writing coffee

My shop is neither small nor big, half is coffee, half is books.

When I first opened the store, I thought for a long time about what kind of connotative, temperamental and unique name I should choose. After thinking for a long time, I probably asked too much and ended up without a problem.Until the last bit of literary and artistic feelings were worn away by various trivial matters before the opening, I finally felt that plainness and simplicity are the most true, so I hit the keyboard and sent four words, coffee and books, to the person in charge of signboard design.

In the end, it was rejected by the designer!Haha, Xiao Churan, that pseudo-artist with long hair and a cigarette between his fingers, thinks my name is too shallow!I had to rack my brains and make a little bit of artistic processing on the original basis, and finally named it "Writing Coffee".

Because of the fate of this name, Xiao Churan and I became friends.Xiao Churan is not as famous as meeting him.

The name Xiao Churan sounds like a clean boy. Considering his age, he should at least be a handsome and handsome young man.However, Xiao Churan himself made me fully understand that "taken literally" is a derogatory term, and everything should not be taken for granted.

He himself has long hair, but it is not the flowing long hair, but a bit natural curly. He always uses a black rubber band to tie it short and casually behind his head, leaving a small amount of hair. Attached to the right earlobe, it looks—sometimes noble, sometimes wretched.

He does not smoke in a lonely or melancholic or mature or deep way, but he smokes one after another when he is working, and throws cigarette butts all over the floor. I swore never when he was working In the same room with him for the second time.

Fortunately, he is a person with extremely precise self-positioning. He never pretends to be elegant and calls himself an "art dealer".But in fact, I only use the word "pseudo-artist" in front of him in private.

"Please, my ancestor! Can you hurry up? I have an appointment and I'm leaving soon!"

Mr. Xiao, a pseudo-artist, is lying on the edge of my bar at the moment, begging me to make him a cup of coffee without humiliation, begging me to make him a cup of coffee.

I felt baffled, and didn't intend to answer his request at all. While wiping my glass, I replied casually, "Can't you drink it another day?"

"I don't know what the next day is! I don't have time to run to you every day!" Xiao Churan became anxious, and unconsciously increased the volume.I frowned and glanced at him before he came to his senses and hurriedly apologized with a smile to the guests who were disturbed by him.

"You said that roasted beans taste best in about a week. I managed to get the legendary 'Golden Mandheling'! Why don't you try it while it's fresh, or wait for it to age?" He lowered his volume and continued to complain. Halfway through the complaint, he suddenly thought of something and patted his head, "No, old Mandheling seems to be more rare?"

I couldn't help laughing.

Xiao Churan's perception of coffee can almost be said to be "rude".I learned early on not to fuss with him about the details and stop trying to correct his misunderstandings because he just doesn't care.The only connection he has with coffee is that he has a friend who is a barista.So I didn't tell him that the "ageing" of Mandheling is in the green bean stage before roasting. Roasted coffee beans have been kept for a long time, even if it is golden Mandheling, it cannot escape the fate of deterioration.

"Smile! Hurry up!" He couldn't help but start bluffing again.

"If you want to drink it, come here before this weekend. If you really don't have time..." I shrugged nonchalantly, and said nonchalantly, "I don't mind writing an article to describe its taste after drinking it. Alright, "Golden Mandheling's Ultimate Taste Bud Journey", do you have any other suggestions?"

He stared at me hard, but he could only stare at me.He doesn't know how to make coffee himself, and he wouldn't be willing to give such precious beans to anyone—he said he asked for it, I know he wasn't joking, and he asked for it for me on a business trip to Indonesia .In China, "Mandheling" is not rare at all, but the real "Golden Mandheling" is very difficult.He wanted to taste something himself, and he really just tasted it by the way. ——I also know how I am. In my opinion, if you just take a sip for the sake of drinking, it doesn't matter if you can't drink it.

So he stared for a while and felt that his eyes were a little tired, so he went to the appointment helplessly.I know he'll be at it again before the weekend, hehe!

