the great west coast coffee crawl
Last weekend Kyle and I snuck into Vancouver BC with Intelli honcho Doug Zell, the Suge Knight of coffee, for an epic west coast coffee crawl. In three days time we would aim to hit every major coffeebar on the west coast from Vancouver to Seattle to Portland and on down to San Francisco, unannounced.
Our schedule was ambitious and our plan would only work if we dodged every potential social obligation. Riding shotgun on this was Brad Ford of Vancouver’s Wicked Coffee who served as our guide in Canadia whose exotic foreign culture we needed help navigating. For instance, telling the customs agent you are in Canada “on business” to visit “coffeeshops” does not go over well.
What this epic tale lacks however is photos. On day two in Seattle my camera bit the dust. I got a lot of life out of that trusty little Casio, but it apparently couldn’t handle a mission of this intensity. I felt like I’d lost a limb.
I’m filled with many impressions and lessons from this overcaffeinated adventure, but I’ll mention only one facet here. The two standout experiences of the roughly 30 shops we hit seemed to re-affirm the cult of the barista. Billy Wilson pulling Stumptown’s ubiquitous Hairbender espresso at Albina Press, and former U.S. barista champ Bronwen Serna at Sitka & Spruce pulling some two day fresh Hines Public Market espresso were standouts by a wide margin. Billy was working a slammed bar on a Saturday morning, dealing with a mad rush of customers but coming through with stunning shots and macchiatos. Bronwen was at a relatively idle bar and with deceptive ease pulled us shots of what may have been the most well articulated, sweetest espresso of the trip. The biggest surprise of this trip may have been how few surprises there actually were given the breadth of our searching.
Thanks for the many warm welcomes we encountered, and apologies to the many people I wish I’d had more time to conect with.
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January 20th, 2007 at 11:54 pm
Poor dead Casio! That little camera’s been through a lot!
January 21st, 2007 at 2:48 am
That’s okay Tony - I was glad Brad tricked me into coming down to the cafe that day.
Though I’m miffed at Doug. Five years now he’s been promising a Vancouver trip. The day he makes it, he wants to be all icognito lol!
Next time… next time you and Kyle have to pull an all nighter here at the very least. I got a guest room and a comfy couch. Famouse people have slept on that couch!
January 21st, 2007 at 2:44 pm
I suppose I should give S&S another shot when this mythical Bronwyn creature is working. The one time I stopped there for coffee, it was bitter and acrid, one of the worst café shots I’ve had in a long time. of course, given that I frequent Vivace and Victrola almost exclusively, I don’t have much exposure to sub-par bean juice.
January 23rd, 2007 at 6:30 am
What no trip over to try out the island?
January 23rd, 2007 at 7:12 am
Logan - next time. absolutely. We had only about 3 hours before crossing down to Bellingham.
January 23rd, 2007 at 9:11 am
We all look forward to it.
January 23rd, 2007 at 10:27 am
Some day Olympia will be on the agenda. Until then we will keep all of our secrets secret ;-)
January 23rd, 2007 at 10:49 am
We had plans to surprise both you and Batdorf Terry - we even got directions, but those clover people kept us long and we had to race to pdx to meet a man in a hat about some green coffees.
I give us a B minus as far as how well we kept to our itinerary. Oly is most certainly on the map.
January 25th, 2007 at 6:34 am
This may seem a little out of left field, but is it possible to send an e-mail your way, re: the l.a. operation? I’ve got some questions if you wouldn’t mind fielding them…
(PS: 21 y.o. college student here with an interest in the biz, not a journalist looking for a story.)
January 26th, 2007 at 4:41 pm
Did you hit any shops in Eugene, OR?
March 2nd, 2007 at 11:26 pm
Has it ever occured to you that Suge Knight may not be the best person with which to compare Doug? Or maybe he is. I’m not entirely sure he’s ever been accused of murder, but I’ve heard his problems with parking tickets are mind-boggling.
-Makaveli
March 6th, 2007 at 9:21 pm
I’m visiting Seattle next week .. Could you shoot me an email?