Lavender Coffee
Tue, 2/15 5:00AM CST • 42:41
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
coffee, lavender, vietnamese, vietnam, sweetened condensed milk, fucking, caffeine, company, debbie, robusta, flavor, podcast, called, drink, friends, robust, grow, cup, brew, mug
00:03
This podcast is brought to you by modest coffee, single origin coffee without the snobbery go to www dot modest dot coffee forward slash no bad reviews to see what coffees they're roasting today tears
00:42
Hello and welcome to no bad reviews colon a coffee podcast, a podcast where three friends and coworkers try coffee, any coffee and we will give no bad reviews. I am Jenni and I manage all of the operations at a coffee company. It happens to be called Modest Coffee, but that's not a big deal.
01:07
Marcus Contaldo. That’s my last name and I do coffee at the same place. And I'm an award winning coffee roaster and my palate counts.
01:19
I'm Stephanie I have been the Employee of the Month of modest coffee for 33 months. one more picture up on the wall. Right and one more picture of myself for my break room.
01:31
Jenni, you've got something exciting to tell us about new subscribers,
01:34
right? Yes, our sponsor Modest Coffee has generously decided to be a part of a giveaway. And so So what we have decided to do because we're a new podcast is anybody who subscribes to our podcast will be entered into a drawing to win a bag of coffee every week. We're going to pull a name but yeah, but you have to let us know that you subscribed like we can't just go like ask who are the subscribers and how do they do that Jenni? Yeah, so what we are asking you to do is subscribe to our podcast wherever you like to listen to podcasts and send us a screenshot of checked subscribe. And you could tag us on social media at no bad reviews pod or if you live more of a private life, you can slide into our DMS with a screenshot (that's what the kids are saying these days.) Or you can send us a an email at Hello at no bad reviews podcast.com And
02:39
we've got a grading scale right? do you want to tell us about the grading scale?
02:43
We typically will try the coffee black. And if we need to, we'll doctor it up with some cream and sugar and if we need to go beyond that we'll doctor it up with some whiskey and whipped cream until we find the perfect point where we can give the coffee a good review.
03:01
Or at least not a bad review
03:02
not a bad review.
03:03
We are a no bad review podcast.
03:05
I don't want to set the bar too high. Thank you. Today we have copper cow coffee. Kind of a special add in because the coffee we're drinking today comes with sweetened condensed milk so that is going to be our starting point.
03:20
Well, I have to confess that I have to make a correction to what I told you. I think I must have seen it with a different coffee company that includes a ketchup packet of sweetened condensed milk, and I thought it was this company and especially because they say they're Vietnamese coffee. I naturally assumed that they were going to go all the way with Vietnamese coffee.
03:41
They This is the company that sells the packets. Oh they do sell packets? You can get the coffee with or without the packets of sweetened condensed milk. Did I fuck this up then? I think maybe whoever ordered the coffee… that
03:51
would have been me… without… Okay, let me look now. There it is. I thought you might you could either buy it as it is or buy it as like a combo pack.
04:00
I think there is a, combo pack, I don't… Ok, yes, Steph’s
04:04
gonna call me out yes, there's a combo pack as well. Well, thank goodness I have sweetened condensed milk. Thank goodness. So I've seen this company advertised to me quite a bit online. So at first I was like is this true Vietnamese coffee, which we can talk about a little bit later. And then I had this realization. I was like, Oh, well they can say that if the coffee comes from Vietnam. Like I was thinking for coffee, Vietnamese coffee from a cultural standpoint, but it could actually just literally be Vietnamese coffee. So then my second question to myself was is this Robusta, which is the most popular coffee in Vietnam. And I know that you did a lot of research into the company and the coffee so I'm really curious if you have the answers to the questions I am seeking. I'm really
04:49
excited to give you the answers. I feel pretty good about this company. Oh cool. So weird position for me to be taking generally speaking.
04:56
It's probably refreshing after the last episode.
05:01
I just know it's lavender coffee, and I'm super excited about it because Lady Grey tea is made with lavender. So I know like the flavors of bergamont and lavender are really good. And so I'm really hopeful that that the first flavored coffee that I'm excited about
05:16
hits. I am the opposite. I'm not excited about drinking lavender in my coffee. When I was at Trader Joe's the other day I saw some lavender soap and I was like you know what, I'm gonna buy this so I can get in the mindset for this podcast on Sunday. And as I was washing with it the other day I'm like this smells great in the shower and as a soap but I don't know that I want to be drinking this scent. Yeah, I
05:38
don't I don't love the kind of flowery flavors all the time and lavender is not even scent wise my favorite, honestly. That’s fair. I don't dislike it, necessarily.
05:49
It's very unique, there is nothing like it. Right.
05:52
When I was pregnant and having a really hard time sleeping. I used lavender spray every night and it put me right to sleep. It did give me some strange dreams. That could have been pregnancy, too. I did find it really effective as a sleep aid.
06:04
So we got a little uppers and downers with this. Oh yeah. Oh
06:08
yeah. Can we before I talk about the company? Can we really describe the product because the product is unusual. It's a box. Open the packet and it's like a paper pourover cone basically with the coffee inside it.
06:27
So, it looks like a bat. It does look like a bat!
06:29
And you put its little wings over the edge of your mug. And then you can just tear off the top and pour your water in. And if you order the right one. We'll also have a little ketchup packet full of sweetened condensed milk inside as well. The owner says that this coffee is not your first morning coffee. She says this is a coffee break coffee. You should really enjoy it. Okay.
06:55
That’s what this podcast is all about, enjoying the coffee.
06:59
I would like to say that I enjoy every cup of coffee I have and in fact, I would say I enjoy my morning cup of coffee. More than any other cup of coffee the entire day. Really? Yes, absolutely.
07:11
I think that first cup of coffee is so necessary that the taste or like taking a moment to really appreciate it gets a little lost in the like you get this in me. That
07:23
kind of, that's good point. Like nobody tells Marcus how to drink his coffee or when he's going to appreciate it. You
07:28
don't know me. I’ll drink my coffee when I want. Yeah, no.
07:32
I think the reason she expresses it that way is because the price point is much higher than if you were just buying a bag of beans. It's it works out to something like $3 a cup, I believe. And also a packet of sweetened condensed milk. I don't know how many cups of coffee you drink in a day. Yeah. I guess it's fine if you're not eating anything, but those packets of sweetened condensed milk are gonna add up basically, I don't know about fat content but sugar content for sure. You just don't want to be drinking four of those.
08:05
So it's like a little bougie treat? Yeah, it’s like a little treat. So she's gonna own that. I’m fine with that.
08:09
Yeah, okay. Yeah. All right. Maybe not, you know, maybe not what you need first thing in the morning but it's what you can enjoy when you have a minute… to treat yourself… Yeah, a little self care in a cup. Not that she's telling you how to drink your coffee. I feel a little protective of this woman in this company because I just like her so much after learning about
08:29
her. Yeah, maybe I should give her a chance, that’s right, no bad reviews.
08:32
I mean, I am naturally suspicious of any sort of gimmick in the coffee industry. And so I feel like you're protective of this woman but I am protective of the coffee industry itself. Ok, wow. That sounds a little pretentious. I guess I don't want to myself sound like an asshole but, but I think this is also cool.
08:55
There's room for everybody except for flavored coffee. And now I'm even becoming welcoming of that too.
09:01
this podcast will change you. Yeah,
09:03
I know. I know.
09:04
It's here to change your soul.
09:06
When we're talking about flavored coffee. There's a difference between artificial bacon flavor and real lavender flowers. Like these are two completely different types of flavored coffee. Yeah,
09:19
and that's where I'm like, really excited because this I feel like there's more room in my heart for real flavor. For sure.
09:27
So I do really appreciate the fact that this company uses real herbs in their coffee. I think that's really cool. And I just opened up the packet and you can see little lavenders in there and it smells like lavender. It smells like straight up like I'm about to fall asleep lavender but my body doesn't actually know what to because I’m also smelling coffee.
09:46
It smells very strongly of lavender. Very strongly.
09:49
Did you see how much lavender it has like one and a half grams or something of lavender? Take your self care routine to the next level. 10.5 grams of fresh coffee and 1.5 grams of real lavender. That's a lot of lavender. Especially because that ends up being like 15% Lavender. Yeah, one thing I'm noticing though if it's only 10.5 grams of coffee if you're doing this like a proper brew ratio of 16 to one that only gives you six ounces of coffee. Well,
10:18
she says that if you really want to make it like a strong Vietnamese style coffee, you should really only pour four ounces of water in with your sweetened condensed milk. Okay. But you can pour up to eight ounces of water for more American style large cup so she is recommending less. Is this robusta?This is 70% robusta and 30% Arabica and 100% grown in Vietnam. That's cool.
