Gourmet Coffee Habit Costing Consumers as Much as $1,500 Yearly
Gourmet Coffee Habit Costing Consumers as Much as $1,500 Yearly -Brewing Premium Gourmet Coffee at Home Costs Less, Tastes Better
Gourmet coffee consumers rarely consider the cost of their daily coffee in terms of the expense to brew premium whole bean coffee at home (50 cents to 75 cents) with prices of a pound of gourmet coffee beans versus a two or three cup a day ($4.50 to $6.00) coffee drinking habit when purchased at premium coffee houses. A recent Washington Post article iscussed Seattle law students spending money from their student loans for Starbucks coffee across the street from the Seattle University School of Law.
Erika Lim, director of career services at the law school has launched a campaign to reduce coffee consumption by students attending the university on student loan money. She points out that students are spending education loans on luxuries like latte instead of necessities like a loaf of bread. That borrowed money takes years to repay and many students don't do the math to see that study time with 2-3 cups of coffee at Starbucks over 4 years can cost them significant sums -as much as $4500 in principle, interest and fees on their student loan - over the course of their education. An online calculator has been posted for those interested in calculating their caffeine expenses at: http://www.hughchou.org/calc/coffee.cgi
Gourmet Coffee drinkers have become accustomed to paying $2 or more per cup for fresh brewed coffees at Premium coffee houses Ð and many sources are predicting those prices may increase to as much as $4 per cup soon due to expected increases in green coffee prices. But smart gourmet coffee consumers have long known that premium coffee brewed at home costs just 12 cents or so per cup, depending on preferences for coffee strength.
Many coffee producers recommend starting with 1 tablespoon of fresh ground gourmet coffee beans per standard 6 ounce cup of water. Starbucks recommends double that amount for stronger coffees at 2 tablespoons per 6 ounce cup. A pound of gourmet coffee (that is 16 Ounces or 1 Lb.) divided by 1 1/2 Ounces comes to roughly 10 pots of 10 cups (6 Ounce cups) equaling 100 cups for the cost of one pound of gourmet coffee beans. At the average of 1.5 tablespoons per 6 ounce cup and average size of 12 ounce coffee mug, you can expect 50 cups of home brewed coffee per pound of gourmet beans!
Prices of premium gourmet coffee beans range between $10 and $18 per pound, making a cup of home-brewed gourmet coffee, made fresh to your liking, cost only between .10 cents and .25 cents per cup or between $1.00 and $2.00 per pot of coffee! Even the rarest and most expensive coffee sold, the exotic Kopi Luwak, at $175 per pound, is still less than $1.75 per 6 ounce cup when brewed at home! So if you have expensive tastes and want a 12 ounce mug of the rarest and most expensive coffee on the planet, you still need only pay what some premium coffee houses charge for a latte ($3.50) for that rare privilege.
When consumers learn that they can purchase gourmet whole bean coffee for between $10 to $18 per pound, then fresh grind and brew at home for significantly less than gourmet
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]]> Host Rule #1 -- reinforced I'll never forget those ghastly, ghostly jellyfish-looking gnocchi I was served at a dinner long ago, nor the twitching faces of all the guests pretending that this wasn't a horrible, horrible meal.
I'm getting ready for the deep-fried turkey on saturday. The dishes are reasonably straightforward. I am trying to figure out some clever way to to serve the balance of the crayfish I'd frozen up as leftover from the last party.
I took the day off, tested some recipes, and reminded myself the Host Rule #1 should never be violated.
]]> Bayou Christmas Party Whew! It's over!]]> Bayou Christmas Preparation Just back from Tokyo late Saturday night. Only seven days till I hold my Bayou Christmas celebration for twenty guests. It will be a tight schedule for the week, if I procrastinate until Saturday (party Sunday noon) I'll be dead meat. Today I practiced some new recipes and refined some old ones.]]> What the hell just happened to me? Thinking about dinner today, my initial plan was another round of pizza research. However, eating another pizza didn't sound that fun, so when someone mentioned crepes, I thought, "yeah! I haven't made those since we shifted house in April."
Made a mental list for the grocery store and then thought, "gee, I am not too enthusiastic about more chocolate/strawberry and ham/cheese crepes." Then Ling's mom said something about having nice seafood crepes in Paris my interest was piqued. Then I decided a nice carmelized apple would do for dessert. I ended up doing 4x more than I expected when I woke up today. Thanks Julia Child.....
]]> In Search of Pizza One of the cafes we enjoyed in Sydney was Bertoni Casalinga. They manage to do something that I have always found absolutely, inexcusably appalling: reheat pizza.
I detest how disgusting NYC 'pizzarias' oven-reheat their cold slices of shit. But the people at Bertoni do it different: they start out with fundamentally good pizza (thick , fluffy crust, beautiful rich sauce, and high quality meat toppings) which they heat up in a large electric sandwich grill. It really comes out nicely.
