Category Archives: Saturday Supplement

A Saturday Supplement is any post that’s not a Coffee Spot

Meet the Roaster: Speckled Ax

Posted on by
6

The Speckled Ax roaster, a refurbished 20 kg Petroncini roaster from the 1970s, in the Walton Street roastery, with the tell-tale woodpile against the wall behind it.Regular readers will know that I have a soft spot for Portland’s coffee shop/roaster, Speckled Ax, which I first visited in June 2015. Back then, there was just the original coffee shop on Congress Street, with the roastery out in South Portland. However, Speckled Ax has been busy in recent years, opening its flagship Thames Street coffee shop in 2020, and then, a year later, moving the roastery to its new home on Walton Street, where it also opened a neat coffee bar.

On my return to Portland at the start of this year, I caught up with Matt, owner of Speckled Ax. I’ve already written about the coffee bar, so today’s Meet the Roaster is all about the roastery. Although an outstanding roastery in its own right, consistently turning out some excellent single-origins and blends year-on-year, Speckled Ax’s particular claim to fame is as one of a handful of wood-fired coffee roasters in the USA (reminiscent of Witney’s Ue Coffee Roasters in the UK). The magic happens in a large, industrial unit behind the coffee bar, where you’ll find the 20 kg Petroncini, a refurbished Italian roaster from the 1970s, its fire box filled with local kiln-dried wood.

Continue reading →

George Howell, Boston Public Market Update

Posted on by
3

Details of the coffee menu at George Howell, Boston Public Market.When Amanda and I arrived in Boston last weekend, getting coffee was top of our list, and where better than George Howell in the Boston Public Market? It helped that it was on the way to our hotel, plus the New England winter had taken the weekend off, resulting in a glorious spring day, so we were able to take our coffee (it’s takeaway only thanks to COVID-19) across the road to the Rose Kennedy Greenway, where we enjoyed it while sitting in the sun.

I originally visited the coffee bar almost exactly six years ago, in February 2016, not long after it had opened. These days, it (and the Boston Public Market) is still going strong, do so well, in fact, that it’s now open seven days a week and has moved across the aisle to a much bigger counter, at least doubling in size. The basic offering remains the same though: top-notch coffee (espresso, batch brew and pour-over through the Chemex) along with a large range of retail bags of coffee for sale.

Continue reading →

Brian’s Travel Spot: Amtrak Downeaster, Part II

Posted on by
9

Amtrak Genesis P42DC diesel locomotive No. 108 done out in Amrtrak's red, white and blue 50th anniversary colours at one end of the Downeaster which took me from Portland, Maine to Boston North Station where it's resting at the end of its journey.Welcome to the second and final part of my Travel Spot dedicated to Amtrak’s Downeaster, which connects Boston with Brunswick, Maine, providing five daily services in each direction, departing from/arriving at Boston’s North Station. In Part I, I took a trip from Portland, where I was staying, to Brunswick, taking the opportunity to check out Amtrak’s business class along the way, before returning by bus.

Part II covers the journey Amanda and I took two days later in the other direction, from Portland to Boston, where we travelled in coach class (Amtrak’s standard class for travel). Incidentally, although I’d travelled in coach class many times before, this was my first detailed look at Amtrak’s refurbished coach-class seating. Along the way, we tried out the café car, sampling the on-board coffee which we put up against some of our own that we’d made on the train.

Other than my trip to Brunswick two days before, I’d only taken the Downeaster once before, at the start of my Portland-to-Portland trans-America train trip in June 2015. Since then, for a variety of reasons, the bus had always proved more convenient, so I was keen to see how the train stacked up against the bus.

Continue reading →

Brian’s Travel Spot: Amtrak Downeaster, Part I

Posted on by
6

Amtrak Genesis P42DC diesel locomotive No. 86 at the head of the Downeaster which took me to Brunswick, Maine (seen here at Brunswick station).Welcome to this two-part Travel Spot, dedicated to Amtrak’s Downeaster, connecting Boston and Maine with five daily services in each direction, departing from/arriving at Boston’s North Station. Regular readers will be aware of my hit-and-miss relationship with the Downeaster, having been on it just once before, at the start of my Portland-to-Portland trans-America train trip. Since then I’ve found the bus more convenient when travelling between Boston and Portland, although tomorrow that will change when Amanda and I take the Downeaster from Portland to Boston, the subject of Part II of this two-part Travel Spot.

So, what’s Part I all about? Well, the Downeaster doesn’t just connect Boston with Portland: there are two more stops north of Portland, Freeport and Brunswick, where the train terminates. Ahead of tomorrow’s journey, I decided to catch the train in the other direction, from Portland to Brunswick, just so that I could say that I’d travelled the full length of the line, albeit in two separate trips. Ideally, I’d have taken the train back to Portland, but Amtrak’s schedule is quirky to say the least. Returning by train would have required a 2½ hour wait, so I caught the Greater Portland Metro BREEZ bus instead.

Continue reading →

Making Coffee at Home: Soulhand Vacuum Canister

Posted on by
2

My new Soulhand vacuum canister, complete with coffee beans, looking very pretty in the sun. Please don't store it in direct sunlight though!Welcome to the latest instalment in my Making Coffee at Home series, which is all about storing coffee beans at home. Other than a post about keeping coffee beans in the freezer, it’s not something that I’ve written much about. Coffee’s twin enemies, when it comes to freshness, are air and light, so the standard advice, once you have opened a bag of coffee, is to store the beans in an airtight container away from directly sunlight.

Typically, I’ll put around 80 grams of beans into an airtight container, storing the rest in the original bag (which, if it’s not resealable, I’ll pop into a larger container) in the cupboard. This means I’m not exposing the bulk of the coffee to fresh air every time I open the bag/container.

