KRMG-Skyler Cooper

This is Double A Cafe. I'm Brian. No Mark today. Just me. This is the end of August, which happens

to be National Coffee Month, which I think is ridiculous if you know me. National Coffee Month,

what is that? It's always National Coffee Month. But because it's National Coffee Month, I got a

hold of a friend of mine named Skylar Cooper, who works for KRMG and he has his own podcast

called Full Access OK. I met Skylar a few years ago. I'm not sure. At KRMG, I was doing a different

radio show. I have a lot of these shows and news articles posted, by the way, at purist.coffee.

That's a domain for the Coffee Purist book. If you go there and click on

news articles, you'll see a link to that. I have a lot of these shows and news articles posted,

by the way, at purist.coffee. That's a domain for the Coffee Purist book. If you go there and click on new,

you can see a lot of these things and you can see some of the stuff that I've done

with Skylar in the past. But Skylar was helping with his radio show and I also went on the morning

show and saw him doing his thing there. But throughout all this, I had brought them coffee

and he became an addict of the double shot. And I watched Skylar doing his thing in the radio studio

and was super impressed because if you've ever heard the morning cycle going on for the

radio show, it's really complicated. And I could just tell that Skylar got it. He just understood

how that thing worked and could keep up with it just inherently. So really talented guy. And

I've enjoyed talking to him over the years. Really interesting individual. So Skylar's now the host

of the Afternoon News Show. And I got him down here and we recorded an episode for the

radio show for his podcast or whatever. And he gave me permission to play it on Double A Cafe. So

I wanted to play that for you here because I felt like there was some interesting information that

had come up during our conversation about National Coffee Month and about coffee itself. So here it is.

Today, we're going to talk about coffee. We are down at Double Shot Coffee again.

One of my favorite places. And I just happened to be here on a Tuesday, which is $2 Tuesday.

I always try to come on Tuesdays, Brian. Now, let me clear something up because I asked one of your

employees one time. I came in and I said, hey, it's $2 Tuesday because you're probably trying

to sell off the old stuff, right? And he said, no. So why is it $2 Tuesday?

It's $2 Tuesday because I'm trying to get people to buy coffee fresh. So I roast on Mondays and

Thursdays and I'm trying to get people to come in on Tuesday so that they buy it straight out of

because I know that if you can keep coming in and buying coffee that's that fresh, whenever you go

and try to buy coffee somewhere else, you'll drink it and realize how stale the other coffee is. So

I'm trying to trick you into buying my coffee. Yeah. So my, I guess, pessimistic assumption was

that it was last week's coffee, but it's yesterday's coffee. Correct. That's really cool.

So yeah, but it absolutely is a game changer. I even noticed because I don't go through a bag

as quickly as probably some people. I'll notice by the end of it, I'm losing my taste for it.

Is it, I mean, how many days do you think after roasting does coffee start to change?

I don't like to drink coffee after it's been out of the roaster for 10 days.

So, you know, I usually say seven to 10 days, it's, it's not at its prime. So try to drink it

before then. And you still have a process here in the store, right? Things that are on the shelf,

they don't stay out longer than that amount of time. Right. Yeah. Yeah. We, we go through coffee

pretty quickly. So, I mean, even in the store, we sell over 300 bags of coffee a week. And so it's,

it's pretty quick. Like there's no worry about things just sitting on the shelf here.

So we are in national coffee month running toward the end of it here in August. We wanted to talk

about it because I've actually seen some of this going around and you mentioned to me the same

thing where people kind of misunderstand the origin of coffee and calling it a bean, right?

It's not the same kind of bean that you would think of in some other situations. So let's go

back to basics here. Take me to school on how coffee started and how it's, how you get coffee

to the roaster. Right. Coffee beans are seeds of coffee cherries and they're grown on a tree and

they're grown in the mountains and the tropics. And so the best coffees are, are, uh, on the

mountainside. And so there's, there's no way you could use like harvesting equipment to,

to harvest them. So people are handpicking the coffee cherries off of the trees and processing

them there on their farms usually. So it's a very manual process, especially when you get it up into

coffees that are really high end, like the ones that we have here. Does it make sense to you that

I gravitate toward a region? Yeah, to some extent, but things are getting a little bit hazy now in

the coffee industry because, because we all have iPhones, right? Or we all have cell phones and

we're all connected worldwide now. And so, whereas there, there used to be a lot of regional

differences in coffee. Now people in India know what people in Costa Rica are doing. And so,

you know, things are, are starting to spread and there's being a little bit more homogenization

around the world. I've just noticed that my original thing that I gravitated toward coming

here was La Manita from Costa Rica. And then again, Rio Negro. Um, but also I like some of

the Guatemalan and the Nicaraguan. And then I've tried some African coffee and it doesn't quite

land for me the same way. So I think, I don't know if it's that different,

but I think I'd gravitate toward an area. Right. You know what it actually is? Well,

it's possible that that's true, but there are different varieties in different areas. So,

when you go to like Ethiopia, you're talking about the origin of all coffees and there's a

whole bunch of varieties that are still grown in Ethiopia that are indigenous to there.

