Aldo Coffee Company

The Past Is Prologue...

Part 1 of 2.  Allow us some license to get nostalgic for a moment...

December 30, 2004. Amy. Andi. Barb. Lois. Meaghan.  The starting five.

None had ever been a barista before.  Then again, neither had the owners. 

Amy could sell tea like nobody's business and owned Sunday mornings. Meaghan was the smoothie queen.  Lois the weekday morning rock that she still is to this day.  Andi went on to compete in Millrock latte art contests and with husband Bill, open Amadeus, a Viennese-styled coffeehouse in Indiana, PA. 

We had planned to open before Thanksgiving.  As the days flew past, realizing we had to open in 2004 for tax reasons, we went into overdrive, even to the point of sleeping in the store. 

Trying to get a final health dept. inspection the Monday after Christmas is something we don't recommend to any entrepreneur.  But we pulled it off. 

We opened with all of our current tables and not a single chair.  

5th Anniversary Week Special #2: FREE Hairbender Shots all day Wednesday

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. 

Five Years Today

5th Anniversary Week Special #1: $1.00 on all Abid-brewed Stumptown Coffees, Tuesday Only

As many of you have already noticed, we've added a new coffee supplier - Stumptown Coffee.  Beans arrive here weekly, two days after roasting in their Brooklyn, NY facility.

As this is our 5th Anniversary week, we're offering drink specials on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.

Tuesday's special is really special:  Any Stumptown coffee brewed on our Abids for only $1.00 (these normally run from $2.50-$4.00).

You can choose from the following coffees in stock:

Guatemala El Injerto Pacamara (Direct Trade)

Colombia El Jordan (Direct Trade)

Costa Rica Montes de Oro (Direct Trade)

Ethiopia Mordecofe (Direct Trade/USDA Organic)

Rwanda Vunga

Additionally, Chrissy Hoag from Stumptown's Portland, OR headquarters will be here from 2-4pm to answer any questions you may have about the coffees. She'll mostly be working with Frank on changes we'll need to make for pulling their Hairbender espresso, but she's always happy to talk about her company's coffees.

More on our decision to carry Stumptown coffees next week.  Meantime, we're working on Wednesday's drink special (we'll announce that late tomorrow) and, assuming FedEx does its job, we have a very special coffee set for arrival here in time for Thursday.

From an undisclosed location on Long Island.

Holiday Week Hours and Events

Hey, our ONE day off each year is coming on Friday!

Yes, we're closed all day on Christmas.

We're open until 3pm on Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve.

We're open from 8am-1pm on New Year's Day (and as tradition goes, we will be serving our now-famous hangover soup.)

Every other day is business as usual.

But wait, there's more!

This Saturday, Sonja is in charge of the joint and is planning a special Boxing Day celebration as she's the only one here who's ever celebrated it.  Details forthcoming.

On Tuesday, December 29, Chrissy Hoeg from Stumptown will be here and we'll be offering Abid-brewed Stumptown coffees all day for only $1.00.

Our 5th Anniversary is next Wednesday, December 30.  We'll be posting more about that in a few days as we'll be having drink specials all day.

Know Someone Who Deserves Coal In Their Stocking?

Because we have lots of COAL in stock.

It's a "gag" gift of really, really dark, oily coffee with a story.  $7.50 for a pound.

Some ideas on who deserves COAL:

The guy who drinks the second-to-last cup of office coffee then puts the carafe back on the hot plate and stinks up the place.

Anyone with a bumper sticker that says, "Coffee should be black as hell and strong as death." 

The Scrooge who thinks sustainable agriculture is a Communist plot.

Anyone who's ever uttered the phrase, "Who cares? It's just coffee."

Someone who really appreciates great coffee.  Because they'll know exactly who to regift it for.

 Available this week only.  Next week it becomes compost.

Call Your Coffee, Call Your Brew Method in Baltimore

Our pal Jay Caragay has always talked about how he wanted to take coffee up to a five-star restaurant service level.  And he just might as his newest shop in Baltimore.

