Vermont Hopped, Vermont Coffee.

Vermont Hopped, Vermont Coffee.

I came upon a couple of creative ads one day. One had an army officer of high rank analyzing a map aboard a ship. He had a bullet in his head and chest. He was drinking coffee with complete focus. The next ad showed someone aboard a submarine at control panels with a cup of coffee on his desk. This guy had a back full of bullet holes. The coffee brought the dead back to life. The ads were brilliant. Since that day, my mind opened up to coffee and I began to travel in search of some great and local grounds. I don’t know why--but that’s how I came into the coffee world. That was many years ago.

Lately I’ve been corresponding with  Philip Goodlaxson, roast master of Corvus Coffee Roasters over in Colorado. I’ve been in search of hopped coffee for the last month. This guy was very professional and really cool to talk with. Unfortunately The distance and distribution was too big a hurdle so I decided to try local. For all you folks over in Colorado though, check out some of their coffees.

The coffee craft is getting a lot of sun and the culture is maturing. I met Benjamin Lee from a mutual friend very recently--just a few weeks before the grand opening of my store. We talked cold brew. There were a few things that I was curious about with the Vermont coffee culture. I had questions:

“Where are the cold brews? where are the hopped coffees?”

It’s happening all around us. I know Stumptown Coffee Roasters stepped into the scene but why hasn’t it come up from within? I knew that a Vermonters mind was in cold brew planning. It always happens this way. You come up with a brilliant idea and someone is one step ahead of you going into business. That’s where Ben was--one step ahead. He had just received his LLC and I invited him to sample his cold brew.

First of all, congratulations to Vermont’s first cold brew company - Northern Bayou Cold Brew! Secondly, I told Ben my desire to bring the first hopped coffee to Vermont. We had a few weeks to go before grand opening. Growler Garage owner Brian Stone got Ben in contact with Vermont Artisan Coffee, and Benjamin met with Kris Anderson, owner and operator of Addison Hop Farm. If you weren’t aware, Addison Hop Farm suffered through a hailstorm this past May. I had met with Kris a few months ago right after the storm and he showed us the damage. He pointed out the holes in the ground and shared his experience with us:

“The hail was the size of quarters, as you can see from the holes in the ground. My suspicion is that they’ll come back. My volume will be down, [but they’ll come back].” (Anderson, 2014)

The hops did rebound and beyond Bobcat, Citizen Cider, and Peak Organics, they found their way into Northern Bayou’s cold brew as well. Next thing I knew, I was making room in our coolers and filling that space with Northern Bayou’s Original Coffee and Hopped Coffee cold brews. The hops come out in exotic flower aromas, with a creamy coffee-jasmine flavor. It has been selling faster than most of my bottled beers. I'm running out.

Anderson, Kris. Field Interview Voice 035 Recorded 05/31/2014