The London Coffee Festival

I've really, really come to love coffee while in London, the tea capitol of the world. I think as tea is such the social convention in England, that the coffee drinkers have been forced to bond more strongly and thus create events to seek out other coffee lovers.



Just recently, I went to the first annual London Coffee Festival. It was held in a slightly dodgy, yet undergoing urban renewal area of London called Brick Lane. It is also called "Little Bangladesh".

A lot of artists and adventurous companies are moving into the area, and a lot of new housing is going up around it as well. My bet is that in 5 years, this will be a very trendy area, and the edgy artistic quality that makes it so appealing to people now will be replaced by the status quo. That's not so bad in my opinion as it could get a little

The festival was held on the second floor of an old warehouse in the now defunct Truman Brewing Company (a beer maker that went out of business in the 60's).

There were machines of all shapes and sizes available for both the professional and consumer sides of the market.

I entered to win an Ascaso Espresso machine. I don't know where we'd put it in our tiny apartment, but we'd find somewhere no doubt. It looks like a good machine, and even has the pressure gauge on the front, which I was told to never buy a machine without one.




A lot of the major coffee vendors in London were in attendance. Starbucks had two booths: one for their standard coffee shops, and one for their new highend exotic single origin coffees.





These specialty reserve coffees are only available at a few stores. I tried one of the coffees, and I thought it was good, but wasn't my favorite at the festival.








I tried a bunch of different coffees. Most vendors were giving away samples, and I avoided any that were charging.


One vendor tricked into trying a tea. . . ick. It looked like a beautiful cup of espresso with a glorious crema, but as soon as I tasted it, it was. . . TEA!!!!




Another vendor was promoting their new highend Hot Chocolate product that they were hoping to place in coffee shops. It was delicious. All the chocolates were single origin, and listed their cocoa content. I hope it is a great success for them.



There were also samples of coffee related snacks. Probably the most unique was the gingerbread biscuit that comes from Sarah Nelson's up in the Lake District. It uses a 100 year old recipe, and was absolutely delicious. In fact, I believe they are still working out of the same 100 year old bakery. Very cool.



One coffeehouse on Brick Lane, Nude Espresso, was the luckiest coffeehouse in London that day as they were just outside the entrance to the festival. I've been there before, and they do make an awesome cup of coffee.

My favorite coffee that I tried was from a company called Percol, and their espresso roast is called Black and Beyond. I ended up buying 2 bags of it as they were having a special.

My favorite local brew coffee came from Allpress, a roaster that is right by brick lane and is an easy walk from my apartment.





In fact just recently, due to the good weather, I decided to walk over there for another fabulous latte, or what they call a "flat white". Allpress, like many repudible coffeehouses in London, is run by Aussies. As good as I would have expected.

Spring 2011

Nothing is more important to the British than the return of Spring after a long cold winter. And nothing is nicer to me than the realization that it isn't quite so cold and dark when I take the dogs to the park at 7:30 in the morning. That first morning when suddenly it just isn't that dark is absolutely wonderful.


And it just gets better and better as the sun rises earlier and earlier until suddenly, it isn't just light, it was actually sunny and the park is bathed in a beautiful orange glow as the newly sprouted leaves and flowers return to further enforce natures announcement that spring has arrived.



I even think the dogs realize the change. I've caught them sniffing the occasional flower.

As soon as the squirrels begin venturing out of their nests, they definitely know spring has arrived.






Even down in Soho, the parks spring to life as the weather gets warmer. They flower beds sprout forth the most amazing tulips that are so colorful, they seem to fool cameras into producing images that just look artificial.

On a beautiful day, I think the indoor restaurants struggle to find customers as everyone heads outdoors to relish the sunshine and the simple joy of sitting in a park for a picnic.

This last week, instead of eating in at our favorite pizza place, a group of us ordered takeout pizza from them and headed to the park. Surrounded by such stunning floral beauty, it made it difficult to return to work.

