Coffee Time!

It's Sunday morning here in China, and I am sipping on my magical morning brew. I started drinking coffee about five years ago on a regular basis because my aunt gave us an old espresso machine that she was not using. So I started drinking soy lattes in the morning and soon became a coffee fiend. I can handle not having coffee every now and then but my day seems to go much smoother if I have a cup in the morning. Just one cup. I'm not one to drink five cups of coffee in a day, nor do I imbibe after noon (most of the time). For Christmas a few years ago, Turner bought me a more powerful espresso machine and a burr grinder so we could have prefect lattes all the time. We also lived down the street from our local coffee roaster, Alakef in Duluth, MN.

So when our move to China became imminent, I was nervous about not being able to enjoy my brew in the land of tea. We packed a stove-top espresso maker and brought along a pound of Alakef grounds. For a while, my mom shipped coffee from Duluth to Qingdao so we could continue to enjoy coffee.

Then, one fortuitous day, we bumped into a fellow foreigner at a DVD shop and he told us about his Chinese friend Gordon who owns the only coffee roasting shop in Qingdao. We found our way to his shop, near Jusco but tucked away in a building with a small sign, and made quick friends with Gordon and his fuwuyuan (shop girl). He imports beans from all over the world and roasts them on-site, from Columbian to Yunnan to his famous Espresso blend. We usually get the Espresso blend--it's strong, full-bodied, and just damn good. On our most recent visit, Gordon looked like a child on Christmas morning. He had just received a new restaurant-quality espresso machine (see the bottom image), so he can make all sorts of espresso drinks, for free of course because we buy beans from him.

In the morning these days, I roll over and poke Turner, asking him, "What time is it?" I'm not looking for the hour but for the response, "Coffee time!" He makes me coffee most mornings in a traditional filter set-up into my extra-large Starbucks Qingdao mug.