I came home (prematurely) early last week after being the first off my table at a poker game at the "Crows Nest Club." On the way home I saw a Domino's pizza. They're the closest it comes to the type of pizza I like, so it got me hungry and I ordered one. It was ok, not great, but alright.
All this got me thinking, "I know exactly how I want my pizza to taste, so why don't I just figure out the exact formula for that?"
So that's what I started research work on this weekend.
Really looking forward to nine hours in economy class with a sixteen-month old.
]]> Tamituesday Painting tractor
Originally uploaded by karavshin.
Ling dropped Shannon at the airport monday afternoon. Tuesday morning, driving to work, I realized Shannon was still in the air, flying. *ouch*
It was good having her over to visit though. At lunch today with friends I asked Luke, "where's Tua-Kah ?" He looked around and gave me his sign language gesture for "not here."
Little man is now walking, tentatively. The longest I've seen him walk so far is about ten feet. He is no longer so resistent to walking. He used to plop on his ass if you tried to carry him along under his arms or hold his hand.
He's also making all sorts of babbling conversation-sound noises to himself, so I suppose that he'll be talking soon too. Ling read somewhere that at his age he should be speaking fifty words. What a joke. He probably knows fifty words, but since he chooses to skip all the one syllable words and go for the two-syllables like 'bubble' and 'tractor' it seems to be slowing his pace a bit.
I'm freed up to tag along with Ling and Luke next week for ten days in Sydney. The only problem is that three nights in a row out having big dinners and drinking plus a bad saturday sunburn knocked my immune system around and I've managed to catch a flu of some sort.
Normally this will kill us -- I get sick, then Ling does, and then Luke does. Three or four weeks later everyone is recovered. I don't want to spoil our vacation, so I went to the doctor and got a course of Tamiflu, that anti-flu viral medication. I gave Ling some too, as apparently taking it reduces the chance of her catching it from my by 92%. Relatively expensive, but well worth the cost of saving a vacation. Ling is sleeping in the other room for the time being, I've been avoiding Luke, and when we drove around today I was wearing a surgical mask. I was amazed how few looks i actually got for it.
Anyway, the dinners were worth it. Particularly saturday night's italian dinner at Valentinos. Most noted item we had there was white truffle. All the girls had generous shavings of white truffles in their olio porcini pasta. I've never had truffle like that before. The smell is truly amazing. The taste, a comparative letdown. Definitely not worth the absurdly outrageous price.
coffee companies charge, many see home brewing premium gourmet coffee as luxurious treat. Purchasing a thermos or a large travel mug to take coffee with them from home makes drinking rich, fresh roasted coffee a possibility for about one-seventh the cost of buying that coffee from expensive and crowded coffee shops.
Many so-called premium coffee houses keep their coffee heated on warmers after brewing, but this practice causes the flavor to turn bitter after less than an hour of warming. It is actually more likely you will get a rich flavorful cup of coffee from an insulated thermos or insulated type pump containers. Reheating coffee can destroy the flavor or good gourmet coffee just as quickly as extensive warming.
Coffee purists prefer to make individual cups with a coffee press, fresh grinding beans for each cup and drinking the entire amount brewed before it turns cold to get the maximum enjoyment from their beans. Microwave a good cup of coffee that has gone cold and you'll see how much better it is freshly brewed. Using good clean, fresh water is essential since coffee is 99% water and bad tasting tap water can quickly ruin even the best fresh ground beans.
You can enjoy great gourmet coffee more and pay less for the privilege by starting with whole beans and grinding them yourself with a $20 coffee grinder. Make only what you can drink or carry with you in a nice thermos or travel mug instead of reheating coffee later. Use good water tasting water and keep your brewing equipment clean to prevent the rancid bitterness that can come from previous grounds in crevices.
You can brew at home with fine gourmet coffee beans, fresh ground and brewed in a French press coffee maker, carry a fancy thermos of great coffee to work or school and enjoy the best coffee available for far less money than you would spend at crowded and expensive premium coffee house.
Written by Mike Banks Valentine for Tastes of The World coffee company, focusing on specialty gourmet coffees which are not readily available in the United States. Rare Gourmet Coffee is their business so they make shopping with them risk free. "If you are happy tell a friend if you are not tell us
Mike Banks Valentine for Tastes of The World coffee company, focusing on specialty gourmet coffees which are not readily available in the United States. Rare Gourmet Coffee is their business so they make shopping with them risk free.
Gourmet Coffee and Coffee Buying Tips Whilst you are looking for gourmet coffee or an associated food and drink accessory it is essential that you utilize the huge number of review that are provided by many of the better coffee Read more...
Gourmet Coffee Habit Costing Consumers as Much as $1,500 Yearly Gourmet Coffee Habit Costing Consumers as Much as $1,500 Yearly -Brewing Premium Gourmet Coffee at Home Costs Less, Tastes Better Gourmet coffee consumers Read more...