10:45
I'm loving it. That means it's gonna be super caffeinated. As long as we're talking about
10:49
the coffee for a minute, can we talk about the difference between Arabica and Robusta?
10:53
Vietnam is known for robusta coffee. It is the second largest producer of coffee in the entire world behind Brazil. Shocked me to learn that. Shocked me, and I remember calling Marcus I was like, why aren’t we buying Vietnamese coffee? And Marcus was like, well, that's because it's like all Robusta. Yeah. I thought this was common knowledge. It's not. Do you want to talk about Robusta versus Arabica, Marcus?
11:11
Yeah, so Robusta grows like a weed, really, it grows at lower elevations really, really easy to harvest really, really easy to grow.
11:18
Does it have to go and shade like Arabica?
11:20
That I'm not certain of.
11:23
You don’t have to know everything, it's okay. Yeah,
11:24
I'm gonna go with [long pause] [laughter]
11:33
Marcus just stared off into space like he was trying to recall something from the deepest regions of his brain and there was nothing there. There was nothing there. File was not found.
11:43
Anyways, um, so don't know the answer to that one. What I do know is that robusta, does have more caffeine, it's like roughly twice the caffeine content. And the reason that is is because it's a pest repellent. So little bugs that eat it will, like, die. Caffeine is actually a response to to pests, and so it kills most of the bugs that eat it and so robusta is very, very hardy plant.
12:18
It's robust. Yeah. Ah, ah, alright, so that makes a lot of sense. Now we know.
12:25
Versus Arabica which is a mutation of the robusta plant. And so that's the one that was tasty andit's actually 70%. I just saw 70% of the global consumption of coffee is Arabica. And that's of that 70%. It's like 40% is grown in Brazil. And Colombia rounds out like 20 or 30%, roughly, I think it's like 20%. And then Vietnam is the second largest producer of coffee, and predominantly growing Robusta.
12:56
Do you know if any other countries grow robusta, or is it pretty much all Vietnam?
13:01
Brazil grows robusta as well. Okay. Yeah, but via Vietnam is really the the main supplier of robusta.
13:07
Like they're the ones who mastered it. Yeah, mastered robusta. Yep,
13:10
they’ve got a good climate for it and good elevation. And and yeah, they kind of cornered the market on Robusta.
13:16
Yeah. I mean, do you have some info? I have a great story. Convince us why we should love this lady. She's
13:22
wonderful. Okay, her name is Debbie Wei Mullin. Okay. The founder of copper cow coffee. She's incredibly smart. If you want to get a glimpse of her, you can watch a three minute clip of her presenting on Shark Tank. It took her episode a year to air. She didn't have the time to wait for that. They won't give you the funding until they know for sure you're going to air. Wow. So she she got sick of waiting. She is not a person to wait around. That's what I've learned about Debbie Wei Mullin. All right, awesome. So Debbie was born in the Bay Area. Her mom is Vietnamese. Her mom and grandmother and other family members came over as refugees. Her dad is American and a coffee addict. She grew up in the Bay Area and she says she grew up in a very Vietnamese household. In spite of her dad being American. All of the food was Vietnamese. The coffee was Vietnamese. The culture was Vietnamese. She said she felt really bad for the American kids who just didn't have any idea what good food was. Really felt connected to the food especially.
14:27
Good bahn mi and some pho.
14:30
She fantasized as a kid about opening a Vietnamese restaurant. She felt like if Americans could just taste Vietnamese food. She felt like she was sitting on a goldmine. Well, she had a couple aunts and uncles who did open restaurants and they were not gold mines. She saw what a huge struggle it was to run a restaurant and keep it profitable. It’s so hard,
14:51
especially if you're an immigrant. You know, it's gonna be really hard if you don't have a lot of startup funds to make something that's really kind of splashy. Something that's going to get, I don't know, the food critics coming in and giving you press. Right.
15:05
So she gave up that dream. And instead, she went to Berkeley and MIT.
15:10
I just recently found out that that's a big school. It’s a good school.
15:13
And then she got a job at the World Bank. Oh, I recommend this podcast at some point later. So I'll just go ahead and tell you the name of it. Now it is called Startup to Storefront. And they did a 50 minute interview with Debbie Wei Mullin that was excellent. The guy interviewing her mentioned that he had a friend who had also worked for the World Bank and they had this little conversation Wow, they didn't use the F word on their podcast. They're a classier podcast than we are. They're
15:41
just they're probably just trying to avoid the explicit writing. You know what, fuck that.
15:45
We wanted the explicit rating. Yeah, yeah, we're interesting
15:48
to see and minimum of three fucks per episode to keep our explicit rating.
15:52
Yeah, you know what that's like our dog whistle to our people. The little E.
16:03
She took her job at the World Bank partly because she had visited Vietnam as a teenager and saw the poverty there and heard her mom talking about the difficult time she had had growing up there. And she felt like this was a way that she could help. She got a job with the World Bank thinking that she could make a difference and what she found… Aw, that’s so sweet… Yes she found that there was just a ton of bureaucracy and things moved very, very slowly there. And that was not the pace she wanted to move. And she also said there was a lot of ageism, more like you're in your 20s Right. It's like I went to fucking MIT bitch. Yeah, that
16:42
only works in the Bay Area in DC. Yeah, but most
16:45
people are like me. And are like you went to college. So what, big deal.
16:51
anyways, okay. Back on topic.
16:53
Um, so she came up with a coffee idea that Vietnamese coffee was such a huge part of her life growing up and she just loved the flavor and thought that would be very approachable for Americans like a strong maybe slightly bitter coffee with this like sweetened condensed milk in it seems right. Jammin. So she her original plan was to put it all in one bottle and do a cold
17:15
brew. So she goes down this path, she realized that it's not working for her. It's
17:19
a big mess. So the current product as it exists was actually her backup plan. She saw this I guess these little pour overs are incredibly popular in Japan and have been for a years. Oh yeah. So she was traveling and saw this somewhere and was like, Oh, this could be the answer with the ketchup packets of condensed milk, keeping them separate will be the backup.
17:40
These things from Japan that you just mentioned. Fucking adorable. What do you remember the company name that makes the the little pourover so disposable pour overs? A little bat company? I have to look this up really quickly. So there is this brand called Kalita. The Kalita Wave… Makers of the Kalita Wave… but they also make these kantan single cup pour over things. And it comes of course, thank you Japan for producing everything in the world that's adorable. So cute. They're just so fucking cute. Little kantans. Love them. Yeah, they're gonna need to brew a standard cup.
18:16
For sure, we’re Americans and we want 16 ounces of coffee. Yes.
18:20
Give me a giant kantan. Right. That's like a medium and it fits over like a bowl right? Instead of a mug. Anyways.
18:32
Okay, so, Debbie Oh, she wants to um she traveled back to Vietnam to try to source coffee. She wanted to really make sure she had good coffee. Under communism, all the coffee in Vietnam was shit. Because there was one market price. And nobody if if I'm going to get the same price for my coffee whether I pick it ripe or not. Good point. So she said it was at first a little bit hard to source really good coffee. She talked to everyone she knew in Vietnam and was just like, do you know anyone in the coffee business? And she just like literally introduced herself to 50 different coffee farmers trying to find somebody to work with. And she did. She found a co-op of Vietnamese farmers who were willing to test the sugar level before they pick the berries and really take it seriously. So she pays twice the market rate for coffee in Vietnam to make sure that she gets the best
19:27
Yeah, I mean, that's I think pretty typical of the specialty coffee industry.
19:31
The robusta market is a little bit lower than the C market anyways, because it's an easier product to grow, that the costs are a little bit lower because of that. And so it's nice. I'm excited to try that knowing that you went through some work to find some quote unquote good, robusta. I am a skeptic still but I'm those are some lofty claims to say that have found like some high quality that there's like the best. Like those those hyperbolic claims like then I'm like I get perked up.
20:03
Well, it sounds like what she's doing is working with the farmers talking to them about growing practices how to grow better coffee, how to harvest better coffee and and then she's paying them more because they're going through that extra effort. So it sounds like she has one of those Farmer programs. Like a direct trade relationship. Yeah, it's just like an education program and a farmer support program. And do you guys want to make more money for your community? This is how you do it. Yeah. So that's, you know, I think that this is probably not very common in Vietnam, and especially not with robusta coffee, but, uh, not it's not 100% novel in the coffee industry, I would say.
