Coffee snob tour of California

Jose is a self-confessed coffee snob, and I'll admit I'm probably turning into one too. While I still frequent Starbucks (the horror!) if I'm feeling desperate, I'm definitely beginning to see the light in terms of truly well-roasted and well-brewed coffee. There are no gourmet coffee shops in Los Altos, which is tragic, but I think Red Rock in Mountain View is probably worth a try.A great part about these shops, though, is that you can buy their beans to brew at home.
Please enjoy these photos from my recent pilgrimages with Jose to notable coffee roasters in Northern California and the LA area!

Barefoot Coffee Bar

5237 Stevens Creek Blvd, Santa Clara, CA

Perks at UCSD brews this coffee, and it's AMAZING! Fun atmosphere, yummy pastries and not too far from Los Altos.

Verve Coffee Roasters

816 41st Ave, Santa Cruz, CA

Our favorite cafe of all of the places we visited, definitely a great place to relax and caffeinate. It was also my favorite espresso of all, and the best part is they roast the beans right next door to the cafe! Their employees and baristas are chill (it is Santa Cruz after all) and it was a fantastic stop. 

Samovar Tea Lounge

3 locations - we visited 297 Page Street, San Francisco, CA

 Ok you caught me, this isn't coffee. But it deserves a spot in this blog because of its ridiculous selection of specialty loose leaf teas. It has everything from black to white to herbal to oolong. Not cheap by any means, but a fun destination for a little snack and more caffeine. By this point in the day, we were definitely buzzing...

Element Coffee 

2364 Ventura Blvd, Camarillo, CA

Our daily breakfast stop while in Oxnard, which brews Intelligentsia coffee beans. It's a relaxed, open atmosphere with a comfy couch (a big plus for me) and yummy pastries. Element was probably my favorite place we visited in the area, and it's Jose's hangout spot when he's at home. Try their vanilla latte sweetened with agave syrup - AMAZING!

Intelligentsia Coffee

5 coffee bars across the country - 

we went to 1331 Abbott Kinney Blvd, Venice, CA

Coffee at its most pretentious... I can't say I loved the "experience" of my coffee here, it was too rushed, a little crowded, and not comfortable to sit for any period of time. The baristas were snobby, but I guess with all of their awards, they're entitled to a little pride. However, there's no denying that their coffee is fantastic and the blackberry thyme muffin we shared was pretty foodgasmic. Worth a trip, but don't plan on bringing a book or making friends with the baristas!

Butter.

The French would be the first to tell you that to avoid butter is to shy away from the heart and soul of baking. There's not a whole lot you can do without butter. None of this margarine stuff, it doesn't ever freeze so the dough is perpetually squishy, which is odd and makes it difficult to roll out. 
Shortbread is one of those things whose very existence depends on this magical compound - no eggs, no leavening agent, no nothing. If you're not a college student whose food budget would probably be better spent on things like broccoli and lettuce, I advise splurging for fancy European-style butter because the finished product will be fantastic!

In order to spice this recipe up, I decided to infuse the butter with loose tea leaves I imported from the most famous fine tea maker in Paris, Mariage Freres. The flavor is called "Pleine Lune" (or "Full Moon" for you non-francophones) and it's a black tea with hints of vanilla and almond. Sounds fancy huh? You can even do this with any kind of tea - try Earl Grey, English Breakfast, Chamomile, etc.

Although "infusion" evokes images of all kinds of baking voodoo, it basically means melting the butter, stirring the tea leaves in and s them steep for a little, so you get the lovely mixture you see at right. Then so you don't eat potpourri, strain out the leaves. It's better to have pretty strongly flavored butter, so put in one tea bag per stick of butter. Let the butter solidify reasonably in the freezer or fridge before you cream it with the sugar in the recipe.

Shortbread Cookies 

Yields about 24 cookies (depending on size)

Recipe adapted from Joy of Baking

2 C all-purpose flour

1/4 tsp salt

1 C (2 sticks) unsalted butter (infused with 2 bags of tea of your choice), at room temperature

1/2 C powdered sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions: Cream butter and sugar in a mixing bowl with an electric mixer until smooth (about 2 min). Beat in vanilla extract. Gently stir in the flour and salt until just incorporated (knead with your hands if necessary). You may need a little less flour than called for because you lose a little butter when you strain the tea leaves out. If that's the case, melt some butter and sprinkle it on the dough to make it stick together more. Flatten dough into a disc, wrap in plastic and refrigerate until stiff.
Preheat oven to 350 and line baking sheets with parchment. Roll out dough to 1/4 inch thick and cut with cookie cutters. Bake for 7-9 minutes or until just browned (no one likes a burned cookie!). Cool on a rack. Eat with tea.