AA Cafe Podcast

What happens when you travel? When you step out of your comfort zone, where you have to turn off auto-pilot and figure out how to do everything? Brian talks about his latest trip to Colombia, scrambling to pick up the pieces when things don't go as planned. It's a discussion about people and bureaucracies and the quest to source great coffee.

We interrupt this regularly scheduled podcast to bring you a conversation with Paul Bowman, vice chairman of the North American Wood Ape Conservancy. Paul tells of his encounters with bigfoot while drinking DoubleShot Coffee. Mark and Brian explore literary and movie references to the mysterious beast. It's off the beaten path, but well worth exploring. Paul Bowman behind the mic wearing his shantung-style straw hat Brian's pixelated iphone pic of Rocky Mountain sheep on the flanks of Mt. Shavano (14,229 feet)

Brian and Mark launch into a rambling conversation about things that are not as they seem. These are the questions that plague the honest coffee professional who has to try and debunk what people think they know about certain coffees. For more information about Kopi Luwak, read these: https://www.facebook.com/168827138418/photos/a.171652533418.120192.168827138418/171652538418/?type=3 http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/end-result-600-a-pound-coffee/ For more information about Bulletproof coffee, go here: http://gizmodo.com/bulletproof-coffee-debunking-the-hot-buttered-hype-1681321467

This episode is a departure from the usual coffee-centric banter. Brian interviews documentary filmmaker, Kyle Bell, a Creek Indian who grew up drinking coffee on the rez. Mark grew up in Tulsa, but didn't have any Indian friends until adulthood. Now, surrounded by the Native American people, Tulsa is developing a rich culture. Watch Kyle's films at vimeo.com/rayvisuals. Also in this episode, Brian announces that DoubleShot Coffee Company is moving. They are reconstructing an 1850's barn and creating a new coffee mecca in Tulsa. Stay up to date with construction progress and everything else going on at the DoubleShot at doubleshotcoffee.com.

Continuing the path to understand coffee brewing variables, Mark and Brian dig around the issue of pressure. Doctor Michael Royce explains the technical aspects of pressure and describes the importance of pressure in his occupation as an anesthesiologist. Relating that information back to coffee (and various other worldly matter), discussions ensue. Hints are dropped as to some big announcements.

Co-hosts Brian Franklin and Mark Brown continue their quest to understand each variable in coffee brewing. In this episode, they delve into the mysterious quality of freshness. Fresh-roasted coffee is what Brian built his business on. Dissecting the various nuances of freshness, the conversation takes many turns before defining freshness as it applies to coffee.

It's our special holiday episode. Mark and Brian talk about several new products at the DoubleShot, as well as the three special limited holiday coffees. And then launch into a long list of 10 things that give them contentment. Listen up. And make your own list. Happy holidays.

This episode of AA Cafe is a departure from our regular episodes. An employee and a customer of the DoubleShot tell stories about encounters with the paranormal. Hope you enjoy this fun little project. Happy Halloween.

In our continuing effort to explore each variable in coffee brewing, we delve into the inner-workings of heat. With the addition of Julie Watson, Mark Brown and Brian Franklin chat about various aspects of heat from body heat to coffee roasting. DoubleShot Chef Shelly Womack talks about when to use the convection setting on your oven, and how to find the hot spots. Also on a guest spot, Andrew Robinson shows how the temperature of coffee changes our perception of its aromas. And our featured guest this episode is Adam Myers from BurnCo BBQ.

Professor Jerry McCoy at the University of Tulsa explains time from the physicists point of view. What is time? What is it REALLY? We live our lives by time, measuring our birth, death, seasons, days, weeks... seconds for the bloom of a pourover... steep time of a french press, etc.  But what is the fundamental nature of time?  What is the fundamental nature of reality?  This is deep. We have a new co-host to the AA Cafe Podcast. Mark Brown (argentfork.com) and Brian Franklin (doubleshotcoffee.com) are joined for the first time by Julie Watson (tulsarootsmusic.org), who is our new roving reporter. In this episode, Julie interviews Jerry McCoy to get down into the minutiae of time. Check out the podcast features at http://www.doubleshotcoffee.com/collections/podcast

Happy Holidays. Mark and Brian get together for a quick podcast to talk about happiness. It was supposed to be a holly jolly podcast, but it ended up talking a lot about the idea of happiness. But we did talk about things that make us happy, and a lot of other people told us about their favorite things as well.

El Erizo is an amazing Costa Rica honey process coffee that we are roasting for the holidays. Hear all about the coffee and some history on the name and the fantastic sequence of events that took place in the mid-1800s, as well as the fantastic sequence of events here at the DoubleShot this month. Happy Thanksgiving. You can order El Erizo here, while it lasts.

The new MADURO BAR is now available! I went to Elm Springs Arkansas to visit with the owner of Kyya Chocolate, Rick Boosey. He tells us all about how chocolate is made and how he got into the business. Mark and I ramble about other related issues, including vanilla. You can read the story about vanilla that he mentions at the end of the podcast here.Order the MADURO BAR on the DoubleShot website.

Earlier this month, I went to Nicaragua for the first time. It was a journey into the unknown, as I wasn't sure where I would be going or what I would find out when I got there. As it turned out, I learned a lot about the coffee culture there and experienced farms and mills at a few different levels. Listen as Mark Brown and I discuss the ins and outs of the trip. Some unexpected audio was caught on a farm in the lowland area of Chacraseca, when a local farmer told us, through an interpreter, about his life in farming and what he learned along the way. Pretty moving piece. Music for this episode is by Lyndon Scarfe, Chenard Walcker, and FortyOne.  Watering the baby coffee plants at the nursery in Finca Santa Emilia.  A small farming family near the town of Santa Emilia. Maria Elena Ramos is the matriarch and they grow coffee on 1.5 manzanas of land.  Geronimo, a very small farmer who recently borrowed the funds from Just Hope foundation to make improvements on his house, which he is very proud of. Our group hanging out on the farm of Freddy (far right, chatting with Luke Oppenheimer) in an area called La Flor. 

For the first time ever, we recorded a live event that took place at the DoubleShot. During this event, I talked about the background for our big holiday package of this year, Brazil Sitio Serra Natural. The DoubleShot pastry chef, Shelly talked about the delicious food pairing she put together, and my co-host Mark Brown read an excerpt from a book he wrote, which comes in the Brazil holiday package. After the event, Mark and I sat down to discuss all the holiday coffees and merchandise available at the DoubleShot and at DoubleShotCoffee.com. Brazil Sitio Serra Natural Costa Rica Pastora Yellow Honey Pourover HolsterWhite Buffalo Track Jacket