That was easy!
As a followup to my last post i received my check from Staples less then 2 weeks after submitting online for the rebate. Nothing to send in and the money is already in my bank accocunt. I haven’t even received confirmation that the buy.com rebates have been received much less any peep about payment.
On happier notes I just go back from a trip to San Diego, a few things to write about later.
ecommerce fails me now
Recently i bought a few things from buy.com–most of it for my sister who’s spending a lot of time overseas so she needed little things like SD memory for her camera, a portable hard drive and a usb memory stick. I usually avoid buy.com because of the hefty rebates on nearly everything. Now i have another reason to avoid them.
First they have an odd order fulfillment system, i ordered 4 items spread across two separate orders to take advantage of some rebates. They send all four items as separate shipments, typically this is doneto get you your items sooner but to be honest i think it multiplies the number of packages and risk. It also spreads out the delivery, i’d rather wait for one package then wait for four!
Anyway the next thing i discovered is that they use USPS for some things, generally i think this is OK, i love the USPS. And the two SD memory cards i ordered arrived fine via USPS, they came in bubble mailers no worse for wear. However the portable hard-drive did not make it. And this i blame completely on buy.com–the portable hard-drive which is about the size of a 3.5 index card and .75 inches thick but comes in a much larger box was also shipped in a bubble mailer. But the shipping department did not secure the envelope with any tape and the weight/size of the package forced the mailer opened. So the hard drive fell out somewhere along the way–i only received an empty mailer.
To their credit the buy.com customer service person (who’s in India) took my riduculous claim and 1 week later they did refund me the cost of the drive. But i still find it unacceptable that they ship something so poorly packed that i would never buy from them again (ha there’s a pun!).
Now you might notice that there’s one more item, well i also ordered a USB thumb drive. This was shipping via FedEx ground and supposedly delivered 1 day after i ordered it. I say supposedly because the day it was claimed delivered i went to the mailroom and they received no FedEx packages that day. The signature also does not match.
Buy.com did their claim but they blame FedEx and they will not assist me in chasing down the package with FedEx, basically they said i’m screwed we ain’t helping you. While I can understand their position since FedEx shows the package delivered, previously other companies would open a proper FedEx trace on the package so that FedEx can actually track the package by hand to make sure it was in fact delivered. It’s strange since i’ve had a lot of luck with FedEx in the past, rarely anything lost and I even have a FedEx shipper account with them!
So my lesson is learned, i’m out $60 for a USB thumb drive through no fault of my own. And I’m still a slave to buy.com because I have $35 in rebates for the SD memory cards I did receive (did i mention the USB thumb drive had $30 in rebates?) so now I have to wait to see how that is resolved and if i receive all my rebates. There were 4 separate rebate forms to fill out which took too much time and $1.48 in postage.
In comparison the rebate on the western digital hard drive i bought from Staples, I filled out online (actually i didn’t fill out anything) and submitted online, no postage, no forms write out, no upc to send in. Now that’s *easy*.
If you’re reading this you might think i’m negative about coffee shops. And that’s not true, in DC I have Murky Coffee which makes fantastic espresso drinks; why? Because they stick to the proper recipes creating drinks in the correct proportion and they focus on the process of making espresso drinks. This is not a dramatically new concept, all good restaurants make a commitment to good ingredients and good processes and you end up with a great final product.
The biggest reason that i harp on the drink recipes is that it makes a huge difference to the taste. You are drinking an espresso drink or a coffee drink, you are not buying a coffee flavored milk drink. But when you look at what’s in your cup that is in fact what you are drinking at most coffee shops.
I want you to remember these things because if a shop neglects to adhere to these things then it’s highly unlikely to result in a good cup. And that might be ok, why? Because maybe that’s not their focus, maybe their focus is food or wifi or tea or whatever. But for me, i look for these things because I don’t want to pay $3 for a marginal poorly created drink.
Looking for these signs is a good way to set your own expectations–if you see untrained baristas making the coffee drinks, order tea or try the coffee instead.
I can apply the same analogy to a restaurant, if you walk into a chinese restaurant and the menu is in chinese then that’s a good sign they know what they’re doing. If they have fish tanks in the back then i bet their seafood is fresh, same idea, look for the signs.
espresso con panna caffe fresco
Originally uploaded by minhi.
yes, i know i’ve already posted an espresso con panna picture but this one has a nice whip cream peak–that was quickly sucked down by the crema.
