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Café Scene in Vietnam - Its international now
Van is going to be able to give us some on the spot updates on the coffee scene in Vietnam from the beginning of next week so stay tuned and In the meantime things seem to be hotting up with major retailers such as Metrang, Trung Nguyen, and Phuc Long slugging it out with Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, Starbucks and MCafe. Every one of them talking about expansion.
Below Me Trang's new Nha Trang cafeThe Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf got off to a bumpy start in their early days but now have 13 shops in HCMC and 2 in Hanoi with steady expansion predicted at 3 new stores next year.
Coffee culture is ingrained into the Vietnamese psyche and there is the belief that you just open the shop and the customers will come.
Some internationals however have got it wrong with Gloria Jeans just recently closing their last Vietnamese store.
Scarily Starbucks’ who arrived in 2013 now has 24 shops of which 18 are in HCMC and 6 in Hanoi. They are positioning them selves as a high end brand and taking advantage of the increasing disposable income and ‘foreign is good’ cachet. Drinks range from VND 85,000 to 100,000 per cup.
Another American new comer is PJ’s, they are trying their luck with similar price range as Starbucks and tapping into their New Orleans roots to get a point of difference.
McDonald’s have after starting 9 fast food shops launched their Mc Café system and joined the throng of food service providers like Tous Les Jours, Paris Baguettes and Dunkin Donuts pushing their drinks range alongside the food.
You don’t have to go far for a coffee in Vietnam with competing stores popping up very close to each other.
Phuc Long is confident they will maintain their share in the coffee phin with their competitive pricing and traditional range.
Below Me Trang's new Nha Trang cafe upstairsTalking of traditional range Metrang officially opened their new MeKing Café at 15 Tran Hung Dao St, Loc Tho, Nha Trang. In front of the busy night marker. Looks like a great place to sip your coffee and watch the passing parade
Don’t forget that We at Viet-Coffee are the go to place for Metrang’s famous MC1 range of coffee.
Vietnamese Coffee - it’s the Beans, it’s the roast, it’s the brew.
We at Viet-coffee continue to enjoy the beans the roast and the brew. Its been a bit cold to have Caphe sua da so we’ve skipped the Da for a bit but we do have another special offer for you.
Our EMC2 Robusta is typically Vietnamese in the beans being Robusta with almost twice the caffeine of Arabica, its roast is a long and slow butter roast that add to the chocolate fruit and nuts tones and the phin drip brew gives a syrupy strong liquor just ideal to be matched with Longevity Milk.
I love this little article I found on the internet about Vietnamese coffee and how to make and enjoy it.
Say Keng Lee, Knowledge Adventurer & Technology Explorer in Strategy, Change & Future-Focus I actually wrote this piece about Vietnam's uniquely famous coffee drink as part of my English coaching of Vietnamese professionals, so as to enable them to articulate eloquently about it, especially to foreign principals.
To me, it serves as a good response to your question.
"Good Evening:Ladies & Gentlemen. Distinguished Guests.
My name is S K, and I am here today to introduce you to Vietnam’s famous coffee drink.
It’s known locally as “caphe sua da pha phin”.
The "phin" is the Vietnamese name for the decanter, a quirky and yet simple Vietnamese coffee filtering contraption, functioning as a single-serve filter, which instills a slow-drip process of on-the-spot, right-in-your-face coffee brewing.
Translated into English, it's basically rich coffee mixed with sweet condensed milk and cool ice cubes, decanter style. The decanter is actually a four-piece all-stainless-steel-or aluminum) combo
A spoonful of freshly-ground extra-bold roast-blend coffee is first poured in the decanter, which sits nicely on the rim of a short glass. Boiling water is added until it slowly brews, and filters slowly into the short glass, which already contains a healthy dollop of condensed milk.
By the way, inside the decanter there is some sort of small-round-thin metal piece, which actually functions as a gravity-pull self-pressing device, thus inducing the slow-drip, facilitated by the small weight of the boiling water at the beginning stage.