20:40
But it's good practices, and I'm excited to try it.
20:42
Yeah. Yeah.
20:43
She said the farmers were pretty skeptical of her at first too, because they had other Americans come in and make promises that they were not able to keep. Oh, yeah, I bet. She also said that when she went back to Vietnam, she was seeing a middle class. She the country had been so poor, the first time she visited at age 16 or whatever. And then when she went back when she was trying to source this coffee, there were cars on the road and there was a middle class and there was a coffee culture suddenly appearing. Well, that's cool. Before her very eyes. And so then the farmers were maybe getting a little more accustomed to people asking for a better product. So that makes sense. I don't know you guys. I think we're gonna be seeing more Vietnamese coffee. I think maybe this woman will single handedly change our opinion of Vietnamese coffee. I’m hoping so. So Debbie Wei Mullin was she was to appear at the Fancy Food Show. Have you heard of the Fancy Food Show? I have. No. She was going to take her cold brew there. That was her plan and then the cold brew failed. And so she had to go with this backup these, pour overs and these little packets and she ended up winning an innovation award at the fancy food awards. That's awesome. That was a turning point for the company. She did a bunch of fundraising. She had a friend who was a venture capitalist and was trying to convince them to invest in the company and he gave her lots of good advice, but he said this is a really niche product. Only Vietnamese people are gonna buy this. I can't invest.
22:14
I don't know. I would say as a woman in business. I am like really sensitive to a man telling me that I can't do something.
22:24
Look, I just want to know who's looking out for the venture capitalists.
22:30
Thank you Marcus for taking a stand for the venture capitalists. So she gets an award at the fancy food show. She also raises a bunch of money from friends and family. This is how you pull yourself up by your bootstraps. In America you raise $900,000 from friends and family. What the fuck! Who has friends and family? She’s from the Bay Area, you guys. What the fuck.
22:56
That’s like, not even enough for a down payment for a house in the Bay Area.
23:01
I just like to point out I don't think I even know I don't even think I have enough friends and family that collectively have $900,000 in their bank accounts, much less willing to give it to me.
23:12
She went to Berkeley and MIT I'm sure she's, you know,
23:15
She doesn't have any friends making minimum right?
23:18
None. That's true. Yeah. And they're just willing to give her fucking 1000s of dollars. I don't have a friend who would give me $1,000. I don't have one friend I think that would give me one thousand dollars. Not because we don’t
23:31
believe in you though. Yeah, exactly. Just because we don't have 1000 dollars.
23:36
I think it just says more about you than it does about her. Maybe you should get some better friends.
23:48
So she's trying to grow her company on this measly $900,000 and listen to what happens to her next
23:57
we started our company on $9,000 of credit card debt. Oh credit card debt, right. And look where you are. Look at us now.
24:06
you also did not have the good luck that she is about to have in our story.
24:09
Okay, am I about to be jealous?
24:13
It's kind of shocking. It's kind of shocking that this type of thing happens. So tell
24:17
us about about Debbie's good fortune, I can’t fucking wait. Yeah, she was pounding
24:21
the pavement trying to market herself, trying to sell this coffee trying to raise money. And she gets a phone call from Walmart. Oh, just out of the blue. Walmart calls her and says our Asian line is trending really well. And we would like to expand… Like in the United States? …in California and the Rocky Mountain area. They wanted her product in 300 stores.
24:45
Well, that's a good yeah. Good for her. So then
24:48
she called her venture capitalist friend back… and was like fuck you, man… you can't call it a niche market when I'm in Walmart. Right? Did
24:56
she say I don't want your fucking money anymore? No, she then accepted
24:59
$2 million dollars of his money. Her coffee is being sold nationwide. In every Whole Foods. She's one of six coffee brands that is sold in every Whole Foods nationwide, and also in Walmart nationwide. And a few other grocery stores. That’s so nice for her. So it's really taken off.
25:25
That’s so great. She's a nice person and I'm like. You know what her good fortune does not take away from I just
25:33
It just sounds like you're trying to convince yourself of something right now.
25:36
I just am trying to swallow the Robusta and think it’s arabica, it’s ok.
25:40
I would like to say that she had a dream. And she also had opportunities. And she fucking worked, what she had and made it happen. I love that. And so for somebody to say this is what I want to do. And this is how I'm going to do it. And she fucking figured it out. I mean, that's super commendable. Yeah,
26:10
yeah, I think she's pretty amazing. And I think if you listen to an interview with her, you would really like her. I mean, she's just really young and excited and innovative and I think she's great. She is she just she just raised another 8.5 million recently from investors to keep moving forward with the company.
26:29
You know, I just wanted just to point out though, to make myself feel a little bit better. If a venture capitalist came to me with money, I'd probably tell them, thanks, but no things. So I think it's great that like she this is like her ideas to like, let's scale as gigantic as possible. And this is how we're going to do it. You know, and the only way you're going to do that is if you want to do that quickly, is through getting gobs of millions of dollars to scale up and to scale into distribution. And I think some people really love that that kind of world is exciting for them. Like Steph is about to explain to us why capitalism is great. I can't wait to hear it.
27:13
I am not about to do that. What I was going to say. I
27:14
can't wait to hear you defend the venture capitalists on record. Oh god, the weirdest episode.
27:19
In defense of the venture capitalist, if you have $8 million. Isn't it better to invest it in a little startup woman owned company, helping farmers in Vietnam than to invest in say, the pharmaceutical industry because you could put that money just into the stock market? Halliburton? That’s a point.
27:45
Or a new gun company, right.
27:46
That's true. That's a good point. Invest in Debbie
27:49
Debbie Wei Mullin, yep, they did end up investing quite heavily in Debbie Wei Mullin. But she is trying to guide the company in the right direction. She doesn't want artificial flavors. She doesn't want preservatives. She she wants compostable packaging, like these are all good things are. Her heart’s in the right place.
28:05
We're aligned in our values, for sure. To me it feels like you know, maybe this isn't traditional traditional Vietnamese coffee culture in the cultural sense. But what I think is really cool about it, is it like a new twist on Vietnamese coffee and it's like a new innovation on traditional Vietnamese coffee. So to give a little bit of background something I'd really love to do a longer episode on. Coffee wasn't even a thing in Vietnam until the 1800s when France colonized Vietnam, brought in coffee and then it wasn't until the 1900s like early 1900s that they started growing robusta coffee and that's when it really started kind of taking off. And then, you know, we know Vietnam had a lot of troubles throughout the 20th century and turmoil and wars and communism and this, that and the other. So 1986 the Doi Moi reforms, like when the whole communism thing ended and they went into reforming their government and their economic policies, and that's when they really started taking off with coffee production. And that's when they really started ramping it up as you know, a way to as an export from the country. And so that's kind of how Vietnam it's, I mean, they became the coffee powerhouse that they are as a country in really recent history, you know, just the last 30 years in fact. Interesting. Yeah. So I was really, really surprised by that. And then
29:35
to be in second place already.
29:37
Yeah, to be second place. 30 years. I mean, they really ramped it up. Wow. Yeah. Crazy.
29:43
Shall we brew some coffee?
29:44
Yes, please.
29:45
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30:15
Right now I am brewing this this little batwing pour over here filled with lavender coffee… Into a beautiful bat cup… Oh my gosh, that's so funny. I do I have this beautiful Amaro coffee cup mug that our friends over at the Yetee... It's got a cute little bat on it… Yetee t-shirts, go Google them yetee.com and give them some money. This is a free ad because we love the Yetee. We’re going to plug the Yetee. And they made this adorable cat bat coffee mug that I managed to get. It doesn't
30:45
look like I mean it looks like it's brewing slow enough. Oh, it smells like lavender. More than
30:50
coffee, in fact. It also says that what you can do is fill up this little carafe a certain number of times. So if you want to do a Vietnamese style fill the filter two to three times, six to eight times for American but that's gonna give you eight to 10 ounces. I guess what I love about this this like bat disposable pourover thing is like when you take it out it's like taking out a little purse.
Steph, did you weigh your coffee?
31:33
I weighed my coffee and I did just over four ounces. And this is the tiniest amount of coffee I've had in a cup before and it's making me a little bit sad.
31:43
Well, let's also consider the fact that it's robusta and has twice as much coffee or caffeine. So you know that small amount is actually double
31:53
which is still only like half a mug
31:58
so you like a visual like impression that you're getting a fuck ton of coffee. I
32:02
guess it just looks it just looks like I didn't finish as how it looks. Tiny little bit in this big mug. It's the overwhelming smell of lavender is making me slightly nervous that it's gonna taste real soapy. So yeah.
