Alterra Coffee Roasters News

Joe Simonds Recommends...

       Name of Alterran: Joe Simonds
       Favorite Drink: Shooter (Tom's double 8oz honey latte)
       Position: Systems Administrator
       Location: Prospect East
       Fun Fact: "I can fly."

"The first tentative sips drummed my lips like rain beginning to fall in a forest.  As I took the brew in, a shadowy cloud of rustic flavors descended upon my mouth.  Sheets of pungent spice washed around my tongue, and puddles of earthy overtones formed. There was a flash of acidic snap followed closely by a thunderclap of body that rolled across my palate.  Torrents of lush, mossy tastes flowed down my throat as my mind's eye envisioned a far away island covered in dense jungle.  With a solid balance, maple-syrupy body and a deep wet-earth flavor the Sulawesi Toraja is a wonderful herald of spring after another Wisconsin winter.

Scott Lucey Recommends...

     Name of Alterran: Scott B. Lucey
     Favorite Drink: Double Espresso
     Position: Barista Training Specialist
     Location: Prospect Avenue café
     Fun Fact: Scott is from a dairy farm and will always love cows.

"For  my coffee recommendation, I choose our Kenya AA Mtaro from the Nyeri region.  My Kenya kick started about one month ago, when I was simply grabbing a 12oz to-go for the walk home (1.3m).  My choice was Kenya, and within one block from the front door, I was experiencing such delicious flavors, the barista inside was turning me around to go back and pull this coffee as a single-origin espresso. The active-complexity I was having drinking that drip brew could only be  intensified as an espresso.  I was in the middle of figuring out a signature drink for the Midwest Regional Barista Competition, and this deliciousness was it.  Anyway, I get a beautiful roundness and mouthfeel that somehow hits all the right spots on my palate and my mouth: sweet, citric notes, that perfect ripe mango or banana, and/or the taste I can inhale with my head inside a bag of brown sugar – these are the things that make this coffee a blazing arrow."