Thursday 26 June 2008

Londinium Espresso now selling the world's finest domestic grinder & espresso machine from Olympia Express, Switzerland. Estb 1928.


Londinium Espresso are proud to announce that we have found a machine and grinder that accurately reflects the Londinium philosophy; artisan methods of manufacture coupled with an obsession for quality and that all but lost ingredient in today's modern age; 'feel'.

What do we mean by 'feel'? Well, the Olympia Cremina lever machine allows you to 'feel' very easily the hot water being forced through the ground coffee, including any channels that the water might find in the coffee (not a good look, but great to be able to detect if this is occurring during the espresso process), allowing it an easier path through the coffee and evidenced by a drop in resistance against the palm of your hand.

First class thermal stability in the group head is assured with a lot of chromed marine grade bronze, and a tiny footprint to assure it a place in the kitchens of London. Oh, and did we mention, no noisy irritating electric pump?

A high quality lever machine extracts a lot of subtle nuances from the coffee that an electric pump machine will not. If you have a coffee that is only 'so-so' then an electric pump machine is a good thing as the additional extraction that a lever machine brings tends to be unpleasant. However, with LondiniumEspresso it brings out a whole new layer of taste that was previously hidden in the cup.

The moment you take this machine from the box it becomes apparent what you have paid for. It is the perfect antidote to the throw-away consumerism ethos that defines our modern world. Many, many Olympia machines that are 30-40 years old are still in active service today, requiring only seal replacements every 3 or 4 years. Use bottled water with a dry residue value of less than 5omg/L and you should never need to descale your machine.

Note: These machines demand a first class grinder in order to function correctly, i.e. Mazzer/equivalent grade and above. Why is this? Well you grind very fine with these machines and tamp very lightly - danced on by pixies by way of metaphor - none of this fashionable 35psi to 50psi malarkey with a tamp weighing a couple of hundred grams!

Olympia Express - radically different since inception, just like Londinium Espresso.

Friday 20 June 2008

Espresso cherry trifle

We would recommend our Brazilian yellow bourbon coffee for this recipe. Try it!


Espresso cherry trifle


Photography by Ben Dearnley

Espresso cherry trifle

Cooking Time

5 minutes

Ingredients (serves 4)

  • 2 tablespoons marsala (see note)
  • 2 tablespoons caster sugar
  • 1/2 cup strong espresso coffee, cooled slightly
  • 4 mini jam sponge rolls, cut into 5mm-thick slices
  • 50g good-quality dark chocolate, grated
  • 1/2 cup thick vanilla custard
  • 425g can black pitted
  • cherries, drained

Method

  1. Combine marsala, sugar and coffee in a jug. Stir until sugar dissolves.
  2. Divide the sponge slices between four 400ml-capacity whisky glasses. Reserve 1 tablespoon of the coffee mixture. Drizzle remaining coffee mixture over the sponge slices.
  3. Top with half the chocolate, and all the custard and cherries. Drizzle with the reserved coffee mixture. Sprinkle with the remaining chocolate and serve.

Notes & tips

  • Marsala is a fortified Italian wine available from liquor stores. You could use dry sherry, Tia Maria liqueur, Kahlua liqueur or brandy instead.

Source

Super Food Ideas - September 2007 , Page 79
Recipe by Annette Forrest

Thursday 19 June 2008

An overview of different decaffeination processes from Wikipedia

Swiss water process

The Swiss Water Process is a method of decaffeinating coffee beans that was developed by the Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee Company. To decaffeinate the coffee bean by the Swiss Water method, a batch of green (unroasted) beans is soaked in hot water, releasing caffeine. This process is done until all the caffeine and coffee solids are released into the water. These beans are then discarded. Next, the water passes through a carbon filter which traps the caffeine molecules but allows the water and the coffee solids to pass through. The caffeine-free water which comes through, known as "flavor-charged" water by the company, is then put in a similar filtration device, and new coffee beans are added. However, since the flavor-charged water cannot remove any of the coffee solids from the new beans, only the caffeine is released. The process repeats, filtering out all the caffeine until the beans are 99.9% caffeine free. These beans are removed and dried, and thus retain most if not all of their flavour and smell.

Direct method

In the direct method the coffee beans are first steamed for 30 minutes and then repeatedly rinsed with either methylene chloride or ethyl acetate for about 10 hours. The solvent is then drained away and the beans steamed for an additional 10 hours to remove any residual solvent. Sometimes coffees which are decaffeinated using ethyl acetate are referred to as naturally processed because ethyl acetate can be derived from various fruits or vegetables. However, for the purpose of decaffeination, it is not generally possible to create such a large quantity of ethyl acetate, thus the chemical is synthetically derived.

Indirect method

In the indirect method beans are first soaked in hot water for several hours, essentially making a strong pot of coffee. Then the beans are removed and either methylene chloride or ethyl acetate is used to extract the caffeine from the water—as in other methods, the caffeine can then be separated from the organic solvent by simple evaporation. The same water is recycled through this two-step process with new batches of beans. An equilibrium is reached after several cycles, where the water and the beans have a similar composition except for the caffeine. After this point, the caffeine is the only material removed from the beans, so no coffee strength or other flavorings are lost. Because water is used in the initial phase of this process, sometimes indirect method decaffeination is referred to as "water processed" even though chemicals are used.

CO2/O2 process

This process is technically known as supercritical fluid extraction. With the CO2 process, pre-steamed beans are soaked in a liquid bath of carbon dioxide at 73 to 300 atmospheres. After a thorough soaking, the pressure is reduced allowing the CO2 to evaporate, or the pressurized CO2 is run through either water or charcoal filters to remove the caffeine. The carbon dioxide is then used on another batch of beans.[3] This same process can also be done with oxygen (O2). These liquids work better than water because they are kept in supercritical state near the transition from liquid to gas so that they have the high diffusion of gas and the high density of a liquid. This process has the advantage that it avoids the use of potentially toxic solvents.

Triglyceride process

Green coffee beans are soaked in a hot water/coffee solution to draw the caffeine to the surface of the beans. Next, the beans are transferred to another container and immersed in coffee oils that were obtained from spent coffee grounds.

After several hours of high temperatures, the triglycerides in the oils remove the caffeine - but not the flavor elements - from the beans. The beans are separated from the oils and dried. The caffeine is removed from the oils, which are reused to decaffeinate another batch of beans. This is a direct contact method of decaffeination.

Wednesday 18 June 2008

Costa Rican SWP decaf now in stock


Yes, we took delivery of this premium Swiss water process decaffeinated coffee today. Tomorrow we hope to run test roasts to profile this coffee. We will also try & post some more information on the Swiss water process of decaffeination and how it differs from CO2 (carbon dioxide) and MC (methyl chloride) decaffeination processes so you can appreciate the differences.

Sunday 15 June 2008

Swiss water process decaf - costa rica - due in this week

In response to customer requests, this week we expect to receive our Swiss water process decaffeinated coffee from Costa Rica. As soon as it arrives we will add it to our product collection for you.