Weekend in Bristol - Part 3 - A lunch in the hills

For our last meal, we drove out to the countryside just outside Bristol to The Walled Garden. It is an artistic communty that has a lovely cafe called, "The Ethicurean". Anthony and Jon had eaten there before, and coincidentally, they had just been profiled on the TV the day before. It is a cute new restaurant run by two youngish lads.

Though the food was excellent, it felt as though they were still finding their legs and techniques for running a restaurant effectively. We met one of their mothers who was from Mexico.

We timed it all well as a small rainstorm came through just as we arrived, and Jon and I had to run from the art studios to the cafe.





We ordered a bottle of wine, and prepared to have a long casual lunch.





For dessert, we had a Cheese plate of local cheeses. Among them a soft blue that had been out of production for a long time, and only recently it had begun to be made again. In my opinion, it could have stayed out of production.





After lunch, the storm had cleared, and we wandered around the lovely grounds savoring the beautiful greens of the British countryside. It is stunning.

The views of the valley below are amazing, and as they have outdoor seating, it would be a lovely place to return in the summer.

Before long, it was time to make our way back to Brunel's Bristol Train Station, and board our train back to London. It was a fantastic break from the city, and I'm really grateful that Anthony and Jon invited me to join the.

Best of all, the dogs were exhausted when we got home. While Tony is away, they are closed up in the apartment all week, so it it great to get them a ton of exercise over the weekend.

A weekend in Bristol - Part 2 - The SS Great Britain

The highlight of the second day in Bristol was a visit to the SS Great Britain. This ship was built in the 1850's, and was the largest ship built up to that time. It was designed by the great engineer Brunel, and was a precurser to even larger ships to follow.







It served for over 90 years, and had circumnavigated the globe 32 times. It made frequent trips to San Francisco and Australia. It had a long career as both a steam and wind powered ship.



It wasn't until it suffered damage in a storm off the coast of Argentina that her traveling days ended. The company who owned it at that time decided not to spend the money to repair it, but instead sold it to a company to use as floating warehouse. It wasn't until it was practically falling apart that this company decided to scuttle the ship.

In the 60's a movement began to raise the ship, return it to Bristol, and renovate it as a museum. There is a great deal of exhibit that shows the complicated process the ship underwent to be brought back up to the surface, transported on a barge over 7000 miles form Argentina to Bristol, and them made seaworthy enough to float back up the river Avon to the same dry dock in Bristol where the ship was built. A truely amazing story.

They've done a magnificent job making it appear that the ship is floating when in fact, there is a glass structure built around the ship, which holds a few inches of water.

This allows you to go under the water and see the preserved iron hull. It is an impressive thing to see how large a vessel this was, and what an amazing engineering achievement it was for it's time.

It was also one of the first propeller driven ships instead of a side paddle. The ship allowed for retracting the propellers when opting to use favorable wind power to conserve fuel.

After going under the ship where the hull has been preserved in its current state, you can go up on top and inside the ship where it has been restored to its original 1850's configuration.

We took the audio tour, which gives you a lot of insight into what it must have been like to have traveled on this ship from Bristol to Australia - a 56 day journey.



Inside you can tour the first, second, and steerage class areas of the ship to get an idea of the differing accomodations. Niether group looked to have neither excessively luxurious nor excessively poor conditions on the ship.

One of the highlights for me was seeing a restored Brunel Engine. It is over 3 stories tall and sits center of the ship (I'm guessing due to weight). It was powered by coal and steam. A very impressive sight.

I could not help but think of the movie "Titanic", while viewing this ship. It is certainly a close relative to that ship which would be built about 55 years later.






Back on deck, I got to fulfill the fantasy of standing at the steering wheel of this magnificent ship.

The Great Britain is the #1 attraction in Bristol, and it certainly warrants a visit. It won the award for best museum the year it opened, and it is a terrific place to visit.

