October 26 – “Starbucks … what to order?”

 

 

Ah.  How sad.  It appears to be the end of an era.  We have decided to seek out a new brand of coffee after twenty years of steadfastly ordering and reordering and mail-ordering that fabulous Colorado Boyer's brand.  Not the Boyer Brothers that you can find at WalMart.  Just Boyer's.  The owner of the company, Bill Boyer, was a member of the church we went to in Denver, and remained a friend until his death a while back. 

 

It's not that Boyer's has changed in flavor.  European Dark is still the best I have ever tasted.  I was a bit perturbed when they went to 12 ounce bags of beans instead of a full pound, but that wasn't fully a deal breaker.  That didn't come until the cost of postage shot up so much that we would have to pay almost fifteen dollars per twelve ounce bag.  Steep enough to look for an alternative. 

 

Over the years that Kel worked for Starbucks he has recommended several different flavors.  Some were not bad.  Some were, well, nasty.  None were comparable to Boyer's.  But we decided to give them another chance.  Kel said to get something from Southeast Asia or Africa.  He particularly likes the one called Sumatra.  So that would cover the Southeast Asia realm.  But the Africa thing intrigued me.

 

We finally made it to Starbucks yesterday.  First thing I noticed was that the beans came in one pound bags.  That's a plus.  They were obviously pushing their "holiday blend," whatever that was.   I saw some of the Sumatra.  But my curiosity got the best of me.  I searched a bit longer and finally uncovered a bag called Kenya.  That would be my first to try.  The price worked out to be cheaper than shipping in Boyer's.  Another plus. 

 

So this morning was the big test.  I ground up some beans and ran the hot water over them.  And the first cup … was not bad.  Not anything to write home about.  Not a lot of flavor, in fact.  That tells me I need to try it with some more beans.  I forgot that one of the pluses for Boyer's was that we never needed as many beans to get the full flavor.  And Starbucks always recommends way too much.  So I'll just have to find the happy medium somewhere in there.  Any recommendations for our next attempt?

 

Proverbs 29:23 says, "A man's pride brings him low, but a man of lowly spirit gains honor."

 

Father, thank you for new adventures.  Amen.