By the way, Xiao Churan is slightly fat.

After the chubby Xiao Churan left, the shop finally became quiet again.

After I wiped the cup, I was suddenly a little bored.Sitting at the small bar, separated by rows of hollow bookshelves, and through the glass door of the store, I look at the kapok tree full of big orange flowers across the road without saying a word.

The extremely short spring in the south can hardly be called spring. The kapok fell to the ground and no one cleaned it. The cleaning ladies in this neighborhood should also be poetic and picturesque people.

"Writing Coffee", this store has been stumbling all the way, and it has been nearly five years now. It was not like this at the beginning.

In the beginning, it was small, but it had all the internal organs.Now, much older, but really only coffee and books are left.

However I like it the way it is now.The floor-to-ceiling bookcases connected to the ceiling are densely packed with books, and people reading books are scattered somewhere, with a cup of coffee in hand.The mellow aroma of coffee floats in the air, seeps into every page bit by bit, and permeates quietly between the lines.That's how I wanted it to be at first, and it's slowly becoming what I want it to be.

A fine and light wind chime awakened my mind, and someone came in.

I looked up, and it was... Jian Qianli.

She only pushed the door open enough for her to get in, poked her head out first, and looked in the direction of the bar with a clear goal. When she met my sight, she smiled.I have to admit, at this moment, in this situation, I am delighted to see her.

I was a little funny watching her sneak in through the crack of the door, and then closed the door lightly. I couldn't help but reflect, did the atmosphere of "writing coffee" inadvertently suppress the nature of some guests?

Before I could come up with a conclusion, Jian Qianli walked around the bookshelf and walked to the bar, her face was a little excited, and she called me with a smile, "Murong~"

Yes, last time, about a week ago, she came and shattered my Ireland, and in return I told her my name...

"Morning." I said, but it was already afternoon.I don’t know why, but I’m particularly obsessed with using this word to greet familiar friends, no matter the time or place, and it’s even more euphemistically called: “Morning” is just a way of saying hello, like “Hello”, “Hello”, “Hi” "Similarly, why bother with the details?

She seemed to be amused by me, imitating my appearance, and replied with a smile, "Morning!"

"Yirgacheffe?" I asked affirmatively, and while I was asking, I was already preparing to pour it.From the first time she came in and asked me to help introduce a coffee to now, she only drinks this, and she hasn't seen any intention of changing the flavor.

"Yeah!" She nodded obediently, like a primary school student, and seemed to want to stand by the side and wait again.

There are no seats at my bar, so in view of her performance last time, I signaled her to move a chair and sit on it.She suddenly opened her eyes wide, showing a kind of flattery, I shook my head with a smile, and she happily went to move the chair.

Yirgacheffe is a very fascinating single origin coffee bean.Its charm lies not only in the intoxicating floral aroma of Yirgacheffe, which is well-known in the water, and the seductive fruity aroma revealed by selected sun exposure, but also in the connotation of the name "Yergacheffe". "Yirgacheffe" was originally just the name of a small town in Ethiopia. The name locally means "settle down on this wetland".Now, "Yirgacheffe" is synonymous with Ethiopian specialty coffee, and it can be said that it represents the highest level of coffee in Ethiopia.Ethiopia is the hometown of coffee in the world.

Therefore, take a sip of the fruity sweetness with the fragrance of flowers, and imagine that the first coffee berry was picked, the first coffee seed was ground, and the first coffee seedling was carefully cared for on the East African plateau in the past ten centuries. It is the first time to cross the ocean and take root in another continent... What a poetic thing!And, Yirgacheffe, the name sounds nice, doesn't it?

"Thank you!" Jian Qianli waited quietly for me to finish my coffee as before, and thanked me politely.

This time, I changed to a set of cups: a large drop-shaped glass jug with a pointed mouth, paired with two small round glass cups without handles, shallowly inlaid on a wooden tray.