32:18
Yeah, lavender is definitely the dominant aroma. I learned that in the last episode. How did you brew yours, Marcus, it looks like you're just eyeballing. I just eyeballed
32:27
it but I counted and I think I did the Vietnamese style. So three to four to three to four. So I did three to 4. 3 to 4?
32:33
All right. Um, have you tried it black yet anybody? I'm like, I'm really nervous. I do like the smell. of lavender. I'm just afraid to try it.
32:44
I just tried it black and it. It is much smoother than I expected it to be, honestly. It's bitter at the end for sure. But the intensity of the lavender smell isn't as intense as the taste I guess. Yeah, I
33:01
would say that I would agree with that. It smells stronger than the tastes. It's not an unpleasant taste. No, you lavender’s not unpleasant.
33:10
You definitely get a lot of lavender in the flavor as well but it's it's really nice. I'm
33:14
surprised at how smooth it is.
33:15
It is smooth. Yeah. For Robusta… for what you've heard about robusta. Have you ever actually tried Robusta? Yeah. Oh yeah. Cafe Bustello, baby.
33:23
Is that robusta? I'm, now I’m not certain of it. I
33:28
think it is. I mean, that comes from another country but not Vietnam.
33:31
Can somebody fact check us in send an email to Hello at no bad reviews podcast.com and let us know.
33:40
Yeah, I I like this. Um,
33:42
I could do black. I could. I'm surprised. I've surprised myself. I was looking forward to doing it with sweetened condensed milk. Yeah, but like for real I could drink this black. This is really tasty. I'm gonna
33:54
accidentally drink it all black because there's so little of it. I'm digging it. Mmhmm. Yeah, the lavender is like slightly
34:04
weird but very good. Maybe the lavender is what softens it.
34:08
So you know, I when I was doing research, I was like, why would anybody want to put lavender in their coffee?
34:14
I tried to find the first instance of lavender going into coffee. I'm not I can't guarantee you that this is the first time but the only story that I could find is from the mid 90s in Moscow, Russia. We were coffee innovation happens. I thought that was just the innovation of vodka. Lavender vodka? Vodka comes up in this story, too.
It was 96 or 97. I don't think it was still the Soviet Union at that point. There was a guy named Raphael, Timur bave. I might not be saying that correctly. There's a high
34:55
likelihood if it's a if it's Russian, you're saying it wrong. I’m not saying it right. But we're gonna go with it. It sounds great.
35:03
I'm trying to pull deep deep down from the Russian that is within me somewhere a few generations ago. Raphael walked into his favorite coffee shop in Russia and said he was sick of what he was normally drinking and he wanted the barista to come up with something. So the barista invented a coffee drink called the Raph named after Raphael. Oh, and it like spread across Russia. It was just like espresso and warm cream and vanilla sugar and a sprinkle of cinnamon. And in Kiev, all the coffee shops put lavender in the Raph. It was all lavender Raph. And that was there was something special about it. And it held the name and spread around Russia. Everybody called it the Raph and it was this like warm cream and espresso drink. That was the first time I could find where people were putting lavender in their coffee. Wow.
36:00
So I was thinking that question. And so that's what I asked Google. The lavender. The calming properties of the lavender are supposed to counteract the jittery properties of the coffee so that you're supposed to be able to get the caffeine kick without any jitters and without any like nervousness or anxiousness. So
36:21
uppers and downers in this case works. Because I learned in dare class in middle school that you're not supposed to mix those two. However,
36:28
That's the most fun, I learned in college.
36:35
Yeah, I mean, like now we get it all in one cup. And God damn I'm really surprised at how good this is just black on its own. I like didn't want to like it as much as I do. And I was excited to try. Yeah, fuck man nailed it. You’re smiling, you don't even need whiskey. I know, I'm like, now I'm just gonna try it with the sweetened condensed milk for fun, but I want to actually want to drink this one black and make a second one. Actually, that's what I'm gonna do. I'm just gonna enjoy it.
37:10
You know, I'm gonna do it. Thanks, Deb. You were right.
37:14
She is right. Just a little afternoon coffee break.
37:16
Yeah, it's good with the sweetened condensed milk. I think I preferred it black but that is how I generally prefer my coffee. So yeah, no surprises. I guess it I mean, I'm surprised by how much I love it though. Yeah, I really really like it.
37:31
It’s very smooth, very well rounded. The floral notes on it are great and the roast on it’s really good. It's not too dark.
37:38
No, it's not. It's a little bitter at the end. It's not terribly dark. I’m enjoying it.
37:43
I do not. When I put the sweetened condensed milk in it brought up that floral flavor. Way too much. Now I feel like I am chewing on a sprig of lavender flowers.
37:56
Oh, you're right Jenni the I the it does bring up like the herbal lavender when you add the sweetened condensed milk to it and it does become more of like,
38:06
Let's Get tea. I mean I do really like sweetened condensed milk. I mean
38:10
I love sweetened condensed milk, key lime pie all day. But I don't think I like it in this coffee. I liked it better I think black.
38:18
I plan to buy more of this. I would really like to try some of the other flavors. I think that a pumpkin spice or salted caramel would be better with the sweetened condensed milk than the lavender is. And all of those flavors are no artificial flavors.
38:34
Now say something about it and make it a not a bad review.
38:38
Oh, and then I would actually I would say if the jittery part is true, this is a coffee that was made for me.
38:46
I was gonna say you're the one who has the most problems with caffeine and it's unfortunate that you're not enjoying the lavender coffee more. I mean,
38:51
maybe it's one of those things where it's like an acquired taste though, because I've never tasted lavender before and I have all of these associations of lavender with these other applications. It just will take my tongue a little bit of time to catch up to my brain. And this could I mean if it there is that take off the jittery although I feel after drinking like three sips I don't know if it's coming through in the audio, but I'm like feeling the caffeine and like what am I going to do? I got a lot of talking to do and I'm gonna do it really fast.
39:21
Maybe the lavender takes a minute to kick in.
39:25
maybe the caffeine hits you first you can go get a bunch of shit done and then the lavender sets and later when it's time to chill the fuck out. Like this is like the perfect housecleaning coffee. Oh. Maybe?
39:37
who is this coffee for them?
39:39
This coffee is definitely then again for me because I always have to clean my house.
39:45
This coffee is so for me that I'm going to go home and order some of the salted caramel to try it. I really like this and I like that I can have a few of these packets in the cabinet and grab one when I'm on the run and not give that $3 to Dunkin Donuts. I don't know.
40:03
Yeah, and I wish I had something more clever to say but I think this coffee is for me too. It's really tasty. I like it. Yeah, surprised at how much I like the coffee black.
40:14
So it's for me, too. Yay like a genuine good review. Haha,
40:19
I know kind of disappointed. Well, I mean, it's good. She did a good job.
40:24
Good job, Debbie. Yeah, good job, Debbie. So. So yeah, I mean it sounds like this coffee as a coffee for anybody.
40:33
Surprisingly, yeah.
40:35
I mean, including ourselves.
40:35
This will be our last podcast.
40:39
I went into it was really like really suspicious expectations. Because lavender in coffee was not, I was like no, this is not going to be good. I did not think it would be good. So, I’m pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed this coffee.
40:59
So I guess that wraps up our episode.So that’s our episode! Awesome! This was a great episode, really enjoyed it. Yeah, really yummy coffee. That was really interesting, I was really surprised, for sure.
41:07
So we hope you guys enjoyed this episode as we enjoyed this coffee, surprisingly. Yeah, and then if you see, if you’re at the store, and you see a crazy coffee that you think would be fun hear about, take a picture, tag us on social media at no bad reviews pod. You can also follow us on social media to see what we’re talking about. Or if you just want to send us an email, you heard something in the podcast you thought was interesting, so it, send us an email hello at no bad reviews podcast dot com. Make sure to like share and subscribe, on your favorite podcasting app. Oh, and tell your friends, word of mouth. We need it, right now. That’s how we get people listening to us. It’s so so important to tell your friends. Because if you tell your friends. 2 friends, and they tell 2 friends, by the end of the month we’ll have like 4 million subscribers which is what we’re going for. We’re going for 4 million. Thanks everybody!
Thank you for listening to this podcast, generously sponsored by Modest Coffee. Purveyors of single origin coffee without the snobbery. Visit www dot modest dot coffee to forward slash no bad reviews to see what they’re roasting today. Enjoy.
