Stumptown's Chrissy Hoeg was in yesterday afternoon working with Frank on getting their legendary Hairbender espresso blend to pour as sweetly here in Pittsburgh as it does back in Portland.
And now it does!
As today is the official 5th Anniversary and espresso is the basis of the majority of drinks we serve, we're celebrating by offering you a double shot of Hairbender for FREE*.
It's a good excuse to get familiar with Hairbender espresso as it'll be on bar from here on out in use for straight shots, macchiatos, small cappuccinos and the secret menu drinks. Hairbender is not a particularly latte-friendly espresso, so we'll be sticking with Black Cat for now for most milk drinks (we're also developing a proprietary blend for bigger milk drinks, code name: CowKiller).
For home espresso enthusiasts, we are working on developing a knowledge base on using Hairbender for smaller HX and lever machines. We know that's been a concern for some of you as Black Cat has a reputation for being one of the most flexible and forgiving commercial espresso blends available for most home espresso rigs.
We've been assured by Stumptown that anyone who can pull a good shot of Black Cat on a Silvia, Gaggia or Europiccola already has all the tools and talent to pull delicious shots of Hairbender. We hope to publish some guidelines for home espresso by end of January once we've talked with Stumptown folks in Portland and have had a chance to use Hairbender on some home rigs ourselves.
*FREE as in free when consumed and enjoyed on its own in a demitasse cup inside the shop. We will not be adding free shots to other drinks. You still have to pay for those.NOTE: We were going to do free shots of both Hairbender and Black Cat, but due to a disconnect (not our on end) and UPS not delivering ground packages on Thursday or Friday we're not getting any Intelligentsia coffees this week. We need most of our remaining Black Cat stock for a huge wedding on Saturday as its specidifed in the contract. So we're only offering Black Cat on call for the next few days until we get a chance to replenish our stock.
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