Coffee Musings . . .

I function best on 7 hours of sleep a night. Which is usually great . . . except when I’m exhausted and go to bed early . . . I’m up early! So at 5AM, sitting here with my laptop and a cup of our own, home grown coffee . . . it’s time for some coffee musings.

Costa Rican Coffee Isn’t Bad

It’s not as good as our coffee, but it isn’t bad. A lot of the cruise lines have marketing agreements with Britt coffee, and it’s not bad. However, you can do just as well, for a lot less money, going into a Costa Rican supermarket and buying coffee off the shelf. On my last cruise on the VOLENDAM we stopped in Punta Arenas and I bought about 6 different kinds of off the shelf Costa Rican coffee in the supermarket. The best were “Rey” (a supermarket chain here in Panama) and “1820″. What Britt has going for it (owned by Starbucks by the way), is a neat system whereby you can order a carton of their coffee and they will ship it directly to your US address.

My favorite Costa Rican coffee however is “Tarrazu” which is grown at around 5,000 feet. It is delicious shade grown, Arabica coffee. I’ve seen this in Trader Joe’s in Seattle. My favorite place to buy it is in Punta Arenas. Just off the pier there is a strip where a lot of vendors sell souvenirs, t-shirts, and coffee. There is an old (like me!) expat gringo named John who sells what he calls “Shade Lady” coffee. Now be careful! It’s “Shade Lady” you’re looking for, not “Shady Lady”! If you patronize Shady Lady you might bring home a lot more than what you bargained for! Anyway John buys green beans from farmers and the day before the ship comes in he roasts the coffee himself. It is really good and I always recommend it (and you’ll see a big line up of our ship passengers) and bring home some for my wife. Bringing twelve pounds of Costa Rican Tarrazu back to Boquete is a little like carrying coals to Newcastle, but we enjoy it. John has a perfect roast for our taste.

The Most Expensive Coffees in The World

Coffee: Kopi Luwak – Indonesia – $160 per pound
Coffee: Hacienda La Esmeralda – Boquete, Panama – $130 per pound
Coffee: Island Coffee Company – St. Helena – $79 per pound
Coffee: El Injerto – Guatemala – $50 per pound
Coffee: Fazenda Santa Ines – Brazil – $50 per pound
Coffee: Blue Mountain – Jamaica – $49 per pound
Coffee: Los Planes – El Salvador – $40 per pound
Coffee: Kona – Hawaii – $34 per pound
Coffee: Yauco Selecto AA – Puerto Rico – $22 per pound
Coffee: Fazenda Sao Benedito – Minas Gerias, Brazil – $21 per pound

Now the most expensive on the list is that stuff from Indonesia Kopi Luwak or Civet coffee that is made from coffee made from coffee cherries which have been eaten by a kind of weasel and passed through the digestive tract. The beans are then removed from the poop and made into coffee. Now if you will pay $160 a pound for shitty coffee, be my guest!

The second most expensive coffee in the world is produced by our Palmira neighbors, the Peterson family. The Peterson’s have been in Panama for over 40 years. When he got out of school Price and his new bride came to Panama to check out some property his family had above Boquete . . . and they never went back. Year after year their Esmeralda coffee’s have taken top honors. They also have a lovely dairy farm. If you walk down the road from the house we’re building in Palmira you eventually come to the back side of their dairy farm. It is beautiful! You would swear you are in Wisconsin! Anyway Price has developed a new strain of Arabica coffee called “Geisha” and it is the hottest and most expensive non-shitty coffee in the market.

You can buy a cup in Toronto coffee shops for $15 cup . . . also in Vancouver, as the following NBC news story illustrates:

How much would you pay to sample one of the world’s finest coffees? Customers at River Maiden Artisan Coffee in Vancouver, Washington are paying nearly $15 per cup of Panama Esmeralda Especial Reserva.

In fact, demand for the drink has exceeded owner Melissa Layman’s wildest expectations.

“[Initially] we just wanted to get through 8 cups — half a pound — and now we’re taking orders for next week,” Layman said. “Everyone thinks it’s worth it.”

She will sell the coffee until the 50 pounds she purchased run out . . .