Magnificent Obsessions
(page 6 of 10)
Coffee with Dr. Loewenstein
By Aaron Belz
Joe Loewenstein makes a living as a professor of English at Washington University, but the way to get him really hot is to ask him about coffee. He tries hard to project a semblance of normalcy, insisting that he’s “not really very devoted, at least not by the standards of the true coffee enthusiasts.” But Loewenstein roasts his own beans—in fact, he owns two roasters, both of which accompany him on sabbatical. He also owns a grinder “the size of a blender but heavier,” noting that it is “the most important tool for making espresso.” As proof that he’s not overly devoted, he says: “I’ll occasionally drink a shot that’s taken under 15 seconds or over 40 seconds to yield 2 ounces.” And he is quick to point out that he doesn’t even use a thermocouple to check the temperatures of his shots or a thermometer to help him when he steams milk.
As far as beans are concerned, Loewenstein is understandably picky, having about as refined a palate as anyone in St. Louis. “When I make my morning coffee tomorrow,” he explains, “I may want the ‘wineyness’ in the Colombian I have or the leathery quality of this Ugandan, which has a touch of earthy, mossy, syrupy something that seems kind of Indonesian in character. My palate may reach out to one of these things, and I may be able to coax it from the machine.” For green beans he recommends Sweet Maria’s, a California-based distributor (
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.sweetmarias.com">www.sweetmarias.com); for commercially roasted beans, he turns to Counter Culture Coffee in North Carolina (
www.counterculturecoffee.com).
“You’d call this obsession?” he asks, increasingly defensive. “Is it obsession when a man opens his door in the morning, looks for the paper and finds it? You need some equipment to make espresso; you need a door if you’re going to go out and get the paper.”
Loewenstein’s Favorite Roasters
Joe Loewenstein won’t recommend varietals: “People owe it to themselves to discover if they’re Indonesian worshippers or devotees of Ethiopian, Rwandan or Central American coffees. Moreover, the Ugandan Bugisu of 2005 just isn’t anywhere near the dense, molasses-chocolate-moss thing it was in 2003. If I tell people that they need to try Guatemalan Huehuetenango and they get coffee from this year’s wrong finca, they might well be disappointed.”
Riley’s Coffee and Fudge (618-307-3419, 1900 Lebanon, Belleville, Ill.,
www.rileys-coffee.com): “The owner, Barry Jarrett, will ship, and he has an international reputation. If I ever find a restaurant in town that brews his coffee—and whose staff he’s trained—I’ll know that coffee culture in St. Louis has taken off.”
Northwest Coffee Roasting Company (three cafes, 314-371-4600,
www.northwestcoffee.com): “The roasting operation at 4251 Laclede is superb.”
Kaldi’s Coffee Roasting Company (four cafes, 314-727-9991,
www.kaldiscoffee.com)
Intelligentsia Coffee (
www.intelligentsiacoffee.com): “They’re based in Chicago, and their Black Cat blend is superb for espresso.”
