Crazy Coffee Art

After seeing the coffee art videos I decided to look up some other designs here are some of my favorites:

My next step is to try and make my own design

Coffee Art

After reading other posts about youtube findings I decided to find some youtube videos about coffee. I didn't know what to expect so I just searched coffee and see what it gave me. I happened to stumble on something very interesting, COFFEE ART. Coffee art is when you take heated milk and pour it into a cup of coffee. You have to turn the cup and pour the milk a certain way to make patterns on the surface of the mixture. It actually looks pretty cool.

More about instant coffee

Well, I must say that I am really intrigued about this whole instant coffee thing. I guess I never really realized how popular it is. Foldgers, Maxwell House, and Nestle (NesCafe or Taster's Choice) all produce a line of instant coffees that include both regular and decaffeinated coffee. Instant coffee is a huge market because of its conveinience. It allows people to make a cup of coffee on the go and brew a single cup of coffee rather than making a whole pot. It also takes the pot out of the mix completely. I can't believe I have never heard of this.

After reading about Starbucks making an instant coffee I became curious as to how instant coffee was made so I did some research.

Surprisingly, instant coffee is in fact coffee. The way it works is, coffee is brewed regularly, then it sits out so that all the water can evaporate leaving a highly concetrated coffee powder. Once the coffee powder is obtained there are two choice of what to do next.

To preserve the most flavor the coffee powder can be freeze-dried. This is a highly involved process that freeze the powder to -40 degrees celcius, leaving dry coffee crystals which can then be added to hot water which melt the crystals and diffuse with the water to make coffee.

The other option is called spray-drying. In this process, once the water evaporates from the brewed coffee it is sprayed from a tower in a hot air chamber. The hot air evaporates any remaining water and the coffee crystals fall to the bottom of the chamber.

I was surprised to find that not many additives are added to instant coffee.

Instant Coffee???

Well according to CNN Starbucks in jumping on the instant coffee band wagon. It is said that Starbucks will be launching a line of instant coffee called VIA. The line will be distributed by Starbucks and allow all you Starbucks lovers out there to brew delicious Starbucks coffee INSTANTLY from your own homes.

My take on the whole idea. Economically it is a great idea for Starbucks to distribute this line of instant coffee. It is low cost and will bring in a whole new market of coffee drinkers who don't have time to stop for coffee in the morning. The downfall is that you have to go to Starbucks to purchase the coffee so if there is not a Starbucks in the area, some consumers will not be exposed to this new product.

As for instant coffee itself, I fear the whole concept. I can't fathom how anything with the word INSTANT in front of it can be nutritions. To me instant coffee just means artificial coffee, which more likely than not results in more additives including added caffeine not the natural caffeine that can be found in coffee beans.

THE WRAP UP:

• Starbucks' coffee sales are dropping
• Decided to launch instant coffee line to reach a new target market
• VIA can only be found at Starbucks stores
• Instant coffee more like instant energy drink

To read the full article from CNN visit: http://money.cnn.com/2009/02/13/news/companies/starbucks_instant.fortune/?postversion=2009021312

Coffee linked to heart disease???

According to the website www.anti-aging-guide.com coffee is linked to many diseases including heart disease. This is not the first time the two have been linked together. Coffee, or more specifically caffeine, has been linked to cardiovascular disease in the past but because it has been so hard to isolate caffeine as the main cause in studies the belief has been put on the back burner. A recent study has shown that high intakes of caffeine were present in subjects who have developed cardiovascular problems but again, it is to hard to isolate caffeine as the cause.

To find out more about this and other diseases linked to coffee check out:
http://http://www.anti-aging-guide.com/41coffee.php#7

How Much Do You Love Coffee???

Would you consider yourself a coffee lover? Do you love coffee enough to run your own coffee shop?


Did you know that Dunkin' Donuts the most popular coffee selling industry in America is a franchise. So you yourself can run your own coffee shop. To find out whats involved in opening and running your own Dunkin' Donuts franchise check out the website below

http://www.dunkinfranchising.com/aboutus/franchise/franchise-home.html

Caffeine in Coffee

Did you know that like most teas, dark roasted coffee has more caffeine that light roasted coffee. Most regular coffees, excluding decaf, have about 60-100mg of caffeine per 8oz. 10g of caffeine is considered a lethal dose, so does that mean if 100 cups of coffee will kill you?


Here's a list of caffeine content of some popular beverages:
http://coffeetea.about.com/library/blcaffeine.htm

So this was interesting to hear, on October 1st Japan celebrates National Coffee Day. The day celebrates the trade and economic benefits of coffee as well as the beverage itself. After hearing this I did some more research and found out that other countries have National Coffee Day celebrations including Nepal, Ireland, and Brazil.

Here is a list of other coffee holidays around the world: http://www.gone-ta-pott.com/National_coffee_holidays.html

Coffee Consumption

You hear the slogan everyday, "America Runs on Dunkin" but how much coffee do Americans really drink?



According to the National Coffee Association on average each American drinks 3.1 cups of coffee a day. That doesn't seem like much until you really analyze this fact. Considering not all Americans drink coffee this means that for every one person that doesn't drink coffee 3.1 people are picking up an extra cup. Thats a lot of coffee, but not as much as other countries. It is said that per capita the United States consumed about 3.0 KG of coffee in 2006, very reasonable compared to Finland and Norway who both came in at over 10Kg per capita, WOAH!


See where other countries ranked: http://www.swivel.com/data_sets/spreadsheet/1001132