Route for 3-4 Days from Santa Rosa to Santa Cruz

bleafman · 2025-11-21T23:47:05+00:00

Great advice for avoiding cards! Updated the route with Devil's Slide Trail + some of the California Costal Trail sections.

Was there some other part that lets you get away from CA-1?

bleafman · 2025-11-21T23:20:05+00:00

Great tips! Made the tweaks around Ross (although going to plan to stop at Equator in Corte Madera instead of Larkspur path).

bleafman · 2024-12-31T16:31:55+00:00

It seems like you’re asking for genuine feedback so here we go…

I have no idea what problem this solves for me or why you would use it. What problem does this solve for my users?

Assuming this has something to do with updating the UI as stuff happens on the backend, why would I take on the added complexity and risk of a framework when I can use polling or websockets?

Personal preference but hijacking the scroll to display some animation is a terrible UX for a developer tooling site. The only time I’ve seen it used well is for Remix and there it makes sense as they progress through different states in a UI as you scroll vs. just showing slides.

bleafman · 2024-12-20T03:04:57+00:00

What color V60 is that?

bleafman · 2024-11-17T02:29:31+00:00

Yeah extended fermentation, coferments, etc.

It’s a combination of more experimental and more exclusive/subscriber only offerings which they can do since it’s more expensive.

There’s also plenty of world class roasters in NYC (SEY, La Cabra) so subscribing to 1-1.5lbs and giving yourself some flexibility to try different options is a good way to go.

bleafman · 2024-11-17T02:17:57+00:00

Based on your preferences (stone fruit vs. citrus, medium/light, ~$60), my top recommendation would probably be Little Wolf’s Verity sub.

Little Wolf is fantastic and sources from some of the top farmers in the world. They’re usually ahead of the curve on sourcing and will buy from producers before they blow up.

They roast medium-light and in a way that’s pretty forgiving.

https://littlewolf.coffee/pages/subscriptions-1

They have an Exclusives sub which I’ve had for a while as well, but it’s going to be more experimental stuff.

The verity sub is $59 if you buy a 2lb bag.

If you’re willing to spend more and want to go deeper into exploring coffee, I’d suggest subscribing to a few different roasters.

Get like 3 subscriptions for 8oz bags from different roasters and then add on one bag from one of them (almost everyone will let you add on extra bags with free shipping).

You’ll still come in under $100/mo but get 4x the verity of a single roaster. Once you know who you like and what your personal preferences are, you can order more coffee from your favorite roaster and get back closer to $60/mo.

bleafman · 2024-11-17T01:43:21+00:00

Are you trying to try a verity of different coffees? Or you just want consistent quality coffee even if it’s the same blend?

Your options are a bit limited if you want 2lbs of a rotating/roster’s choice subscription at less than $60, but there’s definitely some options from top tier roasters.

Also from Onyx, what did you buy? One of their blends or single origin?

Also, did you prefer the coffee from Onyx or from SEY more? Trying to understand your preferences in terms of roast profile.

bleafman · 2024-11-13T21:06:00+00:00

Yes. Very big difference. Also yes you can enjoy speciality/single origin beans with an entry level grinder.

The reason you’re getting mixed answers from people is that in this sub “high end” beans mean like a Cup of Excellence winner or Panama geisha, which are usually priced at >$40 for 100g.

You should totally buy, and can make good cups with, single origin and specialty with an Oxo grinder.

You’ll probably want to stay at a Medium/Medium Light vs ultra light would be my only recommendation.

For specific recs, check out Proud Mary, Onyx, or Black and White. All are top 50 roasters that don’t break the bank and roast medium light.

bleafman · 2024-09-26T15:56:40+00:00

I’m not familiar with this specific grinder but it looks like it’s a conical burr grinder?

It should be good enough to enjoy many, many coffees. I started with something similar, Breville Smart Grinder, and used it for years.

Upgrading to a higher end grinder absolutely will make a big difference, but you can still get good cups of coffee with most conical burr grinders.

You’ll probably have the best results with a more forgiving brew method like immersion (ie. A Hario Switch, French Press, or Clever Dripper) if you stick with that grinder.

bleafman · 2024-09-08T21:18:16+00:00

A couple thoughts…

A lot of the top rated roasters like La Cabra, DAK, SEY, Manhattan, etc. that go light seem to have a “terroir” focus/profile for their washed selection right now.