If you’ve never had an espresso con panna, it’s not like a macchiato the amount of milk you’re adding is very small, maybe a teaspoon’s worth of dairy. so it only takes a slight edge off but also brings out the chocolate flavor, just like a little suger. And when you pull a ristretto with the Caffe Fresco Ambrosia it has the consistency of hot chocolate. And i mean hot chocolate from made from real chocolate and a molinillo.
morning cappucino
Originally uploaded by minhi.
things are getting better, the foam on this was much smoother, velvety then my previous attempts. Again still can’t figure out the latte art thing, grrrr.
these mugs are from ‘just mugs’ i bought a set of 4 for $10 which is pretty decent for cappa cups. They’re a little light, so heat retention is not very good but they’re broad and shallow–which i prefer over the skinny tall ones.
I also have a set of these as demi-tasses but they suffer the same problem of being too light but that set only cost $5! I bought them to use as bar sets because if i break them i don’t really care all that much.
While I’m talking about cappucino’s let me give you the correct recipe:
1 part espresso
1 part steamed milk
1 part foamed milk
so for a 2oz double shot of espresso, add 2oz of steamed milk and 2oz of foamed milk for a total of 6oz.
Yes that’s smaller then even the smallest size drink you can get at most coffee shops (which is normally 8oz and you have to ask for that). At most coffee shops the smallest size is 12oz the difference in volume is usually made up with milk.
Now a problem with my math above is that it assumes a double shot of espresso. Typically an order at a coffee shop includes a single shot of espresso (1-1.25oz of espresso) which works out to about a 4oz drink. Which fits into a cup a little bit larger then the pasquini espresso demi-tasse on this page! At a bad coffee shop this works out to about 11oz of steamed + foamed milk + 1oz espresso in the smallest size they sell!
and then there’s the problem of poorly foamed milk or even worse reheated milk!
double-macchiato1
Originally uploaded by minhi.
a double macchiato the hard way 🙂
As i said before if i want a macchiato I usually split them into two cups. I don’t always wuss out though. These are from last nite, tonite I made an espresso con panna instead. The foam here is a little hard, but they were tasty. again caffe fresco ambrosia blend.
bodum-cappa4
Originally uploaded by minhi.
yes it was good.
bodum-cappa5
Originally uploaded by minhi.
i’m getting a little better with my frothing. Two things that are helping, stop stretching the milk earlier–around 80F and spinning the pitcher before pouring into the cup. That last one needs some explanation, after frothing the milk, slam the pitcher on counter to settle the bubbles then rotate the pitcher in a circle on the counter this push the milk to the sides of the pitcher (centrifugal force and all that) and mix the milk mixture.
This tightens up the mixture, i’m still nowhere close to getting latte art to appear, i can’t figure out the pour technique–at some point i’m hoping to have my epiphany wrt to latte art.
bodum-macchiato
Originally uploaded by minhi.
Normally when I make an espresso drink I pull a double shot of espresso–which is 2-2.5 oz of espresso. In a demi-tasse you can get 2-3 oz of liquid. The proper recipe for a macchiato is:
1 part espresso
.5 part steamed milk
.5 part foamed milk
so for a 2oz double espresso you need 1oz of steamed milk and 1 oz of foamed milk. Obviously those 4oz will not fit in a espresso demi-tasse. So what to do?
You can pull a ristretto which is 1.5oz-2oz which evens up the ratio a little bit. But I think you waste coffee pulling ristrettos, especially if you’re going to mix it with milk which hides some brewing errors.
No, I just split the double into two cups and make two drinks. If you pull 2.5oz into two cups then a demi-tasse is just enough volume. Of course then you have to froth 1oz of milk into 2oz of steamed + frothed, it’s a little difficult to froth so little milk.
I just opened this bag of Caffe Fresco Ambrosia Espresso blend, I really like the coffee from Caffe Fresco, i’ll talk about them in the another post.
Yes, I feel a little wierd having two drinks at once, but there are times when i don’t want a straight espresso and a cappucino is too much milk. An espresso con panna (see back posts) is a good alternative too but it’s a little different from a macchiato. I have noticed that I can’t really drink latte’s anymore, they’re just too much milk. It puts me in a bad spot when i go out to marginal coffee shops. Their espresso is so bad that you have to get a milk drink to temper it (one of the reasons why drinks are so big at that big coffee chain) but most places cannot make a decent cappucino. Their foam is like bubble bath soap so it’s tasteless and nasty, but then their lattes tend to be so big. Sigh, maybe i’ll start drinking tea at coffee shops.
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