They took one variety out of Ethiopia and that kind of has mutated, but that's what's planted

all over Latin America. So you're kind of getting a variety selection there, first of all. And it

sounds to me like you like washed coffees. So when you asked me if I could pinpoint where coffee was

from, that's hard, but I can taste a coffee and tell you whether it's a washed or a ground coffee.

I can taste a coffee and tell you whether it's a washed or a natural. And what that means is when

they pick the coffee off of the tree, they either dry the coffee with the cherry still intact

and then separate it out and get the seeds out, that's a natural, or they strip the skin off and

dry the coffee with just the seed. And it changes the taste in the cup. So I can taste the coffee

and tell you whether it's a washed or a natural. Let's go back to something you said earlier

about the freshness of your coffee, how long it's been out of the roaster. And you said that,

you know, you have people, you try to get it here on Tuesday, so they'll,

taste the freshest coffee. Let's compare that to, okay, so you're buying coffee here at Double

Shot that was roasted yesterday, likely, versus the grocery store shelf. Right. I mean, how many

months might that be? Do you have any idea on the commercial scale of how old coffee might really be

that people are buying and they think is good? That's a really good point. And most people have

never tasted coffee that wasn't stale. And so, you know, there's been a longstanding practice

in the industry where people in the commercial grade coffee,

all that stuff you see on the grocery store shelves, they'll buy the cheapest coffee,

first of all, they buy it on the commodity market. And then they roast it probably in

these giant factories. And then they make sure it's stale before they sell it so that there's

a consistency. People never taste fresh coffee, so they don't expect fresh coffee. Nobody even

knows that it exists. So they don't want to change it up. Right. We don't want this fresh.

Right. So it's purposely stale. It's been there for a long time.

And I've heard people have techniques. Okay, well, I'll preserve this. I'll freeze it. Does

anything? Possibly. But when you freeze coffee, you have a problem with when it thaws out,

it gets moisture on it and that can really ruin the coffee. So if you were going to do that,

you'd need to separate it out into really small batches, vacuum seal it, freeze it, and then

take it out and grind it frozen quickly. Not worth it. Not worth it. No, just buy it fresh

and use it quickly. Let's talk about preparation. I still do pour over every morning. What is the

difference in all of those methods for people who don't really know? Like, how are they going to know

this is better because it was made this way? Yeah, that's hard. But I mean, anything handmade

is going to be better than something that's made with an automatic machine. Like robots don't make

as good of coffee as humans do. Right. So if you're making a pour over and you're pouring

the water by hand, that's like making a Mr. Coffee pot of coffee, but you're doing it purposely

yourself. There's some meditative thing probably about that that makes the coffee taste better as

you've got a French press where that's an immersion method. So it's a completely different

thing. And you can make great coffee with all those different methods. You can make great

coffee with a mocha pot. It's just that each method has to have its own methodology. And so

you have to learn that method and do it all right when you're trying to figure it out.

I've seen an explosion lately of people, companies selling a pour over replicating machine.

Right. You know, it's got something that does the circles. And I want to know,

I wonder if it comes close or is it still that? Is it still a machine that's not going to be as

precise? It's still a machine that's not going to be as precise. And of course, you know, as

technology increases and gets better, then, you know, we're going to get better coffee from

machines. I'm testing out a coffee brewer at home right now. And what I found out is I have to trick

the brewer. So I can't let it do its normal cycle. I have to turn it on and wait for 10 seconds and

then turn it off and then wait another 30 seconds and then turn it back on to get it to do the right

thing. And then the coffee tastes okay.

Is that getting the temperature right before it starts to pour?

Well, whenever you make a pour over you, when you first start pouring the water on the coffee,

if the coffee's fresh, it will bloom. And that means it like expands and gets kind of bubbled up.

If your coffee's stale, you don't have to worry about the bloom, but you want the coffee to bloom

for 30 seconds or so before you continue the pour. And so most auto drips don't do that. The one I

bought to test out does that. It just doesn't do it right.

Okay.

And I've been wondering if maybe I'm too tired some mornings, but I follow the same process

every day. And some days I think, man, I messed this one up. It's just untaste right. Do you think

it is a variation in me or is it the coffee aging?

Both probably. I've found that sometimes people, the biggest problem that people have when they're

making a pour over is that sometimes they wait on the bloom for too long and the bloom starts to go

down. And once that happens, your coffee's going to taste flat.

So, okay. Maybe I am waiting too long.

You're probably waiting too long.

What's, how many times do you wait?

How many seconds do you wait?

I wait 35 seconds.

Okay. I used to do 45. And lately I've been shortening it, wondering if that was it. And

sometimes I'm in a hurry and I'll set the water down and I'll go, you know, feed the dog or

something while I'm going back and forth. And I get that cone in the middle. Then I know I've

really messed up.

Right. No, you've got to focus.

Yeah. Focus.

It's a singular task.

