Coffee Appreciation

I know I know. Apparently South American coffees can taste buttery but I’m looking for a recommendation

Buttery and toffee

all i'm seeing here is you're saying might as well get a slayer.

Your girl maths needs some work.

@Dammit has some of the idea but really need to check his working

Single boiler machine - too much faff to do milk drinks
Get a stand alone coffee milk steamer - too much space waste, another gadget to clutter up the place
Answer - nice shiny dual boiler machine which looks great and gets you extra golf club points and saves you X*Y theoretical £3.90 cups of coffee from theoretical local artisanal coffee shop = big theoretical saving.

Does that work?

Perfect logic. (I have my dual boiler machine on eco mode with the steam boiler off because I don’t drink milk drinks.)

I had to google girls maths (OK boomer).

@ChasnotRobert that’s good.

Here’s my current maths. it takes about 3 mins per espresso shot (weigh, grind, dose, tamp, pull and clean). Steaming of the milk takes a further 4minutes and then bringing the machine back down to temp a further 2 mins.

So I can save myself c.5mins with a dual boiler. I use the machine 3 x per day so that would be 15 mins. That means rough maths 91 hours per year. 16 waking hours per day, 365 days per year means the Micra would have a 9month ROI window. Sell the Silvia and maybe this is 8months.

No brainer

I think buying by region is a bit of a red herring. Processing and roasting have more of an impact on flavour imo. This bag from yb has toffee on the tasting notes. Im sure you could find more from other roasters

https://yellowbourbon.net/collections/shop/products/guatamala-atitlan-washed-process

Can I ask a potential inflammatory question...

What's the meme with watch house?

The two main negatives I can see are:

they charge ridiculous pricing for their "rarities" pourovers. Although I've got to credit them that they are actually desirable, but they're charging what I'd expect to pay for a bag of microlot beans for just 1 cup.

The branding/marketing is clearly trying to project a premium image but in a designer clothing, "we're better than you" sense rather than a premium product sense.

However if you just like coffee, it's £3.50 for a cup of really good batch brew coffee, and in somewhere like Canary Wharf, I can't see a better option in terms of taste vs price.

Yes, £3.50 seems mad for a cup of filter coffee, but it's 2024, prices of everything are mad, and sometimes I just want someone else to make me coffee that I can drink and say, mmm that's good coffee

mmm that's good coffee

And haat!

Few times I have treated myself to a brew/shot from either watch house or shot coffee not far from them and have not been disappointed but im not about to make it a habit
The WH site near Bond St must cost an absolute fortune and there’s always 4-5 staff there, makes you wonder at the financial side of things.

Never heard of them, bit weird they've got a CEO and Managing Director. Seems like it was set up for profit rather than because of the coffee.
https://watchhouse.com/pages/about
It's a golf club full house
https://www.restaurantonline.co.uk/Article/2022/02/21/How-I-Got-Here-Roland-Horne
https://keystotheshop.com/2022/10/375-founder-friday-w-roland-horne-of-watchhouse/

I paid £3.75 for a flat white the other day, it's 3.50 if you provide your own cup but still, I was shocked.

I used to go to the one in Bermondsey from time to time when I worked around the corner, no complaints from me (this was around 2016 or so, so not sure if much has changed)

Yeah I definitely don't get a wholesome vibe from the place, the Canary Wharf one is full of wankers (myself included), but I've seen a few memes about it and I was trying to work out the angle because I'm genuinely surprised at the taste of the coffee.

Canary Wharf one is full of wankers

Don't think that's unique to the coffee shop to be fair

Absolutely

Not defending the pourover pricing, but it definitely happens at other places too. Look at how much the green costs for some of these. These rarities are true micro lots that are processed in less-usual ways, a lot of them are Gesha's which are notoriously expensive anyway. On their Rarities menu there's a Sebastian Ramirez produced Gesha. I can only find one store that still has any of this in stock and its $45 per bag. So.. that's why. Its also significantly more labour intensive than making a batch brew or even espresso based drink.

Onyx Coffee Lab currently have a microlot Gesha from Peru that costs them $32.45/lb. By comparison, one of their constantly in rotation coffees costs them only $9.81/lb.

So the cost of these 'rarities' is reflective of the green coffee cost and the labour involved in making a pourover. Its fair to me. People pay a lot for wine. Why not coffee?

Looks like it has venture capital money behind it. So will be some long term plan about building the brand and then expanding internationally maybe with a franchise model. Selling a few expensive pour overs doesn’t pay the rent with those locations

at the time i was working as a luxury aquarium designer and struggling with the lack of opportunity that afforded me to make an impact in my community

hilarious.

It's always the same with these interviews, it's not until you're 75% of the way through do they mention the career in private banking. The aquariums are a red herring

Agree about WatchHouse - clearly has VC money behind and gives corporate vibes which makes me want to hate it… but the last few filters I’ve had from their Bath branch have been banging

Is there a forum approved set of Chinese/alibaba coffee scales, or did I imagine it?

I bought the Timemore mirror one for around £30 - still going strong after 3yrs of daily use