The entire process generally takes a few minutes. It’s believed that the slower the drip, with one tiny drop at a time, roughly about one drop per second, the better it tastes.
When the steady dripping finishes its natural course, the liquid coffee then mixes with the condensed milk in the short glass below. One can easily smell the fragrance of the rich coffee.
The coffee and condensed milk mixture is then stirred. Buy your 3 pack of Longevity Milk here for $7.50
The combinatory mix is then poured into a tall glass, already filled with ice cubes to the brim, which originally comes with a long and slender tea spoon stuck in position. The spoon is also used in the stirring function.
Again with the aid of the given tea spoon, one just pulls it up and pushes it down through the ice cubes in the tall glass containing the mix, like a piston in an engine.
Moving the spoon in a piston-like fashion, the final mix of sweetness and bitterness is ready for enjoyment.
The final additional human gesture ostensibly gives one the psychic satisfaction of seeing a simple job being done well.
You then take one small sip at a time, either using the given spoon or the accompanying straw. Taking small sips, and not big gulps, as with other type of coffee drinks, I am sure this practice definitely has something to do with influence from the French colonialists, who apparently introduced coffee drinking into the country during the 18th century.
The first sip will invariably brain you up, as well as relax your mood. This is the mystique of the coffee drink.
I am not a coffee connoisseur, but I reckon it's the synergistic confabulation of the sweetness of the condensed milk, the potent brew of the rich roast-blend coffee, and the cool refreshing kick of the ice cubes, which makes "caphe sua da pha phin" a quintessential coffee drink, now known around the world, including Singapore.
To help you on your way to this decadent pleasure we have a special on the EMC2 robusta – there are only 2 cartons at this price – single 500g packs $5.99 or further discounts on shipping with the BX1 and Bulk packs and 5 kg pack (Free Aluminium phin with every order remember to ask for it in your order notes)
Brews well with its coarser grind in Phin, drip, French press, cold brew or chemex.
Be generous with the serve with 20g or at least 1 tablespoon per cup to get that syrupy liquor..
Buy 500g soft pack EMC2 Robusta here $5.99
Buy 500g x 5 soft pack EMC2 Robusta with shipping here $38.95
Buy 500g x 9 soft pack EMC2 Robusta with shipping here $63.91
One carton sold in 2 days One carton left to go
Buy 250g x 9 soft pack Trung Nguyen Gourmet Blend with shipping here $49.67
Buy 250g x 5 soft pack Trung Nguyen House Blend with shipping here $49.99
Here is Shauns Website for more information on his challenge and he will keep us up to date on his travels up and down the hills of Vietnam ( Bloke and a Bike site )
The State of the Global Coffee Trade from the International Coffee Organisation
The latest facts and figures about the global coffee trade from the International Coffee Organization.
Monthly Trade Stats: Exports
Latest update: 30 November 2016
9.13 million bags
World coffee exports amounted to 9.13 million bags in October 2016, compared with 9.31 million bags in October 2015. (Goes to show if you do the maths 12 x months and add it up that its a bit seasonal - in fact with coffee grown both in the north and south hemispheres there are two seasons)
71.93 million bags of Arabica
In the twelve months ending October 2016, exports of Arabica totalled 71.93 million bags compared to 69.21 million bags last year (Arabica production up to meet ongoing demand for bean to cup sales across the world - Difference in styles between Robusta and Arabica still affecting sales of Robusta as Robusta stilll getting a bad rap. However we know at Viet-coffee that good quality robusta enables us to get a great flavousome coffee at a bargain price)
40.46 million bags of Robusta
In the twelve months ending October 2016, Robusta exports amounted to 40.46 million bags compared to 43.81 million bags last year. (Quite a big drop here - instant coffee sales still growing, which is where most Robusta ends up. The data is not finely granulated enough for us to tell if its the lower quality that is selling less or?)