A weekend in Bristol - Part 1

I was invited by my friend Anthony and his boyfriend Jon to make a trip out to Bristol for a weekend visit. Bristol is about a 2 hour train ride west of London, and was an important trading port. A lot of the tobacco from the new world came into England via Bristol. It is also an important town in the history of steam locomotion, which can be summed up in one man Isambard Kingdom Brunel.



Anthony, the pups, and I headed over to Paddington Station, (built by Brunel), and hopped on a train, which follows much of Brunel's orignally designed path from London to Bristol.

Anthony had purchased us two first class tickets, which were actually only 20GBP more than regular tickets. This was a terrific idea as it allowed us to spread out with the dogs and enjoy a nice leasurely ride there. We practically had the entire car to ourselves.

Jon met us at the station in Bristol with his car and drove us to his townhome, that was originally built in the 1800's as housing for coal miners. It has been in his family off and on for a couple generations. He's done a bunch of work on it, and it is very charming.



Interestingly enough, the dogs have been to Bristol already - Even before me. When Tony and I went to the states in December, they came with Anthony to stay with Jon for part of that week. They are quite the travelers. Bentley of course wasted no time getting reaquainted with his old buddy Jon.


The following morning we got up and drove into town. Bristol is built around the river Avon, which flows through the center of town. Being that Bristol was an important trading port, it was heavily damaged in WW2. We saw this beautiful church that had been bombed out.

For breakfast, we went to the Nicholas Market, a cute outdoor market to a restaurant called "Source".




We had a full English breakfast complete with ham, grilled tomatoes, and black pudding to prepare us for a solid day of sightseeing and fun.





The weather seemed to be working in our favor in that it wasn't raining, albeit, it was a bit chillier than I was expecting.



Bristol has been an important city to England and has been joined at the hip with London via Brunel's railroad since the mid 1800's. It's history goes back to medieval days when it was a walled city. Thankfully a handful of these buildings still survive.

We walked around Bristols downtown, which is very quaint. It is much smaller and lowkey than London, and will be a fun place to come visit as an easy weekend getaway. I think Tony would like it a lot.

Of course Queen Victoria, embodying the 1800's was there to welcome me.





The Bristol Cathedral is a beautiful building. I'm not sure how it survived in WW2, but it is a magnificent structure up on a hill overlooking downtown Bristol.



Bristol is also very much a University town, and there are areas that feel it. With cute outdoor Coffee Houses, to tons of bookstores, and a youthful culture.


With most of the shipping now moved outside of Bristol, the old warehouse district is undergoing a major transformation into a new cultural hub for Bristol. Tons and tons of new construction from shops, to restaurants, to new housing are moving in.







Bentley found this art installation with a swimming dog particularly confusing.

Bristol is also home to Aardman Animation, which make the Wallace and Gromit films as well as a ton of commercials here in the UK. Their presence is felt throughout the warehouse district, where they are headquartered.








I understand their main production facility is located further out from downtown, but it was still fun to see their business offices.

We went to visit the Clifton Suspension Bridge that was designed by Brunel. It connects the 2 sides of the Avon River in a most dramatic fashion. Completed in 1864, 5 years after Brunel's death, as a memorial to the famous engineer.

The bridge originally had a strong Egyptian motif which was a popular style at the time. You can still see hints of it in the bridge.



For lunch/dinner, we went to the Grain Barge. It is a floating pub, that serves beer from the Bristol Brewery, and some amazing food.



I tried 1/2 pints of the three beers they had on tap, and had a wonderful Chicken and Leek Pie with a Creamy Gravy - Absolutely delicious.









I'd recommend eating here if ever you are in Bristol. It is both unique, reasonable, and good. We were so stuffed after this that we didn't plan to eat dinner.





That evening we went to the "Tobacco Factory Theater", a local theater which puts on plays. They were performing Richard II, one of Shakespeare's historical plays. I'd never seen or heard of it, so I was intrigued. The theater is in one of the old Tobacco Warehouses, from which it derives its name. Jon, an avid smoker, got a kick out of a sign forbidding smoking inside the tobacco warehouse.

The play was excellent, and I would also highly recommend going if you are in Bristol.