just old stuff here..go to www.fullcirclefoods.ca
just old stuff here..go to www.fullcirclefoods.ca
A long time customer who had been shopping for years at our store, never knew we had a water filtration system!
In case you haven’t noticed it, it is discretely tucked into the corner beside the dairy cooler. This system consists of a commercial water softener ( to pre-soften Kitchener’s notoriously hard water), a commercial reverse osmosis system – sometimes referred to as a R/O system, three filters – two are pre-filters and one polishing filter. The filtered water then passes through a UV sterilizing light before it goes to our stainless steel water dispenser.
The whole filtration system is being maintained regularly by Graham Water Systems.
There is still some improvements to be done as the water lines are due to be replaced at some point and we want to get a new water cooler so that our customers can have a drink of refreshing water while they do their shopping in the store.
[Ed. note: our new water cooler is up and running!]
We are bringing in more water containers and will be bringing in the ultimate water container – glass. Those 1 gallon glass jugs that were easy to obtain ten years ago or more are now hard to find.
[Ed. note: the 1 gallon water jugs are now a regular stock item]
Just a reminder that if you buy any water container at our store, your first fill is free!
Water is 20 cents/liter.
Not long after our post about the use of plastics in water bottles, the Canadian government banned the use plastic baby bottles containing BPA. We never had any of these in our store.
The health concerns appear to be with very hot or boiling water in plastic. Do not put a plastic baby bottle in the microwave to heat it!
Although the government is assuring us that these same plastics are safe with room temperature liquids, we still feel that many types of polycarbonate “sport” water bottles, should be replaced with stainless steel.
We have 600ml food grade, stainless steel water bottles for a bit less than $13 dollars and 1.0 liter bottles for about $20.
It was time to retire the old, inefficient water cooler. The new one is far more energy efficient. Cold water, room temperature water and hot water for is available from this machine. Press the red button, wait a couple of minutes and the water is steaming hot. There is a safety interlock that locks out the hot water button from curious fingers.
Plastic water containers. It is a pretty controversial subject right now.
What everyone can agree on is that people would rather not consume various chemicals that have somehow leached from the container to its contents.
NEW! We have brought in a number of food grade stainless steel water bottles as a safer alternative to various sort of plastic bottles. These are selling quickly and we will be ordering more.
TIP For transporting large quantities of water, we feel that the ultimate water container is actually glass! Pat and I use three 1 gallon water containers to transport water from the store to home. We can get these glass jugs fairly quickly. Just give us a call and we’ll order in as many as you like.
Millions of people drink coffee everyday. It is quite likely that society simply could not function without it. Coffee as a commodity, is second in importance only to oil and despite its vital importance, very few people know much about coffee, where it comes from or how to brew it properly.
The 20th and 21st centuries have not been kind to coffee. Modern living and technology have not improved coffee one bit and one can make a pretty good argument that modern day coffee standards have reached abysmal new lows. Nowadays, cheap, poor quality coffee is flooding the market and no amount of steam extraction or chemical/mechanical adulteration of the product is going to disguise or mask unacceptably bad coffee.There is some hope though. A more knowledgeable consumer is starting to become aware that coffee is not just a large plastic tub of brown sawdust purchased at the local department store. And, that coffee can be as interestingly diverse as wine with a whole new universe of unique tastes and flavours.
So, here are the basics and essentials of coffee preparation you need to know in order to prepare a perfect cup of coffee. This is the “French press” method of preparation which we will describe here.
The Coffee House Rules:
1. Toss out your automatic drip coffee maker. These mass produced kitchen appliances (regardless of price) do not have the proper temperature control to make a proper cup of coffee. If it has a glass carafe and a hotplate – relegate these coffee torture devices to the nearest flea market! There are only two models in the world that are approved by the SCAA. Go to www.coffeecrew.com for more information on these brewers.
2. Buy a simple French press, press pot, or Bodum. Despite the various trade names, these are built pretty much the same way. These consist of a glass cylinder, a plunger and a fine mesh stainless steel filter. These brewers are inexpensive and are readily available everywhere.