Tue, 2/15 5:00AM CST • 42:41
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
coffee, lavender, vietnamese, vietnam, sweetened condensed milk, fucking, caffeine, company, debbie, robusta, flavor, podcast, called, drink, friends, robust, grow, cup, brew, mug
00:03
This podcast is brought to you by modest coffee, single origin coffee without the snobbery go to www dot modest dot coffee forward slash no bad reviews to see what coffees they're roasting today tears
00:42
Hello and welcome to no bad reviews colon a coffee podcast, a podcast where three friends and coworkers try coffee, any coffee and we will give no bad reviews. I am Jenni and I manage all of the operations at a coffee company. It happens to be called Modest Coffee, but that's not a big deal.
01:07
Marcus Contaldo. That’s my last name and I do coffee at the same place. And I'm an award winning coffee roaster and my palate counts.
01:19
I'm Stephanie I have been the Employee of the Month of modest coffee for 33 months. one more picture up on the wall. Right and one more picture of myself for my break room.
01:31
Jenni, you've got something exciting to tell us about new subscribers,
01:34
right? Yes, our sponsor Modest Coffee has generously decided to be a part of a giveaway. And so So what we have decided to do because we're a new podcast is anybody who subscribes to our podcast will be entered into a drawing to win a bag of coffee every week. We're going to pull a name but yeah, but you have to let us know that you subscribed like we can't just go like ask who are the subscribers and how do they do that Jenni? Yeah, so what we are asking you to do is subscribe to our podcast wherever you like to listen to podcasts and send us a screenshot of checked subscribe. And you could tag us on social media at no bad reviews pod or if you live more of a private life, you can slide into our DMS with a screenshot (that's what the kids are saying these days.) Or you can send us a an email at Hello at no bad reviews podcast.com And
02:39
we've got a grading scale right? do you want to tell us about the grading scale?
02:43
We typically will try the coffee black. And if we need to, we'll doctor it up with some cream and sugar and if we need to go beyond that we'll doctor it up with some whiskey and whipped cream until we find the perfect point where we can give the coffee a good review.
03:01
Or at least not a bad review
03:02
not a bad review.
03:03
We are a no bad review podcast.
03:05
I don't want to set the bar too high. Thank you. Today we have copper cow coffee. Kind of a special add in because the coffee we're drinking today comes with sweetened condensed milk so that is going to be our starting point.
03:20
Well, I have to confess that I have to make a correction to what I told you. I think I must have seen it with a different coffee company that includes a ketchup packet of sweetened condensed milk, and I thought it was this company and especially because they say they're Vietnamese coffee. I naturally assumed that they were going to go all the way with Vietnamese coffee.
03:41
They This is the company that sells the packets. Oh they do sell packets? You can get the coffee with or without the packets of sweetened condensed milk. Did I fuck this up then? I think maybe whoever ordered the coffee… that
03:51
would have been me… without… Okay, let me look now. There it is. I thought you might you could either buy it as it is or buy it as like a combo pack.
04:00
I think there is a, combo pack, I don't… Ok, yes, Steph’s
04:04
gonna call me out yes, there's a combo pack as well. Well, thank goodness I have sweetened condensed milk. Thank goodness. So I've seen this company advertised to me quite a bit online. So at first I was like is this true Vietnamese coffee, which we can talk about a little bit later. And then I had this realization. I was like, Oh, well they can say that if the coffee comes from Vietnam. Like I was thinking for coffee, Vietnamese coffee from a cultural standpoint, but it could actually just literally be Vietnamese coffee. So then my second question to myself was is this Robusta, which is the most popular coffee in Vietnam. And I know that you did a lot of research into the company and the coffee so I'm really curious if you have the answers to the questions I am seeking. I'm really
04:49
excited to give you the answers. I feel pretty good about this company. Oh cool. So weird position for me to be taking generally speaking.
04:56
It's probably refreshing after the last episode.
05:01
I just know it's lavender coffee, and I'm super excited about it because Lady Grey tea is made with lavender. So I know like the flavors of bergamont and lavender are really good. And so I'm really hopeful that that the first flavored coffee that I'm excited about
05:16
hits. I am the opposite. I'm not excited about drinking lavender in my coffee. When I was at Trader Joe's the other day I saw some lavender soap and I was like you know what, I'm gonna buy this so I can get in the mindset for this podcast on Sunday. And as I was washing with it the other day I'm like this smells great in the shower and as a soap but I don't know that I want to be drinking this scent. Yeah, I
05:38
don't I don't love the kind of flowery flavors all the time and lavender is not even scent wise my favorite, honestly. That’s fair. I don't dislike it, necessarily.
05:49
It's very unique, there is nothing like it. Right.
05:52
When I was pregnant and having a really hard time sleeping. I used lavender spray every night and it put me right to sleep. It did give me some strange dreams. That could have been pregnancy, too. I did find it really effective as a sleep aid.
06:04
So we got a little uppers and downers with this. Oh yeah. Oh
06:08
yeah. Can we before I talk about the company? Can we really describe the product because the product is unusual. It's a box. Open the packet and it's like a paper pourover cone basically with the coffee inside it.
06:27
So, it looks like a bat. It does look like a bat!
06:29
And you put its little wings over the edge of your mug. And then you can just tear off the top and pour your water in. And if you order the right one. We'll also have a little ketchup packet full of sweetened condensed milk inside as well. The owner says that this coffee is not your first morning coffee. She says this is a coffee break coffee. You should really enjoy it. Okay.
06:55
That’s what this podcast is all about, enjoying the coffee.
06:59
I would like to say that I enjoy every cup of coffee I have and in fact, I would say I enjoy my morning cup of coffee. More than any other cup of coffee the entire day. Really? Yes, absolutely.
07:11
I think that first cup of coffee is so necessary that the taste or like taking a moment to really appreciate it gets a little lost in the like you get this in me. That
07:23
kind of, that's good point. Like nobody tells Marcus how to drink his coffee or when he's going to appreciate it. You
07:28
don't know me. I’ll drink my coffee when I want. Yeah, no.
07:32
I think the reason she expresses it that way is because the price point is much higher than if you were just buying a bag of beans. It's it works out to something like $3 a cup, I believe. And also a packet of sweetened condensed milk. I don't know how many cups of coffee you drink in a day. Yeah. I guess it's fine if you're not eating anything, but those packets of sweetened condensed milk are gonna add up basically, I don't know about fat content but sugar content for sure. You just don't want to be drinking four of those.
08:05
So it's like a little bougie treat? Yeah, it’s like a little treat. So she's gonna own that. I’m fine with that.
08:09
Yeah, okay. Yeah. All right. Maybe not, you know, maybe not what you need first thing in the morning but it's what you can enjoy when you have a minute… to treat yourself… Yeah, a little self care in a cup. Not that she's telling you how to drink your coffee. I feel a little protective of this woman in this company because I just like her so much after learning about
08:29
her. Yeah, maybe I should give her a chance, that’s right, no bad reviews.
08:32
I mean, I am naturally suspicious of any sort of gimmick in the coffee industry. And so I feel like you're protective of this woman but I am protective of the coffee industry itself. Ok, wow. That sounds a little pretentious. I guess I don't want to myself sound like an asshole but, but I think this is also cool.
08:55
There's room for everybody except for flavored coffee. And now I'm even becoming welcoming of that too.
09:01
this podcast will change you. Yeah,
09:03
I know. I know.
09:04
It's here to change your soul.
09:06
When we're talking about flavored coffee. There's a difference between artificial bacon flavor and real lavender flowers. Like these are two completely different types of flavored coffee. Yeah,
09:19
and that's where I'm like, really excited because this I feel like there's more room in my heart for real flavor. For sure.
09:27
So I do really appreciate the fact that this company uses real herbs in their coffee. I think that's really cool. And I just opened up the packet and you can see little lavenders in there and it smells like lavender. It smells like straight up like I'm about to fall asleep lavender but my body doesn't actually know what to because I’m also smelling coffee.
09:46
It smells very strongly of lavender. Very strongly.
09:49
Did you see how much lavender it has like one and a half grams or something of lavender? Take your self care routine to the next level. 10.5 grams of fresh coffee and 1.5 grams of real lavender. That's a lot of lavender. Especially because that ends up being like 15% Lavender. Yeah, one thing I'm noticing though if it's only 10.5 grams of coffee if you're doing this like a proper brew ratio of 16 to one that only gives you six ounces of coffee. Well,
10:18
she says that if you really want to make it like a strong Vietnamese style coffee, you should really only pour four ounces of water in with your sweetened condensed milk. Okay. But you can pour up to eight ounces of water for more American style large cup so she is recommending less. Is this robusta?This is 70% robusta and 30% Arabica and 100% grown in Vietnam. That's cool.
