A Morning at Intelligentsia Part 1
In today's episode, BB co-founder and Make editor in chief Mark Frauenfelder heads out to Intelligentsia Coffee & Tea for an exclusive tour. Intelligentsia Coffee & Tea is based out of Chicago, Illinois and has recently opened up a new store in the Silverlake neighborhood of Los Angeles.
Kyle Glanville, head of research and development at Intelligentsia and winner of the 2008 US Barista Championship shows Mark how they acquire and roast some of the finest coffee in the world.
The word intelligentsia derives from the Latin word intelligentia, meaning a group of people engaged in complex mental and creative labor directed to the development and dissemination of culture. Kyle Glanville has been laboring to promulgate a new coffee culture with Intelligentsia to combat the "get up and go" mentality, and Mark is along for the ride to learn the careful art of roasting coffee.
Intelligentsia is located at 3922 West Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California 90029 and is open 7 days a week.
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Ths s >nt wht trn n bng-bng t s.
There is no word 'intellintia' in Latin. The current meaning of the word intelligentsia derives from a Russian word, which was in turn derived from intellegentia/intelligentia; however, this latter word is simply defined as 'intelligence'. Even the English word intelligentsia is generally considered to have the more mundane meaning of 'the class of society regarded as possessing culture and political initiative'; that Wikipedia's short description is one more suited for an advertisement than an encyclopaedia is unfortunate.
Love that rebuilt roaster. But please, kill the sound effects on the lower 3rds - they're way louder than the dialogue.
Thanks for doing a show about high-end coffee. I've been privy to watch roasters like Intelligentsia, and am amazed by the detailed note-taking and experimenting that help them refine their roasts. It's what distinguishes Stumptown and Intelligentsia-level roasters from 95% of the coffee out there.
I have a personal web project, espressomap.com, that helps you find cafes on par with Intelligentsia, in case anybody gets jonesin' for that quality stuff.
Mark, If you are ever in Salt Lake City then visit Salt Lake Roasting Company. The owner has been roasting coffee since ~1982 and the same baker has been in the kitchen all those years too, mmmm!
"It is impossible to understand coffee without also learning of the cultures from which it comes ....."
So he has visited Brazil, Peru, Indonesia, Ethiopia, Columbia, Kenya and Central America over the years. http://www.roasting.com/traveljournal.html
My friend Matt Riddle works as the designer for Intelligentsia here in Chicago, and he was also the 2006 US Barista champ to boot!
Last year, I got a chance to attend a tasting of La Esmeralda, one of the most expensive coffees in the world (pics and video).
Also, just for kicks - here's Matt holding a big novelty check.
Oh, Intelligentsia, how I miss you so. There is fantastic coffee in Toronto, but it's just not the same.
Awesome, just awesome. I remember watching my grandad roasting some cofee beams in a small roaster. We cutivated one or another tree in our garden, when I was a kid. I can remember the smell exactly... oh boy...
This place has the best espresso in LA (that I've tasted) - we get to see why. Count me as one pleased with this episode.
That Kyle Glanville is a handsome boy... someone should get him a teevee show. ;)
Kyle just left for Copenhagen to compete for the world barista champ title. live video coverage will happen later this week here - http://www.worldbaristachampionship.com/
Number 7, number 7! Be aware that Intelligentsia is available in Toronto - at finer coffee dealers *cough* Mercury Organic Espresso Bar *cough*
I'm gay for Kyle Glanville!
The World Barista Championship, like international soccer, is a great chance to pull for Americans as underdogs.
Go Kyle!
USA! USA!
I hope this doesn't mean the lines will now be even longer.
I thought "Intelligentsia" meant "home for snobbish hipsters who confuse looking homeless for fashion".
That's been my experience there.
I like today’s episode a lot. I didn’t know that Germany produced such good machinery of coffee-makers(!). I like the fact that they could easily modify the roaster to that great up-to-date commercial equipment.
Great engineering and great episode! I was amused.
Now, I'm in a hurry to get a coffee...
I don't know if anyone else has mentioned this but...
please for the love of god start tweaking the audio levels on these videos so speech is audible without having all the other noise coming out at annoyingly-loud-car-stereo sort of levels.
I had to have the volume uncomfortably loud just to hear and discern any of the dialog.
Alternately, giving us captions would be good, too. Or making more effective use of mics... whatever works. Just please make it easier to hear people actually speak or be able to tell what they're saying.
It's a bit flustering to have all sorts of really loud noise coming from your speakers and still having to pay close attention to make out the speech buried deep within all of it.
This case it might make sense with because of the location, but really every episode seems to have had loud background sound and quiet speech.
#14: Why on earth would you think a coffee shop called Intelligentsia would be a home for snobbish hipsters?