The Reading Room

Why your coffee tastes different every day. 6 common causes and fixes: grind drift, bean aging, water changes, dose inconsistency, temperature, and dirty gear.

If you're like most people, Thanksgiving morning is devoted to turkey dinner preparation. There's little time for a big breakfast in between stuffing the bird, chopping the veggies, laying out the crudités and whatever other delectable treats you have planned...

The Rancilio Silvia has been on every best home espresso machine list for 25 years. Is it still worth buying in 2025? Here is the honest case for and against it.

Light vs dark roast comes down to 5 differences: flavor, caffeine, acidity, brewing method, and antioxidants. Here is what the research shows and how to pick the right roast for your cup.

Your coffee preferences reveal your personality. Find your brewing style and the Blackout Coffee roast to match your daily routine.

It’s autumn. You can tell it’s autumn because the trees are a blaze of color, the air is crisp with the promise of frost and your favorite coffee shop has broken out the pumpkin spice coffee. It’s a rite of...

 The Cup of Excellence is the most rigorous coffee competition on earth. Learn how it works, why winning matters, how Brazil started it all, and what a CoE score actually means.

Coffee has a long history, entrenched in many different cultures around the world. The drink has nursed many ideas, brewed revolutions, and inspired writers. For its inaugural event, "Coffee's Night Out" will be taking place in Greenpoint, a neighborhood of...

Siphon coffee uses heat and vacuum to brew one of the cleanest, most complex cups you can make at home. It looks like a science experiment. It tastes like the best coffee you have ever made.

As we mentioned in a previous post, the Big Central Regional Barista and Brewer's Cup Competition took place in Minneapolis over the weekend. The Big Central is comprised of the North Central and South Central regions. For each region, there...

Espresso signature drinks are creative non-alcoholic espresso-based beverages that go beyond the standard latte. Here is what they are, where they come from, and 5 ideas to make at home.

As the coffee industry continues to grow and the consumer becomes more informed, restaurants are taking note. Michelin-starred restaurants are at the top of the high-end food game and when news broke that 30% of the world's top-level restaurants use...

French press, AeroPress, pour over, Chemex, or siphon? Each manual coffee brewer produces a different cup. Here is how to pick the right one for your taste, budget, and brewing style.

Fair warning. If you think that adding anything to your exquisitely brewed coffee is sacrilege, you might want to stop reading right here, because it’s about to get worse. Much worse – or better, depending on your point of view....

The release of the new DSM-5 – the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders – has kicked up a firestorm of headlines and commentary online and elsewhere for its inclusion of a number of controversial “mental disorders,” which includes...

If your favorite coffees come from south of the border, you may be in trouble next year. The unusually wet rainy season and warmer average temperatures in Central America and the northern countries of South America have resulted in widespread...

Remember all the hoopla about a year back when a study seemed to show that green coffee bean extract really, truly does help people lose weight? Just to refresh the memory, the researchers theorized that the chlorogenic acid (CGA) in...

A café mocha is espresso, chocolate, steamed milk, and whipped cream in one cup. Here is the 5-step home recipe plus tips for getting the chocolate-to-espresso balance right every time.

French coffee uses a light roast. Its color is called robe de moine because it resembles that of a monk’s robe. Here’s a simple recipe for brewing two traditional cups of French Cafe Au Lait: 1. Put about 2/3 ounce...

You do not have to be a barista to make Starbucks’ signature drink – the caffé latte. The latte, which means ‘milk’ in Italian, is by far the most popular espresso-based drink offered by any coffee bar. Yet, although the...

How to choose an espresso machine for your home. Compare manual, semi-automatic, and super-automatic machines by budget, skill level, and cup quality.