Embracing the office coffee weirdo
The fine line between scorn and the best ship - friendship
TMR Correspondent, Matty T, is much braver than I am. Check out his bold step into the world of the unknown by making his colleagues a coffee.
It's a fine line, right?
Impressing your colleagues with some off-the-hook brew.
Or, the more likely outcome, coming across as a total wank-face and locking in your reputation as the office wierdo.
Unleashing specialty coffee on your workmates is risky business – get it wrong and they'll mercilessly rip you a new one.
Even if you get it right, chances are they'll only “sorta like it”, and follow through with “it doesn't really taste like coffee”, or, the ultimate “I like Jeds from the supermarket better, have you heard of Jeds? It's really good, you should try it, it's wayyyyyy better than this”.
So, armed with a good idea of the margins involved, I decided to lug a box of brewing kit into the office and shout my workmates a brew on my last day (I waited till the very end to do this).
In I walk – grinder, gooseneck kettle, scales, thermometer, Origami, Hario jug, AeroPress and papers.
The point was to showcase specialty coffee to folks who are content to grab a flat white or two each day, or those who happily rip into the non-branded office supply.
To give them a hint of what else is out there (given most of them spend $5.50 a pop) and serve them a cuppa that will cost them less than that a day to feed their caffeine addiction.
My arsenal of beans included grape-infused, extended fermented, washed Kenya and a banana yeast-infused. A tasty line-up.
I get brewing – bashing out pourovers and AeroPress for the team.
They get sipping.
Positive results – the Felipe Arcila grape honey from Viking Coffee in Dunedin hit the mark first up, while the Jario Arcila ice natural castillo from Rocket Coffee in Hamilton got some positive “oooooooooooos”.
All-in-all a massive success, with colleagues appreciative of having the chance to try something different.
It was a good way to say farewell to some good people – and who knows, one or two may get on the specialty coffee train.
What a legend that lad is. It’s always tough being ‘that guy’ in the office, hand grinding beans while others smash some Jeds. Ka rawe to Matty T for being a bad ass and brewing up a storm. He had some very lucky colleagues.
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