The Trifecta

Walking the Coffee Fest Show floor Friday was mind boggling. Hundreds of displays, thousands of products. Aisles jammed with people from around the world. I heard discussions in Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Ethiopian,French, German, Russian, Italian, Australian (hey mate!), and yes, plain old English.

One of the neatest things we found was the Trifecta. At first I walked right past the booth, which was quite crowded, the object of the show goers envy hidden from my view. My first thought was that it was another new entry into the Espresso machine market. Got 6 of 'em--do I need another? As I came down the next next aisle I noticed the other side of the booth displayed the Bunn logo with their shiny stainless steel coffee brewers featured. It was not until I entered the booth that I realized that Trifecta is Bunn's latest entry into the high-end cutting edge single brew coffee technology. Those of you who know me may know my disdain for the Clover--an over priced single brew under performer bought up by Starbucks a few years ago. But it only took a short demonstration by Rusty Angell from Bunn to convince me otherwise.....

The Trifecta allows single cups (4-16 oz) of coffee to be brewed in 2 minutes with complete control over the brewing variables--11 of them in fact! One can program the machine for brew temperature, pre-infusion (pre-wetting the grounds), agitation, brew time and extraction pressure, among others. What is really cool, is that once you create a brew profile, you can save this to memory in the machine! Operation of the Trifecta is simple--measure the coffee, grind directly into the portafilter like brew cup, insert into the machine, select one of the saved brew profiles from the display (again, you can create and save 12 custom profiles or select  one of Trifecta's own default profiles). Push the start button and watch the magic! The machine preheats the water to the selected temperature, fills the clear cylinder over the brew handle and injects air through the base to agitate the coffee--reminiscent of the Bodum Santos brew system. It's a captivating performance, and at the end it literally injects the finished brew into your waiting cup.

We found the taste of the coffee exceptional-a  bit of turbidity in the cup, much like a French press, but no sludge in the bottom of the cup. Bright notes and nuances from the Guatemalan Huetutango were quite evident with a very pleasing finish. I can say that the Trifecta sets a new standard for coffee brewing technology.

Can't wait to bring one into the Front Porch!

Ahhh Seattle...the Capital of Coffee! We arrived Thursday for the Seattle Coffee Fest--a 3 day industry trade show billed as featuring everything that "smells like, looks like or tastes like coffee" We checked into the Hotel Sorrento an early 1900's style luxury hotel that catered to the train barrons during the settling of the Western Frontier.  This evening we met with our friends/past staff members for dinner at Via Tribunale, our favorite Neapolitan Pizza restaurant.  Alina is working for a catering company in Redmond making all the desserts and pastries.  She is happy and thriving, living in an apartment in Capitol Hill.  Mindaugas is working for a food distributor, driving the delivery truck and making sales calls, he also loves living in Seattle and fits into the city lifestyle seamlesley.  He and Stephanie had some news to share with us this evening; they are engaged!  He proposed to her up on a seanic overlook over Seattle and they were laughing about how the romantic candle he had brought up to the sight wouldn't stay lit because of the wind! They both were very excited and we look forward to coming back to attend their wedding.  Elvira also joined us, she has just arrived in Seattle and has yet to get fully settled in.  We were very impressed with these guys who after moving to Seattle less than a year ago have good jobs, live in a fun hip neighborhood, and are enjoying life....The American Dream!!!