10:45
I'm loving it. That means it's gonna be super caffeinated. As long as we're talking about
10:49
the coffee for a minute, can we talk about the difference between Arabica and Robusta?
10:53
Vietnam is known for robusta coffee. It is the second largest producer of coffee in the entire world behind Brazil. Shocked me to learn that. Shocked me, and I remember calling Marcus I was like, why aren’t we buying Vietnamese coffee? And Marcus was like, well, that's because it's like all Robusta. Yeah. I thought this was common knowledge. It's not. Do you want to talk about Robusta versus Arabica, Marcus?
11:11
Yeah, so Robusta grows like a weed, really, it grows at lower elevations really, really easy to harvest really, really easy to grow.
11:18
Does it have to go and shade like Arabica?
11:20
That I'm not certain of.
11:23
You don’t have to know everything, it's okay. Yeah,
11:24
I'm gonna go with [long pause] [laughter]
11:33
Marcus just stared off into space like he was trying to recall something from the deepest regions of his brain and there was nothing there. There was nothing there. File was not found.
11:43
Anyways, um, so don't know the answer to that one. What I do know is that robusta, does have more caffeine, it's like roughly twice the caffeine content. And the reason that is is because it's a pest repellent. So little bugs that eat it will, like, die. Caffeine is actually a response to to pests, and so it kills most of the bugs that eat it and so robusta is very, very hardy plant.
12:18
It's robust. Yeah. Ah, ah, alright, so that makes a lot of sense. Now we know.
12:25
Versus Arabica which is a mutation of the robusta plant. And so that's the one that was tasty andit's actually 70%. I just saw 70% of the global consumption of coffee is Arabica. And that's of that 70%. It's like 40% is grown in Brazil. And Colombia rounds out like 20 or 30%, roughly, I think it's like 20%. And then Vietnam is the second largest producer of coffee, and predominantly growing Robusta.
12:56
Do you know if any other countries grow robusta, or is it pretty much all Vietnam?
13:01
Brazil grows robusta as well. Okay. Yeah, but via Vietnam is really the the main supplier of robusta.
13:07
Like they're the ones who mastered it. Yeah, mastered robusta. Yep,
13:10
they’ve got a good climate for it and good elevation. And and yeah, they kind of cornered the market on Robusta.
13:16
Yeah. I mean, do you have some info? I have a great story. Convince us why we should love this lady. She's
13:22
wonderful. Okay, her name is Debbie Wei Mullin. Okay. The founder of copper cow coffee. She's incredibly smart. If you want to get a glimpse of her, you can watch a three minute clip of her presenting on Shark Tank. It took her episode a year to air. She didn't have the time to wait for that. They won't give you the funding until they know for sure you're going to air. Wow. So she she got sick of waiting. She is not a person to wait around. That's what I've learned about Debbie Wei Mullin. All right, awesome. So Debbie was born in the Bay Area. Her mom is Vietnamese. Her mom and grandmother and other family members came over as refugees. Her dad is American and a coffee addict. She grew up in the Bay Area and she says she grew up in a very Vietnamese household. In spite of her dad being American. All of the food was Vietnamese. The coffee was Vietnamese. The culture was Vietnamese. She said she felt really bad for the American kids who just didn't have any idea what good food was. Really felt connected to the food especially.
14:27
Good bahn mi and some pho.
14:30
She fantasized as a kid about opening a Vietnamese restaurant. She felt like if Americans could just taste Vietnamese food. She felt like she was sitting on a goldmine. Well, she had a couple aunts and uncles who did open restaurants and they were not gold mines. She saw what a huge struggle it was to run a restaurant and keep it profitable. It’s so hard,
14:51
especially if you're an immigrant. You know, it's gonna be really hard if you don't have a lot of startup funds to make something that's really kind of splashy. Something that's going to get, I don't know, the food critics coming in and giving you press. Right.
15:05
So she gave up that dream. And instead, she went to Berkeley and MIT.
15:10
I just recently found out that that's a big school. It’s a good school.
15:13
And then she got a job at the World Bank. Oh, I recommend this podcast at some point later. So I'll just go ahead and tell you the name of it. Now it is called Startup to Storefront. And they did a 50 minute interview with Debbie Wei Mullin that was excellent. The guy interviewing her mentioned that he had a friend who had also worked for the World Bank and they had this little conversation Wow, they didn't use the F word on their podcast. They're a classier podcast than we are. They're
15:41
just they're probably just trying to avoid the explicit writing. You know what, fuck that.
15:45
We wanted the explicit rating. Yeah, yeah, we're interesting
15:48
to see and minimum of three fucks per episode to keep our explicit rating.
15:52
Yeah, you know what that's like our dog whistle to our people. The little E.
16:03
She took her job at the World Bank partly because she had visited Vietnam as a teenager and saw the poverty there and heard her mom talking about the difficult time she had had growing up there. And she felt like this was a way that she could help. She got a job with the World Bank thinking that she could make a difference and what she found… Aw, that’s so sweet… Yes she found that there was just a ton of bureaucracy and things moved very, very slowly there. And that was not the pace she wanted to move. And she also said there was a lot of ageism, more like you're in your 20s Right. It's like I went to fucking MIT bitch. Yeah, that
16:42
only works in the Bay Area in DC. Yeah, but most
16:45
people are like me. And are like you went to college. So what, big deal.
16:51
anyways, okay. Back on topic.
16:53
Um, so she came up with a coffee idea that Vietnamese coffee was such a huge part of her life growing up and she just loved the flavor and thought that would be very approachable for Americans like a strong maybe slightly bitter coffee with this like sweetened condensed milk in it seems right. Jammin. So she her original plan was to put it all in one bottle and do a cold
17:15
brew. So she goes down this path, she realized that it's not working for her. It's
17:19
a big mess. So the current product as it exists was actually her backup plan. She saw this I guess these little pour overs are incredibly popular in Japan and have been for a years. Oh yeah. So she was traveling and saw this somewhere and was like, Oh, this could be the answer with the ketchup packets of condensed milk, keeping them separate will be the backup.
17:40
These things from Japan that you just mentioned. Fucking adorable. What do you remember the company name that makes the the little pourover so disposable pour overs? A little bat company? I have to look this up really quickly. So there is this brand called Kalita. The Kalita Wave… Makers of the Kalita Wave… but they also make these kantan single cup pour over things. And it comes of course, thank you Japan for producing everything in the world that's adorable. So cute. They're just so fucking cute. Little kantans. Love them. Yeah, they're gonna need to brew a standard cup.
18:16
For sure, we’re Americans and we want 16 ounces of coffee. Yes.
18:20
Give me a giant kantan. Right. That's like a medium and it fits over like a bowl right? Instead of a mug. Anyways.
18:32
Okay, so, Debbie Oh, she wants to um she traveled back to Vietnam to try to source coffee. She wanted to really make sure she had good coffee. Under communism, all the coffee in Vietnam was shit. Because there was one market price. And nobody if if I'm going to get the same price for my coffee whether I pick it ripe or not. Good point. So she said it was at first a little bit hard to source really good coffee. She talked to everyone she knew in Vietnam and was just like, do you know anyone in the coffee business? And she just like literally introduced herself to 50 different coffee farmers trying to find somebody to work with. And she did. She found a co-op of Vietnamese farmers who were willing to test the sugar level before they pick the berries and really take it seriously. So she pays twice the market rate for coffee in Vietnam to make sure that she gets the best
19:27
Yeah, I mean, that's I think pretty typical of the specialty coffee industry.
19:31
The robusta market is a little bit lower than the C market anyways, because it's an easier product to grow, that the costs are a little bit lower because of that. And so it's nice. I'm excited to try that knowing that you went through some work to find some quote unquote good, robusta. I am a skeptic still but I'm those are some lofty claims to say that have found like some high quality that there's like the best. Like those those hyperbolic claims like then I'm like I get perked up.
20:03
Well, it sounds like what she's doing is working with the farmers talking to them about growing practices how to grow better coffee, how to harvest better coffee and and then she's paying them more because they're going through that extra effort. So it sounds like she has one of those Farmer programs. Like a direct trade relationship. Yeah, it's just like an education program and a farmer support program. And do you guys want to make more money for your community? This is how you do it. Yeah. So that's, you know, I think that this is probably not very common in Vietnam, and especially not with robusta coffee, but, uh, not it's not 100% novel in the coffee industry, I would say.
20:40
But it's good practices, and I'm excited to try it.
20:42
Yeah. Yeah.
