Te Aro and the $20 1/4lb bag of coffee

Recently my bff Anna moved to Toronto. This was a pretty sad affair for me, as you can imagine.
But, now she works in a pretty rad cafe called Te Aro and sends me awesome things in the mail like delicious coffees.
Recently she sent me a 1/4 lb of a Colombian (roasted by Te-Aro) that is the Cup Of Excellence 2011 winner. It cost me $20.oo (I actually haven’t paid her back yet…. Hey! That’s what friends are for!) when all the shipping and handling from there to here was said and done. It’s kinda a lot of money for ANYONE to spend on coffee….But it’s good, really good! I tried it as a pour over and am planning to share the rest with Dan tomorrow morning in the French Press… the rest of it has been shared with my coffee loving co-workers!
I am including a little chart from Te Aro on the tasting notes, as they can say it all way more eloquently then I ever could…

Via http://www.te-aro.ca/

"The coffee" (I felt like you needed to see how small the bag is!!!)

Here’s the thing though. For me there are tonnes of coffees that are at a normal price point that I can get right here in Halifax, and they  are great! I love drinking the single origins from Just Us! I LOVE all of the Phil & Sebastian from Two If By Sea,  I love grabbing a bag of  49th Parallel from Steve-O-Reno’s (also, Have you checked out there website recently?!), And that I can get Intelligentsia at the Smiling Goat. PLUS we have amazing coffee being roasted right here in our own back yards (pretty much) at places like Java Blend. So as nice as it is to have a little experiment with coffee so expensive that actually drinking it is kinda scary, it will definitely stay that way for me, an experiment (….’Cause it could get pretty addictive and expensive if I don’t give myself these rules right now)!
Thanks to Anna (and Te Aro) for making to possible for me to taste this amazing coffee!!

Cheers,

-Ceilidh

Late-night-home-made-capps

Mmm!

A couple nights ago I had to go back to work at Just Us! from 9 until late to prepare the store for the final reno’s (which are happening right now!). I normally don’t drink coffee at night unless I’ve just ate a really big meal or at a restaurant or something but Dan had tried the Phil & Sebastian that morning and told me I had to try it. Since I was going to be up late anyways it seemed like a good idea to indulge. So we decided to make some home-style cappuccinos using a stove top espresso maker and a manual milk frother. Anyways- they turned out so delicious. The coffee is truly wonderful with a lot of good things going on….. I am defiantly not the best person to describe the taste but will try to work out some kind of description and let you know!

Such a cute little mug!

Dan and I have a really great selection of hand made mugs which makes drinking anything better. You can see a couple of our favourites in these photos! These two were both made locally and are really, really beautiful.

Dan!

 

Dan and I also had the chance to hit up Two if By Sea early Saturday morning when we were on our way out of Halifax for the night. We finally got to try some of there other croissants – other than the plain one. We grabbed a chocolate and an almond and we both enjoyed them a lot more than the plain one! They were a pretty yummy and decadent treat.

We have been having very good coffee times lately!!!

Cheers,

-Ceilidh