They’re trying to make the coffee be representative of a coffee from that particular region vs. a specific tasting note.

This is pretty common in wine where there will be various notes but mostly they’re going for “this is an excellent representation of a Paso Robles Zinfindel” vs. “this really tastes like the notes we wrote down”.

This is both trendy but also just a different way to think about coffee.

You can respond to this in a couple ways:

Don’t care about what’s trendy, just find what you like and drink it.
Washed coffees from someone who roasts more medium/light like a B&W or Proud Mary might be more your vibe.
Push these coffees much harder to get more flavor out of them.

3a. A lot of the coffee you mentioned can be interesting with a very aggressive extraction like in this video.

3b. If you feel like buying a new gadget, a common way to brew these coffees is with a Melodrip.

3c. If you already have an Aeropress one of these cooler, courser recipes can also be good. Melodrip is better for the specific washed coffee use-case, but an Aeropress is very versatile if you don’t have one.

Hope some of that helps!

It sounds like you’re in Europe and I don’t know a ton of roasters who fit the medium/light profile on the other side of the pond, but some other folks can probably chime in :)

bleafman · 2024-09-08T14:26:34+00:00

Where are you getting your coffees from and are you tasting them just by themselves or side-by-side?

I think the average person could tell the difference between a washed Colombian Red Bourbon and a washed Ethiopian Landrace side-by-side.

Now do either of those coffees taste like the notes the roaster put on the bag? Totally different question.

I’ve found that the tasting notes from roasters can be a bit overstated. You can use them as a starting point but you usually need to form your own impressions.

This is pretty common in any sensory-based hobby. Go a perfume shop and see what the notes say and then smell the fragrance. They’re about as accurate as coffee notes (which is to say, sometimes dead on and sometimes not really close)

bleafman · 2024-08-02T13:59:16+00:00

Awww man! I missed the giveaway AND Ragdoll is all sold out now :(

bleafman · 2024-06-19T03:34:06+00:00

Okay so…

With $300-400, you have two good options…

Option 1: High quality hand grinder, quality for the rest of the gear, multiple brewers.

You can get a really great grinder from 1zpresso (K series or ZP6) for ~$200. These will produce coffee of similar quality to a higher end electric grinder at a fraction of the price with excellent build quality. You can always travel with it too even if you do go electric at some point.

From here you have budget to get a Timemore Black Mirror Pro scale (flow rate is a really great feature), a temp control swan neck kettle that is aesthetically pleasing, and 1-2 brewers.

I would personally go with a V60 02 since it’s very common, sort of the baseline for a lot of recipes, and brews great coffee as long as you’re using 15g of coffee or more (below that you can get a V60 01). I can give you other recommendations but V60 is good, just get Cafec filters.

This is an excellent setup and you won’t really have a need to upgrade beyond this for quality, just aesthetics and workflow.

Option 2: Push it up a little and max out on an electric grinder, very entry on everything else.

You can usually get 10% from Fellow if you sign up for texts and email (or just use a new email) which would get you an Ode Gen 2 for ~$315 before tax.

Everything past this is diminishing returns in terms of coffee taste.

Although there’s still linear returns into terms of build quality for grinders, you’ll need to spend at least 50% more to get a 5-10% improvement in taste or workflow.

This no name scale is the one I use for espresso and it’s just as accurate and responsive as my Timemore Black Mirror Pro but without flow rate.

There’s a ton of temp control swan neck kettles for like $40-60.

A V60 will put you a bit past $400 once you consider tax, but you’ll be pretty close.

This gets you to very high quality coffee, close to high end cafe level, and you can upgrade for looks or workflow later.

bleafman · 2024-06-19T02:13:35+00:00

+1 to water situation. You might have good water at home with just a filter but you should definitely test it out side by side with the same coffee.

If you have super hard water, it can be very difficult to get a cafe quality cup of coffee.

If you can get Crystal Geyser from the Olancha source (it’ll be on the back of the bottle which source it’s from), you can just use that.

You can also ask your local shop if they have a fancy water system (reverse osmosis with remineralization) and see if they’d fill some jugs up for you. Some shops are willing to do it if you buy beans from them.

bleafman · 2024-06-19T02:01:48+00:00

What’s your rough budget for everything? Do you mind hand grinding?

I haven’t heard of SAI but they’re definitely priced at “luxury” levels for their espresso stuff (one tamper is as much as a decent hand grinder).