"Coffee today." I said.

As soon as I finished speaking, her eyes lit up immediately, she was a little surprised, but she didn't hold back, she just said "Thank you!" again sweetly, looking very expectant.What a delight.

I held the glass jug in my hand and shook it lightly. The dark brown coffee liquid was lined by the transparent glass, and then I poured half a cup into each of the two small cups, and the aroma was overflowing.That's how two people should drink coffee.

I took one of the cups and handed it to her. I picked up another cup and took a deep breath under my nose. Is there anything more fragrant than coffee in this world?

She also sniffed it in a decent way, took a sip, and then commented with a smile: "This cup of coffee is much more fragrant than the ones I drank a few times before, and it's a bit sweeter!"

Haha, a little sweet.I was amused by her, but I didn't answer, I'm not good at small talk.

"Actually, I always thought this kind of coffee was very bitter, so I didn't dare to drink it." She rubbed her nose shyly and didn't care about my silence. "When I came in for the first time that day and saw the menu, I was completely stunned. It was like getting a French test paper when I was taking an English test. I couldn't understand it at all! I thought I went to the wrong place..."

Even if she deliberately lowered her voice, it did not affect the vividness in her tone, and accidentally exposed her student attributes.I immediately recalled her first visit to Writing Coffee.

I have no memory of how she came here, but I only remember that she stood in front of the bar, looked down at the only handwritten menu, opened her eyes wide with a puzzled expression, then looked up and asked me apologetically: "Are these all coffee? I'm sorry I don't understand, can you recommend it?" After speaking, he looked at me sincerely.

So I remembered her.She wasn't the first guest to not understand my menu, but she was the first to be so frankly lovely.

Many people's impressions of coffee shops are on some big chain brands. These shops not only provide coffee, but also other beverages, desserts, and even Western food, with a rich and colorful menu.There are also many people's cognition of coffee is limited to "latte" and "cappuccino", which are fancy coffee made with espresso liquid and milk, or light and bitter "American coffee", or added syrup "Mocha", "Caramel Macchiato" and "Flavoured Latte".

Because of this "many people", even small private coffee shops often have these nouns on the menu. "Writing Coffee" sold Jiratu in the first two years...

But now, there are only single items left here, and there are very few styles, no more than five, and because the beans are often changed, the menu is all handwritten by myself.

Many customers who came to the store for the first time like Jian Qianli were not as educated as Jian Qianli.For example, a customer raised her sharp voice and asked: "Oh, isn't this a coffee shop? What kind of things do you sell here?" Another example, a customer pointed at the menu and tapped Baba ordered a cup of Costa Rica, didn't even know he had mispronounced the name, complained that the coffee was too bitter, and ordered three packets of sugar, one of which was spilled on the table.Another guest, like my boss, went through the document, no, the menu, and then directly issued an order to me, "Give me a latte, don't put too much sugar!" ... and so on.

Thinking of this, I couldn't help laughing.

"Why do you only sell single items?" She finally asked out her inner curiosity. She must have wanted to ask for a long time.

"The sound of frothing milk is too loud," I said.

She looked at the bookcases and people reading books around her, and then at the grinder I just used, and made a very hesitant look of sudden realization, "Oh, yes!" Then she looked at it suspiciously. I.

I smiled meaningfully, but didn't explain anymore, so she stopped asking and changed the subject.

"By the way, are you alone here? Is there a fixed rest time?" She stuck out her tongue, "Every time I come here, I'm afraid I'll meet you just to rest..."

"Yeah, every Monday." After thinking for a while, he added, "If nothing unexpected happens."

"Why do I think the latter is the key point?"

I started to smirk, "You think too much..."

After this day, Jian Qianli would appear in my store almost every weekend, sometimes on Saturday, sometimes on Sunday, sometimes on both days, and occasionally on weekdays. Of course, for her Say it's school day.

She still only drinks Yirgacheffe.