20:43
She said the farmers were pretty skeptical of her at first too, because they had other Americans come in and make promises that they were not able to keep. Oh, yeah, I bet. She also said that when she went back to Vietnam, she was seeing a middle class. She the country had been so poor, the first time she visited at age 16 or whatever. And then when she went back when she was trying to source this coffee, there were cars on the road and there was a middle class and there was a coffee culture suddenly appearing. Well, that's cool. Before her very eyes. And so then the farmers were maybe getting a little more accustomed to people asking for a better product. So that makes sense. I don't know you guys. I think we're gonna be seeing more Vietnamese coffee. I think maybe this woman will single handedly change our opinion of Vietnamese coffee. I’m hoping so. So Debbie Wei Mullin was she was to appear at the Fancy Food Show. Have you heard of the Fancy Food Show? I have. No. She was going to take her cold brew there. That was her plan and then the cold brew failed. And so she had to go with this backup these, pour overs and these little packets and she ended up winning an innovation award at the fancy food awards. That's awesome. That was a turning point for the company. She did a bunch of fundraising. She had a friend who was a venture capitalist and was trying to convince them to invest in the company and he gave her lots of good advice, but he said this is a really niche product. Only Vietnamese people are gonna buy this. I can't invest.
22:14
I don't know. I would say as a woman in business. I am like really sensitive to a man telling me that I can't do something.
22:24
Look, I just want to know who's looking out for the venture capitalists.
22:30
Thank you Marcus for taking a stand for the venture capitalists. So she gets an award at the fancy food show. She also raises a bunch of money from friends and family. This is how you pull yourself up by your bootstraps. In America you raise $900,000 from friends and family. What the fuck! Who has friends and family? She’s from the Bay Area, you guys. What the fuck.
22:56
That’s like, not even enough for a down payment for a house in the Bay Area.
23:01
I just like to point out I don't think I even know I don't even think I have enough friends and family that collectively have $900,000 in their bank accounts, much less willing to give it to me.
23:12
She went to Berkeley and MIT I'm sure she's, you know,
23:15
She doesn't have any friends making minimum right?
23:18
None. That's true. Yeah. And they're just willing to give her fucking 1000s of dollars. I don't have a friend who would give me $1,000. I don't have one friend I think that would give me one thousand dollars. Not because we don’t
23:31
believe in you though. Yeah, exactly. Just because we don't have 1000 dollars.
23:36
I think it just says more about you than it does about her. Maybe you should get some better friends.
23:48
So she's trying to grow her company on this measly $900,000 and listen to what happens to her next
23:57
we started our company on $9,000 of credit card debt. Oh credit card debt, right. And look where you are. Look at us now.
24:06
you also did not have the good luck that she is about to have in our story.
24:09
Okay, am I about to be jealous?
24:13
It's kind of shocking. It's kind of shocking that this type of thing happens. So tell
24:17
us about about Debbie's good fortune, I can’t fucking wait. Yeah, she was pounding
24:21
the pavement trying to market herself, trying to sell this coffee trying to raise money. And she gets a phone call from Walmart. Oh, just out of the blue. Walmart calls her and says our Asian line is trending really well. And we would like to expand… Like in the United States? …in California and the Rocky Mountain area. They wanted her product in 300 stores.
24:45
Well, that's a good yeah. Good for her. So then
24:48
she called her venture capitalist friend back… and was like fuck you, man… you can't call it a niche market when I'm in Walmart. Right? Did
24:56
she say I don't want your fucking money anymore? No, she then accepted
24:59
$2 million dollars of his money. Her coffee is being sold nationwide. In every Whole Foods. She's one of six coffee brands that is sold in every Whole Foods nationwide, and also in Walmart nationwide. And a few other grocery stores. That’s so nice for her. So it's really taken off.
25:25
That’s so great. She's a nice person and I'm like. You know what her good fortune does not take away from I just
25:33
It just sounds like you're trying to convince yourself of something right now.
25:36
I just am trying to swallow the Robusta and think it’s arabica, it’s ok.
25:40
I would like to say that she had a dream. And she also had opportunities. And she fucking worked, what she had and made it happen. I love that. And so for somebody to say this is what I want to do. And this is how I'm going to do it. And she fucking figured it out. I mean, that's super commendable. Yeah,
26:10
yeah, I think she's pretty amazing. And I think if you listen to an interview with her, you would really like her. I mean, she's just really young and excited and innovative and I think she's great. She is she just she just raised another 8.5 million recently from investors to keep moving forward with the company.
26:29
You know, I just wanted just to point out though, to make myself feel a little bit better. If a venture capitalist came to me with money, I'd probably tell them, thanks, but no things. So I think it's great that like she this is like her ideas to like, let's scale as gigantic as possible. And this is how we're going to do it. You know, and the only way you're going to do that is if you want to do that quickly, is through getting gobs of millions of dollars to scale up and to scale into distribution. And I think some people really love that that kind of world is exciting for them. Like Steph is about to explain to us why capitalism is great. I can't wait to hear it.
27:13
I am not about to do that. What I was going to say. I
27:14
can't wait to hear you defend the venture capitalists on record. Oh god, the weirdest episode.
27:19
In defense of the venture capitalist, if you have $8 million. Isn't it better to invest it in a little startup woman owned company, helping farmers in Vietnam than to invest in say, the pharmaceutical industry because you could put that money just into the stock market? Halliburton? That’s a point.
27:45
Or a new gun company, right.
27:46
That's true. That's a good point. Invest in Debbie
27:49
Debbie Wei Mullin, yep, they did end up investing quite heavily in Debbie Wei Mullin. But she is trying to guide the company in the right direction. She doesn't want artificial flavors. She doesn't want preservatives. She she wants compostable packaging, like these are all good things are. Her heart’s in the right place.
28:05
We're aligned in our values, for sure. To me it feels like you know, maybe this isn't traditional traditional Vietnamese coffee culture in the cultural sense. But what I think is really cool about it, is it like a new twist on Vietnamese coffee and it's like a new innovation on traditional Vietnamese coffee. So to give a little bit of background something I'd really love to do a longer episode on. Coffee wasn't even a thing in Vietnam until the 1800s when France colonized Vietnam, brought in coffee and then it wasn't until the 1900s like early 1900s that they started growing robusta coffee and that's when it really started kind of taking off. And then, you know, we know Vietnam had a lot of troubles throughout the 20th century and turmoil and wars and communism and this, that and the other. So 1986 the Doi Moi reforms, like when the whole communism thing ended and they went into reforming their government and their economic policies, and that's when they really started taking off with coffee production. And that's when they really started ramping it up as you know, a way to as an export from the country. And so that's kind of how Vietnam it's, I mean, they became the coffee powerhouse that they are as a country in really recent history, you know, just the last 30 years in fact. Interesting. Yeah. So I was really, really surprised by that. And then
29:35
to be in second place already.
29:37
Yeah, to be second place. 30 years. I mean, they really ramped it up. Wow. Yeah. Crazy.
29:43
Shall we brew some coffee?
29:44
Yes, please.
29:45
Modest coffee roasts the highest quality single origin coffees without the snobbery. They take the guesswork out of buying specialty coffee by carefully curating green coffees and sorting them to one of their tiers based on cupping scores, price, flavor notes and roast level go to w w w dot modest dot coffee forward slash no bad reviews to see what they're roasting today, pip pip cheerio.
30:15
Right now I am brewing this this little batwing pour over here filled with lavender coffee… Into a beautiful bat cup… Oh my gosh, that's so funny. I do I have this beautiful Amaro coffee cup mug that our friends over at the Yetee... It's got a cute little bat on it… Yetee t-shirts, go Google them yetee.com and give them some money. This is a free ad because we love the Yetee. We’re going to plug the Yetee. And they made this adorable cat bat coffee mug that I managed to get. It doesn't
30:45
look like I mean it looks like it's brewing slow enough. Oh, it smells like lavender. More than
30:50
coffee, in fact. It also says that what you can do is fill up this little carafe a certain number of times. So if you want to do a Vietnamese style fill the filter two to three times, six to eight times for American but that's gonna give you eight to 10 ounces. I guess what I love about this this like bat disposable pourover thing is like when you take it out it's like taking out a little purse.
Steph, did you weigh your coffee?
31:33
I weighed my coffee and I did just over four ounces. And this is the tiniest amount of coffee I've had in a cup before and it's making me a little bit sad.
31:43
Well, let's also consider the fact that it's robusta and has twice as much coffee or caffeine. So you know that small amount is actually double
31:53
which is still only like half a mug
31:58
so you like a visual like impression that you're getting a fuck ton of coffee. I
32:02
guess it just looks it just looks like I didn't finish as how it looks. Tiny little bit in this big mug. It's the overwhelming smell of lavender is making me slightly nervous that it's gonna taste real soapy. So yeah.