So what's new around double shot? I know you guys, we talked last year or so about getting your own

farm. That's kind of...

In the process of growing, I think. But what else is new around here? And what new coffees do you

have?

The coffee we're drinking right now is from a farm called Vulcancitos. And it's a Nicaraguan

coffee from Nueva Segovia, which is in the north part of Nicaragua. You know, talking about

National Coffee Month kind of makes me think about this because it's international, you know? So I'm

buying coffee from this guy, Sergio Gutierrez, who's a friend of mine who owns Vulcancitos.

And he's producing excellent coffee. And when you think about buying, like people say, buy local,

right? Which is important. When you cut by from a local roaster like Double Shot,

you're supporting this business. You're keeping your money in the community. I'm hiring local

people. And so they're spending their money in the community. And it's an important thing to buy

local and to know where your products are coming from. But forget about national, all those national

brands. Like it's National Coffee Month. Forget about national.

Because that money is going somewhere else and they're buying terrible coffee anyway.

So when I talked to Sergio about coffee, he has two choices about how he can make money selling

coffee. And one is to sell to these national commercial brands or to sell to me. And I pay

twice as much. And so when you buy a pound of coffee from a place like this that knows that,

you know, I'm friends with the farmers I buy from, it really impacts not just Double Shot,

it impacts the farmer.

And so I think that's really important to think about during National Coffee Month year round. But,

you know, it's about intentionality, really.

It's a good point. It's, you know, people in the confines of your own life, you don't think about

where what you're consuming comes from. And all of our coffee is probably from very far away.

Right.

Yeah. So that's a topic that I'm trying to preach, I guess. And it's been part of the

mission of the Double Shot for a long time to connect our consumers with the origin of our

products. And we're really careful about where we source things, whether that be our ceramic cups

from local potters, our bison that we use in the bison burritos on Sunday, we get from the Osage

Nation. Our milk we get from Red Ridge Creamery out in Lahoma, Oklahoma. Pat and Stephen Kane,

they milk the cows. You know, we buy milk from them.

So there's a lot of things here that, you know, we, I know the people who are producing the

products. And that, I think that's really important. The other thing that I'm working

on right now is a book. So I'm writing a book called The Coffee Purist, which should be out

in the spring. And it's about my career in coffee, but it's been a crazy, crazy 20 years. And so I

think it's going to be eye-opening for people who buy the book and read it and they begin to

understand coffee the way I learned about coffee. And really the baseline is that intentionality.

Now, last time I was here, we were talking about the book and you were raising some money,

a kind of a Kickstarter campaign. Did you get where you needed to go?

We did. We raised $25,000 on Kickstarter, which will finance, we're self-publishing. So that'll

finance the publishing of the book. And so right now we're just trying to finish it up. And Mark

and I are working really hard every day to try to get the writing and the, you know, layout and

design and pictures and everything put together. So if people haven't been able to pick up on it

by listening to this conversation, Brian Franklin, the owner of Double Shot is

passionate about coffee and quality coffee. And you have a couple of avenues for people to

deep dive with you on some podcasts. Tell us about those.

Yeah, I have a podcast called AA Cafe. It's aacafe.org. And it's the oldest and longest

running coffee podcast. We started in 2005 and still going. And so we talk about coffee. We

don't always talk about coffee on that podcast, but we always are drinking coffee while we're

doing the podcast. But it's informative about coffee.

I love that. I love that. In fact,

just sitting here sipping coffee while we're talking, it makes this experience that much

better for me, not only because it's my first cup today, but also because I just love that

vibe, you know, the aura of sitting here sipping coffee and chatting.

Right. Yeah. So we have that. I have another podcast called Double Shot Folk,

where I interview people who have been coming to the Double Shot for a long time. And I let

them just tell their story, who they are, what they do and why they come to the Double Shot

and how it's affected their lives.

That's really cool. I remember the first time we met was actually at the radio station studio,

as you came in to record one of our weekend shows, brought some coffee. And then that changed my

whole experience with coffee. A short time later, I brought a first date to your old location on

Boston. And yeah, almost six years later, I can't drink different coffee. So thank you.

Well, you have to be paying attention. And so apparently you were paying attention.

Brian Franklin, always good to chat. Thank you.

Thanks, Skylar.

By me, Brian Franklin, with help from Skylar Cooper. Special thanks this episode to Skylar,

who is the host of Afternoon News at FM 102.3 KRMG and the Full Access OK podcast,

all of which are available at krmg.com. The Double A Cafe podcast is a production of

Double Shot Coffee Company. Go to doubleshotcoffee.com and sign up for the Roaster's

Choice coffee subscription. I still roast all the coffee myself, and we always ship within

48 hours of roasting, so you always get fresh coffee. Double Shot Coffee Company exists to

provide an excellent coffee experience to as many people as we can, and to be a portal for

our customers to the origin of our products. Music in the intro is from Paul Werner,

and the music you're hearing now is by Bruce Zimmerman. Thanks for listening. Drink more coffee.