We're mentioning it here because as you guys know, we've played around with every single brew method Jay is using.  And some of us (OK, TWO of us) know how to use them all.  But having the nads to not only use seven brew methods (Abid, Aeropress, Cafe Solo, Chemex, Press Pot, Pourover, Siphon), but also to make recommendations on which method each of the nine coffees being offered is the "best" for that method is pretty out there for a city not heretofore known for much more than crabcakes and red sauce Italian.

Clearly Jay is pushing the envelope with this new project. Baltimore and Pittsburgh are not too dissimilar demographically so it's going to be interesting to follow Jay's progress once he opens in January.

Funny thing is, we highly respect Jay, but just looking at his initial recommendations we'd already disagree on the El Injerto Pacamara, which to us is clearly better in an Abid (as are all our current Stumptown offerings).  Then again, we don't have his press pot recipe and he doesn't have our Abid recipe.  So it could easily be a matter of how the coffee is dosed and prepared.

His recommendation on brewing the Santuario on an Aeropress means we'll be dusting ours off this weekend to give it a go with our Santuario stock.  Sad to say although we've demoed the Aeropress a hundred times and sold a few dozen, we rarely consider it for a production brew at the shop.  Good to know someone is out there doing it.

The thing is, coffee is that flexible.  And at the same time, it isn't.  Jay and Baltimore are about to find out how elastic coffee can be. We wish him success and can't wait to get down and visit.

Coming December 11, the Most Ingenious Coffee Brewing Device Ever Created

Yeah, we went all in this time.  Eight cases of Abid Clever Coffee Drippers are headed our way.  They should be in next Friday, December 11 (not so coincidentally just in time for your holiday shopping!).  To the best of our knowledge, we'll be the only outlet east of St. Louis and north of DC offering Abids for retail.

You've seen the Abid on our brew bar.  Customers are loving Abid-brewed coffees and orders for Abids are now about 3x those for press pots, despite our using press pots for 5 years and Abids for only 5 months.

We still look at the Abid and think to ourselves, "What took so long for somebody to invent this thing?"  If you're not yet familiar with it, pretty much all the Abid is is a larger Melitta drip cone with a plunger valve on the bottom (Abid calls it their "patented amazing shut-off filter"). 

But it's that valve that makes the Abid ingenious. Standard pourover cones like Melitta, Beehouse or Hario V60s give you limited control over steep time.  As soon as you start pouring water over the grounds, brewed coffee will immediately begin to pour through the filter into your cup.  Regulation of flow is only achieved through changing fineness of grind, timing your pouring or plugging up some of the holes. 

On the opposite end of the brewing spectrum, a press pot gives you control over steep time, but unless you mod the filters to something finer than out-of-the-box, you're going to get a lot of fines in your cup (which make it sludgy).  The Abid gives you the steep time of a press pot without the fines and sludge.  The Abid accommodates any common #4 filter.  We use Melitta bamboo, but any bleached or unbleached #4 filter or even a Swiss Gold cone will work.

The steeping is possible because Abid's plunger-valve stays closed until you put the brewer on top of your cup.  Pour your water over the grounds and let it sit on the countertop until you're ready to drink. Combined  with control of all other variables regarding water temperature, grind fineness or amount of coffee used and you've got complete control over how you want your cup brewed. 

The only other brewing method that offers as much control is the much-ballyhooed Clover (which you can often find on eBay for the friendly price of $6,000 or more, plumbing not included).

Still not sure what the Abid is about?  Come in and try a cup.  Or watch this video* complete with a cheesy rendition of Ziggy Stardust.

Abid Clever Coffee Dripper from The Other Black Stuff on Vimeo.

Once they're here we'll be selling them for $16.00. 

* Note: our Abid brew methods are a bit different than what's on this video. We'll give you a sheet with the method we follow, but the beauty of the Abid is that you can experiment on your own to customize exactly the way you want your cup to taste.