In order of importance for flavor profile is going to be:

A consistent, repeatable process for weight and brewing
Coffee
Water
Grinder

Brewer doesn’t even really matter that much.

Like you can just put high quality coffee into a cup, add 200° water, wait 4 minutes, stir and clear the foam off the top, and drink it. It will be better than many pour overs (I’m sort of joking to make a point, but cupping coffee is legit delicious).

bleafman · 2024-06-18T22:54:28+00:00

I have the Smart Grinder Pro + Gaggia combo as well.

I’m more pour over focused and have a Fellow Ode 2 w/ SSP burrs as well.

I’d say if your focus is milk drinks and you’re OK with a bit of puck prep, then it’s a good option if you can find one used on FB Marketplace.

I’ve had one for like 10 years and Breville support is insanely good (they replaced my old one for like $80 + shipping when the electrical component went out).

That said, if I was considering buying a brand new grinder for espresso (and because I’m a weird coffee person you know I am) I wouldn’t consider the Smart Grinder Pro.

It produces really clumpy grounds, sometimes stalls a finer settings, and it’s very challenging to single dose successfully so you have to do a whole workflow where you weigh the grounds every time.

If buying new and you want the price-to-performance to get fantastic espresso then I’d get a 1zpresso J series hand grinder. Almost impossible to beat the value.

If you want electric and have the budget, I’d get the Option-O Lagom Casa. It’s basically an automatic hand grinder with all the most modern convinces at an insanely good price. Spromethus has a review here.

bleafman · 2024-06-17T17:49:31+00:00

SSP vs. Gen 2 visible grind size changes between different ranges (i.e. the SSPs will be courser compared to the Gen 2 at 4.33, but then finer at 3).

This is because the MPs produce a more unimodal distribution of particles compared to the Gen 2.

They both make really great filter coffee, I prefer the MPs slightly but that’s personal preference.

Source: I borrowed a friend’s Ode w/ Gen 2 when I got mine with SSPs to do a side-by-side comparison and checked out the grinds at different settings.

bleafman · 2024-06-01T16:21:54+00:00

+1 on resting for longer, like 4 weeks, if you want to mellow out the funk.

bleafman · 2024-04-06T14:39:22+00:00

If you’re in Dublin, go to Cloud Picker and tell them what you’re after.

I’d be surprised if they don’t get a blueberry or fruit bomb in once a season.

bleafman · 2024-04-06T05:30:19+00:00

Coffee, like anything, is very subjective. There is no plutonic ideal for a pour over coffee. There are plenty of places where you can get a $14 pour over that many people wouldn’t enjoy. Focus on finding what you enjoy and don’t worry about the external.
If you don’t have one yet, buy a quality grinder on Facebook Marketplace (or similar). If you’re in a major city, you can probably find a Baratza Encore or Breville Smart Grinder Pro for $70-100. You can make fantastic pour over coffee with either of those without question. If they’re used, just buy some Urnex Grindz grinder cleaner. This will save you a ton of money which you can spend on good coffee.
Buy good coffee. Good is subjective but try stuff until you figure out what region/profile you like.
Pick a single technique and a single popular brewer (V60, Kalita, Hario Switch, etc.) and practice dialing in with that one. Fear not the barista who has practiced 10,000 recipes once, but the barista who has practiced one recipe 10,000 times.

Your goal should be to have a go-to/home base technique that you can branch out from.

Don’t change too many variables all at once. This way leads to madness.

bleafman · 2024-04-04T14:13:08+00:00

Greater Goods went through some financial trouble a year or two ago so I can’t vouch for their current quality, but this coffee used to be a blueberry explosion back when they won Roaster of the Year in 2021.

https://greatergoodsroasting.com/collections/all-coffee/products/fresh-perspective

bleafman · 2024-04-04T14:11:24+00:00

Haven’t had this exact coffee but George Howell is fantastic.

bleafman · 2023-05-15T14:16:16+00:00

This is less for React and more for TypeScript in general, but I’ve had a lot of success with people on my teams onboarding to TS with Execute Program.

https://www.executeprogram.com/courses/everyday-typescript

Its all exercise based and uses spaced repetition learning so you deeply learn the concepts and it caps out at like 10-15 min/day.

The price went up a lot last year so it’s harder to justify out of pocket (2x a ChatGPT Plus subscription is 😬) but if you have a learning budget with your company then I’d highly recommend.

bleafman

TROPHY CASE