KC Perky

In order of discovery!

Coffee Art

Coffee Art is alive and well in KC, and here’s proof.  I unfortunately have no idea what shop Lesa and her sister were drinking at, but, yeah.  What a beauty.

Starbucks is trimming management.  They claim no baristas will be laid off, but I suspect it is only a matter of time till branches start to feel the pinch.  Its unfortunate, but I fear coffee shops in general will be feeling the pinch of this economic down turn, more so than any other type of food service.

How Coffee Works.  A brief history of coffee, how its made, how decaf is made (worthless), and everything else.  There’s a collalary documentary on Discovery channel some times if you want to watch it.  Pop quiz: Which is the only US state to grow coffee?

Coffee, as told by napkins.  Back in December a NYT guy had a lot of fun telling a coffee story, illustrated by drawing with coffee onto napkins.  This is old news by now (2 months is forever on the internet), but if you missed it, the illustrations and story are pretty amusing.

Twitter brews up business.  Hey KC coffee shop owners, want to improve your customer’s experience?  Try what this shop did: allow ordering via Twitter.  If anybody does this, please, please, PLEASE let me know @mildweed (or this post).  I will SO tweet you some orders, as would the rest of the Social Media Club of KC, probably.

Boozefish goes MORE European with “Le plaisir de jour” (aka Boozefish Brunch).  Now on Saturdays, you can get very special espresso along with authentic crepes.  Of note, its only from 10-2, so don’t wake up toooooo early on Saturday.

Wired Waldo.  Finally back to KC coffee shops specifically, Waldo is about to explode with coffee shops.  Silly me, till this article was published a couple days ago, I only knew about one of these.  As far as I can tell, there are only a few parts of town with this kind of density: Downtown, Crossroads, 39th St / Westport, The Plaza, and JCCC.  Something tells me that Waldo doesn’t have the kind of coffee traffic to keep all 3 alive.  Location, location, location, people.

Also, I’m posting some map updates right now.  Thanks for all the tips Kay, Darrell, Mike and Bret, keep ‘em comin in to scott@kcperky.com:

Bean Counter Cafe, 9019 S Highway 7, Lee’s Summit, MO 60464
Dean & Deluca, 4700 West 119th St, Leawood, KS
Kansas City Coffee Company, 1807 East 123rd Terrace, Olathe, Kansas 66061
Java Crossing, 8830 West 95th Street, Overland Park, Kansas 66212
Latte Land, 7224 W 135th St, Overland Park, KS 66223 (Where Beanology used to be)

Its getting hard to keep up with all the Latte Land locations.  They’re possibly the city’s most successful local coffee chain.

In a jealous attempt to keep up with this blog, the Coffee Map is back now too and getting better than it ever was before.  As you will see, it is now going to show if the shop has WiFi available for customers.  If you know a place to have WiFi and I don’t have it marked as such yet on the map, let me know, I’ll get it corrected.  The map now also has some tea listings!  We’ll get more as Karen gets rolling.  While I’m feeling ambitious, are there any other map-related requests any of you have?

First up, UMKC student Laura Katzer did a roundup of coffee shops near campus, and she did a very good job.  Go check it out.

Next up, again, KCPerky is in need of a Southland Correspondent.  “I am seeking somebody who lives /works in roughly the OP/Leawood area and is as crazy as I am to join me is my exploration. Email me if you’re interested.”   I know you exist down there, KC’s Ad Club just started their Southland Coffee Fridays.

As many of you long-time readers know, my yardstick of a barista’s skill / tools is a mocha.  I feel I have finally run my course with that on this side of 75th St.  As new shops pop up, that will still be my go-to, but a new day has risen and its name is Double Shot Espresso.  Look out, all you demitasse, I will be sipping from you shortly.  Will I like long shots?  Will I like ristretto style?  How many baristas will even know how to make a ristretto shot?  Hard to say. Broadway Cafe’s got the early lead on those.  The goal is to find an espresso just like the ones I had in Paris.  Those things are fantastic.

Speaking of Parisian coffee experiences, those long, narrow sugar packets they use there fit so nicely on a demitasse saucer.  I’ve already found I have trouble balancing our wider packets on the tiny plate.

By the way, I’ve got half-written reviews for Scooters, Main Street Cafe, Broadway Cafe, Mildred’s, City Market Coffee Shop, and JavaLand.  Somebody kick me in the butt to finish them, please.

I’m looking at you, awesome shops that have recently closed.  Crave Cafe.  Magazines and Coffee.  Cafe Nouri.  Nighthawks.

http://www.coffeeshopprofits.com/
http://www.crimsoncup.com/open_sevenstepstosuccess.php
http://www.espressobusiness.com/book.htm
http://www.homerscoffeehouse.com/new%20book.htm

Sure, each of these sites wants to sell you a book, but perhaps that’s what you need.  When not drinking coffee or grinding away at my day job, I do improv comedy pretty seriously.  How many books do I have on the topic of improv comedy?  Over 25.  And its not even my livelihood.  Certainly, you can afford 3 or 4 books before you go and buy your massive espresso machine.

I’d like to take this opportunity to send out a warm welcome to KCPerky’s new Southland Coffee Correspondent, Jennifer!   In her own words:

I recently joined Scott in this adventure to explore coffe shops beyond Starbucks. Don’t get me wrong I like Starbucks but there is definitely better coffee houses out there. I am helping out in this great adventure to go to the shops in Johnson County. I know that I’m here for a good time.

Everybody say, ‘Hi Jennifer!’

Think that coffee shops with art showings is as close as coffee and art come? Hardly! There are many shops in town that will offer art ON your coffee. Hardly a revolutionary idea, but this video adds a whole new perspective to the world of art on coffee:

For less exciting (but still good) latte art in KC, visit The Roastarie, Broadway Cafe, or Espresso dell’Anatra. Readers: Where else have you seen good coffee art in KC?

//update: the company in question that makes this is OnLatte

Green this, green that. Every publication under the sun is writing something about being green. So why not KCPerky saying how to greenify your coffee?

For our purposes today, we won’t be talking about the chances of global warming being real, and we won’t be going into a detailed account of what you can do in your own life to significantly slow it, despite China and pundits. We will be talking about waste management. Specifically, those cups and sleeves you keep using on your to-go coffee. I have two products that will get you set right…

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Good Morning, bean heads. How much coffee is there in KC? Enough to fill these huge coffee pots.

There is a SUPER-massive coffee map update pending. Hold on to your seats, because its going to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 more shops as well as map functionality additions. Its taking a long time to verify the listings as well as just get it all organized properly, so it might be a bit yet.

So, with this many new shops, and many of them being much farther south than I usually am, I have realized that there are way too many shops in town. Especially for just one man to drink from all of them and keep the listings up to date. Therefore, I am seeking somebody who lives /works in roughly the OP/Leawood area and is as crazy as I am to join me is my exploration. Email me if you’re interested.

Brandon Briscoe of The Roastarie wrote a very nice article on coffee tastings over at Tastebud Magazine here in KC.

Go check it out: Tastebud: Drink Beans

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So there I was, just minding my own business.  Wearing green.   Dancing a jig.  Wanting to drink a McDonald’s Shamrock Shake.  When this beast ruined St. Patrick’s Day:

That’s right, the McDonald’s McCafe atrocity.

4 Stores in a row, no Shamrock Shakes.

According to the manager at the 4th store, McDonald’s marketing department is working so hard to promote the McCafe coffee, they skipped doing Shamrock Shakes all together!

Such a shame.  Their coffee isn’t even that great.