How specialty coffee has evolved, been understood, and enjoyed has changed greatly over the past 50 years. Today get to talk someone whose career has not developed in parallel with the coffee industry but has been instrumental in advancing some of the best aspects of it. I’m thrilled to have bene able to sit down with the great Kenneth Davids!
Kenneth has been involved with coffee since the early 1970s and has published three books on coffee, including the influential Home Roasting: Romance and Revival, now in its second edition, and Coffee: A Guide to Buying, Brewing and Enjoying, which has sold nearly 250,000 copies in five editions. His latest book, 21st Century Coffee: A Guide, is an unprecedentedly thorough survey of specialty coffee in all of its aspects, authoritative yet engaging.
Ken’s workshops and seminars on coffee sourcing, evaluation and communication have been featured at professional coffee meetings on six continents.
He is Professor Emeritus of Critical Studies at the California College of the Arts in San Francisco. In 1996 he was awarded a Special Achievement Award for Outstanding Contributions to Coffee Literature by the Specialty Coffee Association of America.
One of our industries most influential people. Kenneth’s work has shaped multiple generations of coffee enthusiasts and professionals and in this sense an hour conversation is woefully insufficient to give you even idea of the breadth and Kenneth’s journey and work but here we are and I can honestly say it was true honor to speak with him and to feature his wisdom and perspectives on this show.
We cover:
- Goals of his new book
- The new challenges of writing about coffee
- Honesty and authority of information
- How Kenneth went form cafe owner to coffee writer
- Mere communication vs delivering depth of understanding
- Consumer community and its evolution
- Starting Coffee review
- The gap of accessibility and need to building the middle
- What shapes consumer tastes today
- Incentivizing accessible excellence
- Using information to draw people in vs push away
- Communicating flavor
- How naturals chawed things
- The hope for coffee’s future
Links:
Buy Kenneth’s new book!
https://www.kennethdavidscoffee.com
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