32:18
Yeah, lavender is definitely the dominant aroma. I learned that in the last episode. How did you brew yours, Marcus, it looks like you're just eyeballing. I just eyeballed
32:27
it but I counted and I think I did the Vietnamese style. So three to four to three to four. So I did three to 4. 3 to 4?
32:33
All right. Um, have you tried it black yet anybody? I'm like, I'm really nervous. I do like the smell. of lavender. I'm just afraid to try it.
32:44
I just tried it black and it. It is much smoother than I expected it to be, honestly. It's bitter at the end for sure. But the intensity of the lavender smell isn't as intense as the taste I guess. Yeah, I
33:01
would say that I would agree with that. It smells stronger than the tastes. It's not an unpleasant taste. No, you lavender’s not unpleasant.
33:10
You definitely get a lot of lavender in the flavor as well but it's it's really nice. I'm
33:14
surprised at how smooth it is.
33:15
It is smooth. Yeah. For Robusta… for what you've heard about robusta. Have you ever actually tried Robusta? Yeah. Oh yeah. Cafe Bustello, baby.
33:23
Is that robusta? I'm, now I’m not certain of it. I
33:28
think it is. I mean, that comes from another country but not Vietnam.
33:31
Can somebody fact check us in send an email to Hello at no bad reviews podcast.com and let us know.
33:40
Yeah, I I like this. Um,
33:42
I could do black. I could. I'm surprised. I've surprised myself. I was looking forward to doing it with sweetened condensed milk. Yeah, but like for real I could drink this black. This is really tasty. I'm gonna
33:54
accidentally drink it all black because there's so little of it. I'm digging it. Mmhmm. Yeah, the lavender is like slightly
34:04
weird but very good. Maybe the lavender is what softens it.
34:08
So you know, I when I was doing research, I was like, why would anybody want to put lavender in their coffee?
34:14
I tried to find the first instance of lavender going into coffee. I'm not I can't guarantee you that this is the first time but the only story that I could find is from the mid 90s in Moscow, Russia. We were coffee innovation happens. I thought that was just the innovation of vodka. Lavender vodka? Vodka comes up in this story, too.
It was 96 or 97. I don't think it was still the Soviet Union at that point. There was a guy named Raphael, Timur bave. I might not be saying that correctly. There's a high
34:55
likelihood if it's a if it's Russian, you're saying it wrong. I’m not saying it right. But we're gonna go with it. It sounds great.
35:03
I'm trying to pull deep deep down from the Russian that is within me somewhere a few generations ago. Raphael walked into his favorite coffee shop in Russia and said he was sick of what he was normally drinking and he wanted the barista to come up with something. So the barista invented a coffee drink called the Raph named after Raphael. Oh, and it like spread across Russia. It was just like espresso and warm cream and vanilla sugar and a sprinkle of cinnamon. And in Kiev, all the coffee shops put lavender in the Raph. It was all lavender Raph. And that was there was something special about it. And it held the name and spread around Russia. Everybody called it the Raph and it was this like warm cream and espresso drink. That was the first time I could find where people were putting lavender in their coffee. Wow.
36:00
So I was thinking that question. And so that's what I asked Google. The lavender. The calming properties of the lavender are supposed to counteract the jittery properties of the coffee so that you're supposed to be able to get the caffeine kick without any jitters and without any like nervousness or anxiousness. So
36:21
uppers and downers in this case works. Because I learned in dare class in middle school that you're not supposed to mix those two. However,
36:28
That's the most fun, I learned in college.
36:35
Yeah, I mean, like now we get it all in one cup. And God damn I'm really surprised at how good this is just black on its own. I like didn't want to like it as much as I do. And I was excited to try. Yeah, fuck man nailed it. You’re smiling, you don't even need whiskey. I know, I'm like, now I'm just gonna try it with the sweetened condensed milk for fun, but I want to actually want to drink this one black and make a second one. Actually, that's what I'm gonna do. I'm just gonna enjoy it.
37:10
You know, I'm gonna do it. Thanks, Deb. You were right.
37:14
She is right. Just a little afternoon coffee break.
37:16
Yeah, it's good with the sweetened condensed milk. I think I preferred it black but that is how I generally prefer my coffee. So yeah, no surprises. I guess it I mean, I'm surprised by how much I love it though. Yeah, I really really like it.
37:31
It’s very smooth, very well rounded. The floral notes on it are great and the roast on it’s really good. It's not too dark.
37:38
No, it's not. It's a little bitter at the end. It's not terribly dark. I’m enjoying it.
37:43
I do not. When I put the sweetened condensed milk in it brought up that floral flavor. Way too much. Now I feel like I am chewing on a sprig of lavender flowers.
37:56
Oh, you're right Jenni the I the it does bring up like the herbal lavender when you add the sweetened condensed milk to it and it does become more of like,
38:06
Let's Get tea. I mean I do really like sweetened condensed milk. I mean
38:10
I love sweetened condensed milk, key lime pie all day. But I don't think I like it in this coffee. I liked it better I think black.
38:18
I plan to buy more of this. I would really like to try some of the other flavors. I think that a pumpkin spice or salted caramel would be better with the sweetened condensed milk than the lavender is. And all of those flavors are no artificial flavors.
38:34
Now say something about it and make it a not a bad review.
38:38
Oh, and then I would actually I would say if the jittery part is true, this is a coffee that was made for me.
38:46
I was gonna say you're the one who has the most problems with caffeine and it's unfortunate that you're not enjoying the lavender coffee more. I mean,
38:51
maybe it's one of those things where it's like an acquired taste though, because I've never tasted lavender before and I have all of these associations of lavender with these other applications. It just will take my tongue a little bit of time to catch up to my brain. And this could I mean if it there is that take off the jittery although I feel after drinking like three sips I don't know if it's coming through in the audio, but I'm like feeling the caffeine and like what am I going to do? I got a lot of talking to do and I'm gonna do it really fast.
39:21
Maybe the lavender takes a minute to kick in.
39:25
maybe the caffeine hits you first you can go get a bunch of shit done and then the lavender sets and later when it's time to chill the fuck out. Like this is like the perfect housecleaning coffee. Oh. Maybe?
39:37
who is this coffee for them?
39:39
This coffee is definitely then again for me because I always have to clean my house.
39:45
This coffee is so for me that I'm going to go home and order some of the salted caramel to try it. I really like this and I like that I can have a few of these packets in the cabinet and grab one when I'm on the run and not give that $3 to Dunkin Donuts. I don't know.
40:03
Yeah, and I wish I had something more clever to say but I think this coffee is for me too. It's really tasty. I like it. Yeah, surprised at how much I like the coffee black.
40:14
So it's for me, too. Yay like a genuine good review. Haha,
40:19
I know kind of disappointed. Well, I mean, it's good. She did a good job.
40:24
Good job, Debbie. Yeah, good job, Debbie. So. So yeah, I mean it sounds like this coffee as a coffee for anybody.
40:33
Surprisingly, yeah.
40:35
I mean, including ourselves.
40:35
This will be our last podcast.
40:39
I went into it was really like really suspicious expectations. Because lavender in coffee was not, I was like no, this is not going to be good. I did not think it would be good. So, I’m pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed this coffee.
40:59
So I guess that wraps up our episode.So that’s our episode! Awesome! This was a great episode, really enjoyed it. Yeah, really yummy coffee. That was really interesting, I was really surprised, for sure.
41:07
So we hope you guys enjoyed this episode as we enjoyed this coffee, surprisingly. Yeah, and then if you see, if you’re at the store, and you see a crazy coffee that you think would be fun hear about, take a picture, tag us on social media at no bad reviews pod. You can also follow us on social media to see what we’re talking about. Or if you just want to send us an email, you heard something in the podcast you thought was interesting, so it, send us an email hello at no bad reviews podcast dot com. Make sure to like share and subscribe, on your favorite podcasting app. Oh, and tell your friends, word of mouth. We need it, right now. That’s how we get people listening to us. It’s so so important to tell your friends. Because if you tell your friends. 2 friends, and they tell 2 friends, by the end of the month we’ll have like 4 million subscribers which is what we’re going for. We’re going for 4 million. Thanks everybody!
Thank you for listening to this podcast, generously sponsored by Modest Coffee. Purveyors of single origin coffee without the snobbery. Visit www dot modest dot coffee to forward slash no bad reviews to see what they’re roasting today. Enjoy.
