Diesel, made simply from coffee grounds (ah, the exhaust aroma)

By Henry Fountain
Published: December 16, 2008

In research that touches on two of Americans' great obsessions — coffee and cars — scientists at the University of Nevada, Reno, have made diesel fuel from used coffee grounds.

The technique is not difficult, they report in The Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, and there is so much coffee around that several hundred million gallons of biodiesel could potentially be made annually.

Dr. Mano Misra, a professor of engineering who conducted the research with Narasimharao Kondamudi and Susanta K. Mohapatra, said it was by accident that he realized coffee beans contained a significant amount of oil. "I made a coffee one night but forgot to drink it," he said. "The next morning I saw a layer of oil floating on it." He and his team thought there might be a useful amount of oil in used grounds, so they went to several Starbucks stores and picked up about 50 pounds of them.

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Gifts for the coffee lover

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World Coffee Deficit May Be 8 Million Bags in 2009-10

By Claire Leow
Dec. 9 (Bloomberg) -- World coffee consumption may outstrip production by as much as 8 million bags in 2009-10 because of the smaller crop in Brazil, the top grower, said Nestor Osorio, International Coffee Organization Executive Director.

``It's a tight situation that will support prices,'' Osorio said in an interview today in Ho Chi Minh City.

Prices of the mild-tasting arabica coffee used by Starbucks Corp. jumped 6.1 percent yesterday, the biggest gain in almost three years as Brazil's Agriculture Minister Reinhold Stephanes said output may drop as much as 22 percent next year to as low as 36 million bags. Prices of the bitter-tasting robusta used in espresso and instant coffee by Nestle SA climbed 4.3 percent.

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Talking With The King Of Coffee

NEW YORK, Dec. 8, 2008 | by Katie Couric

Katie Couric speaks exclusively with Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz. (CBS)

(CBS) He's the king of coffee, who oversees more than 16,000 Starbucks worldwide, and for putting lingo like "can I have a doppio espresso macchiato" into everyday lexicon.

"Why do you have to do that? Why can't you say small, medium and large like normal people?" CBS News anchor Katie Couric asked Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks.

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Does caffeine increase weight loss?

Mayo Clinic dietitian Katherine Zeratsky, R.D., L.D., and colleagues answer select questions from readers.

Answer

A few studies indicate that caffeine may slightly enhance weight loss in people who exercise and maintain a low-fat diet. But there's no evidence that increased caffeine intake results in significant or permanent weight loss.

Marketers of fad diets and weight-loss supplements often exaggerate the benefits of caffeine, claiming that caffeine will significantly curb your appetite and help you drop pounds quickly. However, clinical studies on the relationship between caffeine and weight loss don't support these claims.

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Colombia wants coffee countries to buy Starbucks

BOGOTA, Nov 23 (Reuters) - Coffee-growing nations should buy Starbucks and create their own distribution chain as the U.S. company grapples with slowing sales, Colombia's coffee federation chief said in an interview published on Sunday.

Gabriel Silva, director of the National Federation of Coffee Growers, also told El Tiempo newspaper that Colombia will accumulate four times the coffee stocks it did a year ago to build inventories and shore up coffee prices.

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McDonald's goes after slice of gourmet coffee market

By Carly Harrington
Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Want a latte with that Big Mac?

Customers can now order one at most Knoxville-area McDonald's restaurants where mochas, lattes and cappuccinos are being served up alongside Happy Meals.

The McCafe, a concept that was first introduced by the fast-food chain in Australia in 1993, has finally reached East Tennessee, where local franchisees are attempting to grab a share of the gourmet coffee market with the Golden Arches brand of espresso-based drinks.

"We're becoming baristas," said Tom Cochran, whose family owns 29 McDonald's restaurants in the area. "It's been a learning process."

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Across France, Cafe Owners Are Suffering

By STEVEN ERLANGER
Published: November 22, 2008

SAULIEU, France — Nathalie Guérin, 35, opened Le Festi’Val bar and cafe here two years ago full of high hopes, after working at this little Burgundy town’s main competition, the Café du Nord. But this summer, business started to droop, and in October, she said, “it’s been in free fall.”

“Now there’s no one,” she said, standing in a somber room with a few sad holiday decorations, an idle pool table and one young man playing a video game.

“People fear the future, and now with the banking crisis, they are even more afraid,” she said, her eyes reddening. “They buy a bottle at the supermarket and they drink it at home.”

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High service roasters do more than just roast coffee

By David Smith • Spill the Beans columnist

The specialty coffee business seems to draw an inordinate number of entrepreneurs who are driven by issues beyond financial motivation.
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Social and environmental issues are regularly championed and emphasized by retailers, roasters and coffee-related media.

Many retailers and quality roasters go above and beyond the necessary and practical issues of business survival and growth by extending their reach into community enhancing projects, both local and global.

Of course, many other (non-coffee) businesses are also intimately involved in helping to make their communities and the world a better place in which to live. But my perception is that the specialty coffee world does a better and more consistent job of heralding and promoting that kind of involvement among its ranks. Several truly high service roasters seem especially devoted to issues beyond their bottom lines.

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New technique for French Press

This video was posted on About Coffee Social Network


Videocast #2 - French Press Technique from James Hoffmann on Vimeo.

Coffee cups get recycling reprieve (Toronto)

by John Spears
City Hall Bureau

Toronto coffee shops will get a second chance to come up with a plan for curbing the flood of throwaway paper cups – a million a day – that flow into the city's garbage bins.

But councillors on the city's works committee say they want to move ahead on a proposal requiring stores to give customers a 10-cent refund if they bring their own bag instead of using a plastic one.

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Green Mountain Coffee 4Q profit nearly doubles

WATERBURY, Vt. (AP) -- Specialty coffee maker Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. reported Wednesday that its fiscal fourth-quarter profit nearly doubled as sales jumped 45 percent.

The company also gave earnings guidance for fiscal 2009 that, when certain items are excluded, is in line with Wall Street expectations.

For the three months ended Sept. 27, the company said it recorded net income of $7.1 million, or 28 cents a share, a 98 percent increase from the profit of $3.6 million, or 14 cents a share, recorded a year earlier.

Sales rose to $134.8 million from $93 million.

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Coffee Production to Rise 15% to Record on Brazil, Licht Says

By Claudia Carpenter

Nov. 13 (Bloomberg) -- Global coffee production will rise 15 percent to a record 139 million bags this season on bigger crops from Brazil and Vietnam, the world's largest growers, F.O. Licht said in its first estimate for the harvest that started Oct. 1.

The jump from 121.1 million bags last season will include a Brazil crop of 49.7 million bags and a Vietnam harvest of 20.9 million bags, F.O. Licht analyst Stefan Uhlenbrock said in an interview today from Ratzeburg, Germany. A bag weighs 60 kilograms (132 pounds).

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Starbucks sets pay for new CFO

By Melissa Allison
Seattle Times business reporter

Starbucks new chief financial officer, Troy Alstead, will be paid a base salary of $450,000 plus a potential bonus of $225,000. He will receive stock options worth $210,000 and life insurance worth three times his base salary.

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