012

Coffee boom.


MUG: Chinese-made novelty mug. Standard ceramic mug. Drinks OK, neither excelling nor irritating. Its one possibly irritating factor is the very reason I bought it in the first place.

COFFEE: Brazilian Estate (which estate, I wonder?) from Barrett's Roasters. When a mechanical failure at the Barrett's 'plant' caused my monthly five pound shipment of Colombian Supremo to be delayed, I was gifted by them with two 1/2 pound bags of coffee beans. This Brazilian Estate is one of them. It's a bit different from the Brazilian Bourbon Santos coffees I've had in the past. They describe it as "nutty," and I have to agree.

NOTES: This mug was purchased at the National Museum of the Pacific War in Fredericksburg, Texas. What began life as a museum dedicated to the life and career of Fredericksburg's native son Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, housed in the old Nimitz Hotel, has evolved into a full city block of museum dedicated to the US servicemen and women who fought in the Pacific Theater during WWII. The image on the mug is that of "Fat Man," the bomb that was dropped over Nagasaki by the United States on August 9, 1945. It was the second atomic bomb used against Imperial Japan, and only the third detonated. Its use was authorized by my first cousin twice removed, Harry S. Truman. Its use effectively ended the Second World War, thus saving millions of American and Japanese lives, both military and civilian.