Hot Valentine Date

Yep, we were "Alfa" and "Sammy" for the day..

Feb 12, 2011

It was an accidental cab ride that made me discover the special Valentines coffee course being offered by the Philippine Coffee and Barista Academy (PCBA). At that time, I was still clueless about what to give LTJG for V-day.. so after checking his schedule, I decided to sign us up! (I was so surprised when I got an enthusiastic yes!

Poizone de Amore (Love Potion) is a whole day "fun" workshop (I say fun because, one shouldn't expect to be an expert barista after the session..) for couples on coffee and beverage mixing. We love coffee, but are not coffee connoisieurs - LTJG and I are perfectly happy just tasting that coffee taste - be it from a sachet or from an expensive coffee shop if we want to indulge. We wanted to take our passion to the next level :-) Both of us are not big alcohol drinkers, so we bond over coffee and are more interested in espresso than cocktails.

The workshop was from 9-4pm. We learned about the different ways of coffee preparation (from manual drips, the coffee press, the mocha cup to fancy automatic machines that cost as much as a brand new car), how to distinguish a good cup from a bad cup, the right kind of grind for different filters, etc etc! . I've never had so much coffee in my life! I actually stopped counting after I sampled my 6th kind of drink.

Banana latte


Coffee from a manual drip brewer


Coffee from a coffee press


Espresso from a mocha pot


Mocha "frappuccino" (I put that in quotes because Frap is a brand by Starbucks. It's coffee blended with milk and ice)


Strawberry Banana Smoothie (yep we made non-coffee drinks as well)


Espresso from a coffee capsule


Almond rocha iced latte


Cappuccino ( trivia: a good cappuccino has fine, firm froth - test this by balancing a spoon on the froth.. it shouldn't fall through!)




Choco-orange "frappuccino"(which I commented that it might be better hot, so Mike, our instructor also made me ... a Choco-orange hot latte)

Green Mango smoothie (to cleanse our palate)

Blackforest "frappuccino" - super great, I won't reveal the recipe

Then, we were given the freedom to mix our own "Love Potion" :-)

After trying out three mixtures, we found our signature mix, which we called "RASPBERRY KISS" - we were asked to demonstrate the mix infront of the class. I won't reveal this recipe, either. But like I said during the demo, "It has to be made with lots of love and drank with pouty lips!"

Our potion won! (We were only one of two couples who attended, BUT STILL!) We got Php1000 worth of spa GCs, a box of Toblerone Krispy Kremes, a bag of vanilla smoothie mix, and a bottle of caramel syrup! Our Php3000 registration fee was worth it :-)

BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE...

The night after the workshop, as the caffeine slowly drained out of our system and we recalled the unique and pleasurable experience we had during the workshop, LTJG decided to give me his V-day gift.

Sweet delight, he gave me my very own espresso machine ! Hah! And he bought it last January, when we had no clue that we were going to do our coffee workshop :-)

Little did I know that we could practice what we learned at home :-) Yay! Thanks so much LTJG! (I'm having trouble uploading photos, so next time na lang muna! )

Interested to learn more about your coffee? Email phil.barista@yahoo.com !!!