…a sign of good things to come.

April is shaping up to be a great month.  We have a couple cool events coming up, the first being an art show featuring Melissa Voth’s latest series.  We’ll have local winery Sonoran in the house pouring their award wining wines and tasty hors d’oeuvres made by yours truly.  This is going down on the evening of April 21.  For more details click here.

On April 27 we have live music and tapas we’re happy to be hosting Joshua Smith w/Mark Irving.  Details here.

We’ve been staying open late for a few months now and it has been a lot of fun.  How, we asked ourselves, could we make it better? Live music of course!

This Friday March 23, we are hosting Ky Babyn and Michael Bablitz on their “Who Shot Who Tour”.  Think roots-folk from Alberta.  I’m told there may be harmonicas involved.  Come check it out, the show starts at 6:30.

You can listen to some of Ky’s tunes here.

We are one of the participating restaurants for this year’s Light up the Vines, an exciting combination of wineries and restaurants.  You can check out the menu here

This past Friday, we remained open late serving samples of a few of our evening menu ideas.  It was a great night and a great learning experience.  Starting this Friday, October 21st, we will be staying open late and serving our newly tweaked evening menu as well as Summerland wines and British Columbian craft beers.

You can check out the menu here

After some late night inspiration, we have finalized our first evening menu.  You can check it out here

and then, it what seemed like the blink of an eye, it was October and with it came the fall weather…

Some may think of the weather as dreary but we prefer to think of it as cozy, perfect for spending some time in your local coffeehouse.  Thoughts turn to comfortable things and comfort foods.  Fireplaces, sweaters, boots, hearty soups, braised meats and of course that cup of coffee on a chilly morning or a full bodied red wine shared with friends.

Speaking of wine, we will soon be serving a selection of local wines and microbrewed beers as well as remaining open later on select evenings.  Expect to see the Bottleneck Drive wines well represented as well as award winning BC beers.  To go with the beer and wine will be expanding our evening menu to include tapas, small plates and share plates.  Our intention is to provide our customers with a place to relax, enjoy a drink and a snack at an affordable price.

On March 19 we hosted a coffee tasting and tweet up, offering three very different coffees brewed by different methods.  It was great fun to share our passion with so many great people.

We are super happy to currently be featuring paintings by Okanagan artist Leanne Spanza.  You can learn more about her at her website and she also has a facebook page.  Come check them out!

Admittedly, I am still fairly new to the coffee business. Prior to purchasing the shop I currently operate, a good cup of coffee likely meant a visit to Starbucks and I’m embarrassed to say that Tim Hortons would do in a pinch. This being said, I’ve always had a basic understanding of the importance of freshness in regards to coffee. Only grind before brewing and once brewed coffee had a limited life.

As prevalent as the “fresher is better” mentality is in our culture, the application of this mindset to roasted coffee beans seems to be a fairly recent one. After roasting, the optimum window for brewing is 3 days to 2 weeks. After that, the beans rapidly degrade. Over a month and the beans are stale. Sure, it can still be drinkable but certainly it is not at it’s best.

The other day I was shopping at a local grocery store and I checked out their selection of coffee beans. Perhaps a dozen different brands, some big name, some local. Not one had a “roasted on” date. Best before dates all around, som extending 8 months into the future.

Grocery stores by their very nature preclude them from selling fresh coffee beans. Considering the time to roast, package, ship, and stock the shelves with beans chances are the peak flavour has gone.

Any reputable shop who sells coffee beans and truely cares about the quality of their product should either have the roast date clearly marked on the bag or be able to tell you the date. If they can’t, find a coffee shop that can.