Have you heard of the Café Todra? It’s a coffee like a Latte but in a glass 2 thirds the size. Same amount of coffee as a latte just less milk. Basically the same flavour just a little stronger. It’s my coffee of choice. I drink it as a Soy Todra. It’s a coffee that any coffee maker could stumble upon but the name Todra has a small story behind it.
The story actually starts years before Urban Grind when I worked for another cafe that served a long standing coffee in the same size glass but they were over extracting the coffee by half filling the glass with expresso before topping up with milk. It seems that many cafés do not understand what ‘espresso based’ coffee means. For me it is 25-30mls of coffee poured over 20-25 seconds. Those numbers can vary depending on the coffee and the preferred method of the coffee maker but all good coffee makers will agree that there is a point where there is nothing more to extract from the grind. To continue pouring is to simply pour dirty water over good coffee. So I started pouring true espresso based coffee and put an end to the over extraction. I know I was onto something when a customer walked in and said, “I have been ordering the same coffee from this shop for 14 years and that was the best ________ that I have ever had.” It became my coffee of choice then.
Jump to the first week of Urban Grind opening and some climbing friends drop in from an overseas trip to play chess and drink coffee. I asked them what they would like and they ask me to make them what ever I drink. I return with 2 coffees to find amazed looks on their faces as they quickly explain to me how for the last 3 months they have been rock climbing in a place called Todra Gorge in Morocco drinking the very same coffee every morning before climbing. The name Todra was adopted. Though we don’t use it anymore, the phrase ‘Please do not ask for Decafe as refusal may offend.” was coined 5 minutes later when one of the climbers made the joke. He said I could use it, and I did until Nestlé said I couldn’t.
I haven’t heard the Nestle story!