World consumption, production and stock change (2012/13 - 2015/16)
The coffee market ended 2015/16 in deficit for the second consecutive year, but stocks accumulated in 2012/13 and 2013/14 have allowed the market to remain well supplied.
Data as at 14 October 2016 - next update January 2017 (this deficit in production will eventually lead to problems of supply as with increasing numbers of significant climate events making production less reliable through drought and temperature problems Robusta may get to be king! There is no comment on the coffee stockpile but we have seen steady pricing so one may assume that the accumulated stock is being released steadily to keep the price stable.)
-3.3 million 60kg bags
Estimated deficit between production and consumption in 2015/16
Global Coffee Production
Data as at 14 October 2016 - next update January 2017
148 million
Estimated number of 60 kg bags of coffee produced in 2015/16
+0.9%
Estimated increase in global coffee production in 2015/16 compared to 2014/15
0.7%
Estimated change in global production of Arabica coffees in 2015/16 compared to previous coffee year
1.3%
Estimated increase in global production of Robusta coffees in 2015/16 compared to previous coffee year (this contradicts the reduction in exports but this may be accounted for by increased local consumption in coffee producing areas)
Global Coffee Consumption
Data as at 14 October 2016 - next update January 2017
151.3 million
Estimated number of 60 kg bags of coffee consumed in coffee year 2015/16 (Oct. 2015 to Sep. 2016)
1.3%
Average annual growth rate in global coffee consumption since coffee year 2012/13 (- may sound percentage wise not very large but its a lot of cups of coffee!! and with no large increases in production associated with reduction in the coffee stockpile we may have a bumpy ride over the upcoming years a bit like the severe frost in Brazil in 1975 and the Brazil drought in 2014 - Bad weather = high coffee prices)
However our prices effectively remain the same - grab a Vietnamese coffee bargain today from Viet-coffee.com.au.
Coffee trends - focus on the quality of water
For Aussies that travel around a lot you know that the water tastes different from place to place this is due to different levels of minerals dissolved in the water and this not only makes a difference in the taste of water but your coffee also.
In the past a lot of attention has been paid to the effect of bean choice, roasting, grinding and extracting and now more recently, the world class baristas have begun discussing in greater depth the importance of water in the brewing process.
There are numerous books and articles both in print and on the web on the topic and some quite scientific articles’ are available.
Coffee Science has a choose your water guide (http://www.coffeescience.org/how-to-choose-best-water-for-coffee/) with some interesting points about what’s actually in the water (and out) that makes a difference. You have to remember that your cuppa is really 98% water so it’s a significant part of the whole. Not just an ingredient! Its something more!
The significance of water is it’s the solvent that is extracting the flavour compounds from the roasted coffee seeds. It forms chemical bonds in the seed and carries the bonded product away from the seed for your coffee.
Water chemisty – High Magnesium ion levels in water improve extraction and contribute to the fruitier flavours. Calcium emphasises heavier creamy notes which is the buffer for sharper acid notes. Carbonate plays a role in buffering acid but too much will leave calcium deposits in your machine and is also bad for flavour. You also get to a point of diminishing returns where there is too much.
Magnesium and Calcium are positive ions and this is coincidentally useful with extraction as the positive charges aid in extraction of the flavours in the coffee by an attraction to the negative ions associated with the flavours in the beans.
Striving for that perfect cup has so many variables and if you know the characteristics of water you can consider making changes to the levels of Magnesium and calcium.
If you want to get serious about this Hartley (2014) https://www.fivesenses.com.au/blog/experimenting-with-the-effect-of-water-quality-on-coffee/ suggests 70/30 water – 70 ppm sodium bicarbonate and 30 ppm magnesium sulphate - Here’s the link https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/hosted.fivesenses.com.au/hosted_docs/water_recipe.pdf
For those wanting more try these references
So Coffee is a great double pick me up – once for you and twice for your garden!
Here is a link to Get your double pick me up with the Special offer on a bulk pack of G7 Gu Manh x 2 here 72 sachets for $39.99 with shipping included
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