That tea set looks fabulous. I'm sorry I haven't been in touch in eons. I broke my ankle pretty severely last may. Then I got a promotion and have essentially been super busy ever since. I was involved in planning a barista jam in Chicago this past fall, which took up tons of time, plus I was training new hires for a store we opened the same month. It doesn't help that my computer is ancient either. I've been trying to plan my move to England for over a year now. I'm hoping that I'll be able to find a nice specialty coffee shop in London. But, let me ask you this, are the foreign labor laws as strict in Australia as they are in the UK? I'm looking at a working-holiday visa since that is the easiest way to get my foot in the door. I can't imagine I'd have much luck finding an employer willing to write me a work permit without meeting me and seeing me work first. Sighs. Well I hope you are well and cheerful. :)
~Gwen

Thanks Ben. I cant do it myself... but can try a few people. flick me an email with some details. carlsara@xtra.co.nz

Cheers

Ben!! How are you mate?
I need to find out where to get a 1kg roaster from. there was a guy called Will something :) that imports Topper to Australia, do you know him or anyone?
Anyway, I am floating around improving the coffee of the world and hopefully starting some of my own with some people. hope to hear from you soon, my email is kaffaconsulting@gmail.com I lost your number which is why I am contacting you this way! mine is +94771230883 for now.
Cheers keep up the great work.

Tell me more about this national tea infusion challenge. I don't think I've heard anything like it. Cait and Wes are going to the international tea convention Las Vegas soon. I can't wait to hear all about it. There are going to be some pretty swanky teas there.

Hello!!
how are you Ben? I'm sorry i've been so hard to contact, hope alls well, and no, not dead so far... been out of reach but now I hav e the net again... finally! I'm on skype if you have we should chat sometime, look me up under my email address. Cheers man enjoy!

The blizzard is gone now. Thank god. People were able to dig themselves out so far, so life goes on. It was just St. Patrick's day so, there were many green beer-guzzling "Irish" celebrators out and about today; generally making the roads unsafe and causing mayhem. Thanks for the info on my espresso machine. Apparently the design is older than I am. But again, life goes on. I'm confused however, about bars still. Is that referring to the amount of pressure of the water going into the portafilter through the grouphead? That's really the only thing I can think of. Ah well. Thrilled to hear back from you.
~gwen

"Oh me! Oh life! Of the questions of these recurring..." (Can you name that poet WITHOUT looking it up?) I think HE was right about how life is. :) But things with me... well, they're great. Thanks for asking. What about you? :)

Ok, so after a grueling weekend at work I finally got you the stats on the espresso machine I work with day in and day out. It is a 1995 La San Marco Mod. 85-16m-2. Freq. 60Hz. Pot. 3kw. Press. max 2 bars. Hey if you think about it, maybe you could explain what these things mean; I'd love to know. You will not believe what a work weekend I have had. Starting Friday night at around 7 we had non-stop snow flurries until 10pm Saturday. A total of twenty four inches of snow. We actually had to shut down shop early on Sat, but you wouldn't believe the number of people who came out for coffee in that weather! Mostly people on foot since the roads we nearly impassible unless you had an SUV with four wheel drive. My mom actually had to rescue me from work; my car was completely snowed in, in the back lot. But life goes on and coffee culture continues. I'm due for my shift now but I look forward to hearing from you.
rock on,
~gwen

His name's Deaton Pigot. I'm not sure what he was doing down there, but if you know him, I'll tell him hello.

My full name is Tisha. It's not short for anything. I have only heard it a few times. Pretty unique.
Where in Australia are you located? Hows the coffee biz there?

Hey Ben, Chicago's scene is pretty great. We (Intelligentsia) are sort of the big player in town, but there's also a great little micro-roaster called Metropolis, and they're definitely worth checking out.

How's it looking in Australia? From our perspective, it looks good- we recently hired an Aussie to roast in Los Angeles for us, and he's great. l

Nice to meet you, Ben.

We sort of have an espresso machine guru so as far as tweaking machines I'm a little helpless. What you're doing with machines sounds really cool. Someday I'm going to have to get more intimate with some espresso machines. Cleveland is maybe three or four hours north of Columbus, which is the capital city of Ohio. It's a nice day trip. Do you have any roasting experience? It's something I've always wanted to learn, but I missed the last roastery position we had when I was visiting family in Virginia.

At home I've got a French Press, which I love more than words can say. I'm not sure exactly what kind of machine we've got at the store, but when I find out I'll let you know. We switched to a new dosing method a few months ago. We were doing the overflow and then level method, which was pretty consistent. But when we got the newer machine we switched to a two click method. The shots are a little less consistent but they're almost sweeter so it's working well. I can tell you this about the machine, you can over-ride the automatic settings and flip the whole thing into a manual mode. You can also manually fill the boiler which we haven't had to do yet. I'll keep you posted. How long have you been operating on machines? I would love to learn, in my "free" time.
cheers!

Hi! Australia's pretty rockin' and I'm happy to have friends anywhere. What's the coffee scene like?

Hey Ben... I've been busy lately... we're getting new things in our shop everyday as we are starting to get a really great customer base... I've been sampling teas and working on frozen drinks - which we've delayed bringing in a long as we could =)

Hi Ben All is going well I am heading to Melbourne next monday, tuesday, wednesday and back home thursday. Then on friday i am going to Merthi Mountain India to check out the robusta harvest and watch them rub the parchment with their hands every three hours or so. When you get down to Sydney next time call in. We've just installed a new water system and the coffee tastes unbelievably better. It's like someone is taking a mask off it. Very clear, distinct and clean. And I'm also looking at new machines....see you soon!

i actually am! hope you are too homie.

Its in Minnesota.