3. The most important rule of all is to obtain FRESH roasted whole bean coffee. Coffee is a perishable food product. Just because it hasn’t turned green or moldy, doesn’t mean it is any good. Coffee is good for about a week (maybe two) after roasting and after that, quality starts to decline rapidly.
4. Buy freshly roasted coffee in small quantities. Ideally, you should buy just enough for the week.
5. Artificially flavoured coffee beans are a abomination against nature. Do not go there. Instead, add a natural, organic flavouring syrup directly to your brewed coffee for a pleasant coffee-like beverage.
6. Buy filtered, chlorine-free, bottled water that ideally has some mineral hardness in it. A cup of coffee is 99% water. Bad tasting water is not going to make a good cup of coffee. Use the good stuff.
7. Buy an accurate digital “stick” type thermometer. Correct water temperature is very important. Aim to get around 200 degrees F.
8. Proper grind. You want a fairly coarse grind. Too fine and the fine metal screen will get plugged up and you won’t be able to plunge the coffee. Too coarse and the coffee will be thin and flavourless. Seconds count. Grind your beans just moments before brewing.
9. Proper brewing time. This is your call. It depends on the fineness of the grind and the temperature of the water. Try for a two minute steeping time. Feel free to experiment.
10. Brewed coffee is good for 15 minutes only! Coffee is always best consumed immediately. Do not drink stale, oxidized coffee. Always make a fresh batch.
HOW TO: The rules say to obtain fresh coffee, yet this is the most difficult thing to do of all. With very few exceptions, there are no roast dates on coffee. Pay no attention to expiry dates. If you see an expiry date on a package of coffee, do not buy it! It could be sitting on a shelf for months or even years!Pre-packaged ground coffee in grocery stores is pre-staled before packaging. The coffee is essentially dead before you even open it. Ground coffee starts to oxidize the instant it is exposed to air and even exotic packaging methods using inert gases can not preserve freshness for very long.
The secret is to use fresh roasted whole bean coffee that is ground just before brewing.
Coffee enthusiasts can roast their own green coffee beans at home and be assured of a fresh supply of coffee however, home roasting is a somewhat messy process and there are some limitations. Home roasting is covered in detail elsewhere on www.coffeecrew.com.
So where can you get freshly roasted coffee? There have been an increasing number of specialty coffee roasters that will deliver fresh roasted coffee right to your door. Use the internet to find a supplier close to you. Unfortunately, shipping is expensive and if you are ordering 1 lb at a time, it will add considerably to your costs.If you live close to a café that roasts their own beans in-house, chances are they are selling coffee beans to their customers as well. Some specialty food stores dealing in bulk goods may be able to supply you with fresh coffee.Regardless of where you are sourcing your beans, ask WHEN it was roasted. If they don’t know – move on and don’t waste your money.
Now that you have the beans, you will have to grind them. Unfortunately, those inexpensive rotary blade coffee/spice mills aren’t going to do the job. They just aren’t capable of producing a uniform particle size. Buy a good quality burr coffee grinder so that you can precisely adjust grind fineness.
The next step is to boil a kettle full of water making sure it is at a rolling boil. Remove from heat and wait. Do not pour boiling water directly on coffee grounds. It will be ruined.
The trick is to wait long enough so that the water cools down a bit.Your target is to get about 200°F as the final temperature of the mix of hot water and coffee grounds. An inexpensive “stick type” digital thermometer works nicely here.If the water is too hot, wait a few more seconds before pouring the water on the grounds. Likewise, if it too cool, you waited a bit too long. Soon though, you’ll get the feel of the correct timing.
Give the coffee a gentle stir with your charismatic wooden stirring stick, wait a couple of minutes. Plunge slowly and gently and voila! You have coffee that has been brilliantly and expertly prepared. That’s it. Nothing complicated. Coffee at its barest essential elements; fire, water, coffee and the passage of time.