However, there is an alternative, which prompted me to the write this post. A couple of weeks ago, the folks at Soulhand offered me a vacuum canister. It’s something I’ve been thinking about getting for a while, so naturally, I jumped at the chance. Vacuum canisters, as the name suggests, work by removing (almost) all the air from the canister, which, in theory keeps the coffee fresh for longer.

Continue reading →

Speckled Ax, Walton

Posted on by
9

The sign over the door, proclaiming "COFFEE" at Speckled Ax, Walton Street.If you’ve been paying attention for the last two weeks, you’ll know that I’m back in Portland, Maine, where, weather permitting, I’m catching up with the local coffee shops. Top of my list was Speckled Ax’s new roastery/coffee bar on Walton Street, which opened last year. It’s out beyond Back Cove, north of Portland’s compact city centre, just over the train tracks from Forest Avenue, the main north/south drag.

Home to Speckled Ax’s new roastery (which has its own Meet the Roaster feature), there’s a small takeout coffee bar attached. Unlike the other Speckled Ax locations (Congress and Thames), with their multiple options on espresso and filter, here it’s just the daily batch brew or espresso, although, of course, plenty of retail bags of coffee are available to buy. There’s no seating, although when COVID-19 allows, there will be a small standing bar at the front. For now, it’s takeaway only, so don’t forget to bring your own cup.

Continue reading →

Brian’s Travel Spot: Return from Dublin

Posted on by
2

The Route 700 Aircoach waiting at the start of its route, outside my hotel at Leopardstown, from where it would take me to Dublin Airport.Welcome to the second instalment of my Travel Spot, covering my flights to/from Dublin in October 2019, at the start/end of a two-week trip to Ireland. I spent my first week driving around Ireland, enjoying the beauty of the Wicklow Mountains, Waterford, Cork, the Ring of Kerry and Galway. This was followed by a weekend in Dublin (visiting coffee shops, of course) and a week working in Leopardstown, just south of Dublin, before I flew home on Friday afternoon.

The first instalment was about my flight from Heathrow to Dublin, travelling in Club Europe with British Airways, while this post covers my return, which saw me take the slightly bizarre route of Dublin – Heathrow – Manchester, again flying Club Europe with British Airways. This was partly due to laziness on my part (it was the seventh trip of a hectic year, sandwiched between two trips to Japan) which made the default option of booking with British Airways the easy way out, and partly down to airline madness, which makes this sort of routing cheaper than flying London to Dublin with British Airways, then returning from Dublin direct to Manchester with Aer Lingus (which would have been the logical route to take).

Continue reading →

Making Coffee at Home: Cafetiere Clean-up Made Easy

Posted on by
1

My shiny metal cafetiere (I got tired of breaking the glass ones!).The very first Making Coffee at Home post I wrote, before I even knew I’d create a whole Coffee at Home section for the Coffee Spot, was a simple guide to making better coffee with the cafetiere. To this day, for all the fancy pour-over methods I have at my disposable, or other immersion methods, such as the AeroPress or Clever Dripper, not to mention my home espresso machine, the cafetiere (or French Press), is still my go-to method for making my morning coffee.

One of the complaints I regularly hear about the cafetiere is that it’s difficult to clean up after a brew. This is something that I’ve never understood, since disposing of the used grounds in a cafetiere is ridiculously easy. Okay, so it’s not quite as simple as tossing a used paper pour-over filter, grounds and all, or popping an AeroPress puck into the compost, but it’s less hassle than, say, cleaning a reusable cloth filter.

So why does the cafetiere have a reputation that it’s difficult to clean up? I suspect it’s because lots of people don’t actually know how to dispose of the used grounds, so to rectify that, I’ve written this little guide.

Continue reading →

Brian’s Travel Spot: Flying to Dublin

Posted on by
3

My British Aiways Airbus A320 seen nose-on while on the ground at Dublin Airport, having flown me from London Heathrow. External steps, attached front and back, can be seen on the right-hand side, while the hold door on the opposite side is also open.Welcome to another Travel Spot post and, no, before anyone wonders why I’m flying from Boston to Dublin, this isn’t part of my current trip. Instead, I’m catching up on my backlog of past trips that I didn’t get to write up at the time. In contrast to the recent diet of long-haul flights, this covers the short hop I took across the Irish Sea in October 2019 to visit Ireland for a couple of weeks, one for work, with the other spent driving around Waterford, Cork and Galway.

It was the seventh trip of a hectic year, sandwiched between two trips to Japan (more long-haul flights!), so represented a welcome change of pace. This post covers the flight out from Heathrow to Dublin, travelling in Club Europe with British Airways, while a separate post covers my return, which saw me taking the slightly bizarre route of Dublin – Heathrow – Manchester.

Continue reading →

Making Coffee at Home: Cloth Filters

Posted on by
7

Using my two-cup CoffeeSock cloth filter to make a pour-over in a white ceramic pour-over filter.When I first made coffee at home, over 25 years ago, I used a cheap filter machine, but I didn’t like the taste its metal filter imparted to the coffee, so I switched to the cafetiere and never looked back. Years later, when I started experimenting with home pour-over and other methods such as the Clever Dripper, I naturally used paper filters (I’ve had the occasional metal filter but never got on with them).

For several years, I’ve toyed with getting cloth filters to use at home. However, inertia and a general sense that they were a bit of a faff compared to paper filters put me off (which is odd, since many of the other little rituals around making coffee don’t bother me). Then, on my last trip to see Amanda in November, we were in GoGo Refill, a low-waste store in South Portland, where I saw some cloth filters from CoffeeSock.

To cut a long story short, I bought a pair, one for a Chemex and one for a standard two-cup ridge-bottom filter (like my collapsible travel filter). After using them on and off for the last two months, I thought it was time to share my thoughts.

Continue reading →