Hey cuppers…

Effective this coming Wednesday (September 5th), we’ll be holding our public cuppings at the Roastery at 11am, rather than 1pm!!  It’s still fun, just a little earlier…

It’s Retro!

No, you won’t find us wearing tight neon spandex or Aquanetting our hair into a cascade of bangs (though check out this RAD album cover that Justin dug up… we asked him to find his most amazingly “retro” album, and boy did he deliver!), but you will find us enjoying this tasty new Sumatra!

The folks at Royal Coffee Importers dubbed this coffee “retro” because of its characteristics similar to that of a Sumatra they once loved and imported back in the eighties. Now they’ve uncovered another source, just north of Lake Tawar in the Bener Meriah region (where the pickers recognize the old coffee trees and keep their cherries separate)… and we can see why they pined after it. Just after being freshly ground, apricot jam, cloves, and fragrant wood fill the air. Brew it up, and you’ll find the unusually clean yet heavy mouthfeel — coupled with macadamia nut, dried pear, sandalwood, and spice — reminds you of rich, sweet, homemade cake.

I don’t know about you, but that makes me want to go grab a cup of French pressed coffee from the baristas, right now. You can too, at either of our locations. We also have bags of it available (looking for a nice home!), at the cafes and also online, of course. You can also be pretty sure that we’ll have it on the cupping table at the Roastery for the next couple of Wednesdays… public cuppings start at 11am, and you’re invited! See you there…

Victrola joins the Mile High Club

Next time you’re on an Alaska Airlines flight, check out the in-flight magazine on pages 54-63 for a great article called “True Brew: Small roasters take coffee to a new level,” by Paul Clarke (photos by Julie Quarry).  They included quotes from Jen and Chris, and also some great photos of the Roastery on Pike.  And now Perry can add “model” to his resume, ha ha.

Almost out of Sumatra Lake Tawar…

Personally, I’m especially sad to see us run out of this amazing coffee.  The cedar! The tropical fruit!  The unique nose!  Keith says he’ll probably roast up the last batch on Friday, so after next week (get it while you can!), we’ll bid a fond farewell to the Tawar.  Sigh.

However, all is not woe.  We have another durn good Sumatra lined up to take its place on the shelf and in the presses: the Sumatra Retro Mandheling.  What’s “Retro,” you ask?  Oh, we’ll keep you in suspense for the time being, but we’ll be sure to let you know when we roll it out in the next week or two.

Behind the Scenes at Synesso

Many thanks to Mark, Caleb, Jeremy, Sandy & the whole Synesso team for letting a bunch of us Victrola coffee geeks infiltrate their workshop in south Seattle last week! We learned a lot about the history, production, and inner workings of the Cyncra, their very streamlined & efficient espresso machine.

At one point, Mark P, Laurel & Tonya got really excited about the slightly angular tamper that Synesso uses to test all their finished machines. New toys always make us giddy.

The tour was topped off by a trip to the taco bus, and we all went home with our heads full of machine maintenance tips, troubleshooting advice & good stories, and our tummies full of burritos! Thanks again, Synesso!

Get your roast on…

The weather forecast is calling for partly cloudy this weekend (and we all know what that really means in Seattle), so what better way to spend your Sunday morning than with Keith, Perry, and Lindsay down at the Pike Roastery at our cupping session? Topic: roasting! This is the capstone class for our four-part series, but don’t be shy if you haven’t been to our other cuppings this summer! Keith and Perry have been working hard to prepare for this class, so get ready to talk about, learn about, and even help a little, with the roasting process. They’ll be firing up our production Diedrich, and Perry’s going to bring in his home roaster and show how you can DIY! To finish it all off, we’ll be cupping the same coffee, but roasted to different degrees… so you can really relate flavor to roast profile. Pretty cool!

Due to a few last-minute cancellations, we’ve got some extra spots, and we’d love to see you there! Start time is 9am, and we’re usually wrapped up at 11-ish. Cost is $10/person, and you get to bring home a 1/2lb of coffee (this week it’ll be the coffee you watched being roasted!). RSVP at cupping@victrolacoffee.com, or give us a call at 206.325.6080 (if you call, know that we won’t be in on Saturday).

Its not every day you get kissed by Mel Brooks

The wonderful, funny Mel Brooks paid us a visit at the Pike Street location yesterday. He and Addison became fast friends as you can see from this photo!

Here he is ordering coffee from Hardison who proceeded to spout off some quotes from Mel’s movies to which Mel replied “I see you are familiar with my work”! Now Mel is familiar with Hardisons work..he drank 3 cappuccinos because they were SOOOO good!

As he waved goodbye to us he said “I’ll be back”…we hope so. We love ya Mel!!!!!