The holidays are over once again and if you have slipped a bit, now it is time to pledge better eating habits for the balance of the year.
Start anew buy getting into or back into fresh organic produce. We are passing on savings where we can due to the strong Canadian dollar and produce is good value right now even though it is winter.
—
We have a number of end-of-year clearance items for sale at great prices. These are 50% off the regular sticker price.
Need some last minute gift ideas?
1. Real wood bamboo case of exotic imported teas or choose from our vast selection of green or black teas.
2. Matcha tea. Matcha tea is the finely ground green tea ( almost flour-like consistency) that is all the rage right now. I’ve been looking for a matcha bamboo wisk for some time, couldn’t find one anywhere so we brought them in and we’ve got them in stock. Buy a tin of quality Match tea and the wisk ( get both for just over $50) as a very special Christmas present.
3. One of the big trends we are seeing is in the quality chocolate market. A corner store chocolate bar just doesn’t cut any more. We’ve got in a good supply of great chocolate just for the holiday season. Some are hand made, fair trade, organic chocolate and these items usually disappear the fastest. Want a step up from the drug store selections? Try Green & Black boxed chocolates. Organic chocolate at less than $15. Fab quality for this price.
We’ve set up a feature table highlighting our favorite Christmas selections.
Demo has been done!
A great success and the lads stayed an extra hour to manage the crowds.
For newcomers to the world of coffee, tasting coffee that was roasted just 48 hours ago was quite the revelation.
—
The Waterloo Coffee Company will be doing a demo this Saturday, Dec 1st.
This will be between 10:00am and 12:00 (noon).
The WCC is our preferred supplier of fresh roasted coffee beans. Their quality standards are close to fanatical.
Here is your chance to sample brewed fair-trade, organic coffee that has been roasted just 48 hours ago.
To help celebrate, our coffee beans will be on sale this Saturday only. Reg $14.99, Sale $12.99/lb. This is an outstanding bargain for our unique, custom specialty blend using (FTO) fair-trade organic coffee.
There are two blends available. – Muskoka Morning & Mocha Java
We decided that we needed to find a roaster who could roast coffee to our exacting specifications. Freshness was a primary concern and that meant that we needed to find a local roaster who would be willing to supply us with fresh roasted coffee weekly.
A new company called the Waterloo Coffee Company was also freshness obsessed and we also liked their philosophy of using only organic, fair traded coffee beans – the same mandate that we had at Full Circle Foods for many years.
We tried and liked their Muskoka Morning blend however we thought it was quite a bit too dark roasted. After several weeks of experimentation, we brought down the roast level to exactly where we wanted it.
A medium roast is the best roast level to reveal the flavour characteristics of each of the coffee origins. Too dark and the coffee tastes and flavours are masked by the roast characteristics. For instance if you roast way too dark, you will taste charcoal!
We decided on the medium roast Muskoka Morning because we wanted a “morning style” coffee that was bright and snappy without being too thin and acidic like many doughnut shop coffees. It is a careful blend of at least three coffee origins with Centrals (Central American coffee beans) as its base. The caffeine level is a tad higher in this blend – just enough to get you going in the morning.
The next blend we created is the most interesting because it is one Full Circle Foods created from scratch. It is a long forgotten blend going back to the 19th century. A happy accident of mixing Java coffee beans with Yemen coffee beans – a perfect marriage of blending a unique coffee bean with naturally occurring chocolate flavours and a very low acid, full bodied, earthy Java coffee.
Replicating this blend using fair trade organic coffees is nigh impossible so our exclusive take on Mocha Java consists of 50% Sumatra and 50% Ethiopian Harrar. The roast level is critical and we worked hard with our roaster to get the roast level precisely where we wanted it. This was roasting to the verge of second crack and stopping the roast at the exact moment. We are quite certain that we were testing the skills of the local roastmaster right to the limit.
The Mocha Java is our best dual purpose blend. It is great as an espresso or drip coffee. It is full bodied, smooth and not too acidic. It makes an exceptional latte.
