<aside> đź’ˇ Tip: Click any section in the Wiki Headers underneath this notice, it will take you right to the corresponding section!
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Note: these are not done yet, and are still being compiled by me. If you by any chance find this before I remove this chunk of text, then… please be patient with me, my goal is to flesh these out as I go, and this Shard would be a running diary/journal of sorts to keep track of my adventures within this passion. I already have notes on the majority of these roasters, along with their coffee sources and roast philosophies, I just desperately need to reorganize them into a coherent stream of thoughts for a complete blog writeup section. Thank you for supporting me on this little adventure of mine.
BIGGER SUB-NOTE: I am currently in the process of moving, and thus all of my adventure logs and other specifications are temporarily jumbled up and are existing in limbo for the time being. Once I am able to fully sort out my move and iron out these temporary wrinkles, I anticipate more information will start to appear in this Shard in a much faster rate. Thank you for bearing with me, and supporting me on this fun little journey of all of ours.
After the third year of my life in Austin, one of the fastest-growing metropolitan areas in the US at the time of this writing, I had yet to be able to figure out what makes Austin… well, Austin. Even with my usual approach of picking up my camera and conversing with the city, its environment, and its people through the lens and the viewfinder, I found myself still struggling to determine what the identity of this city truly is, even though deep down I had always known that this city contains something quite truly special. According to my camera, this city is productive, versatile, creative, and colorful. But anything further than that about its character, how it is colorful, how it is creative and productive, I had yet to find out. And thus, following a fresh exit from a toxic and abusive relationship and being hit with a massive identity crisis, I started rediscovering myself and my surroundings through the lens (no camera pun intended) of coffee, something that has always been near and dear to my life. This journey of returning to the bean has been detailed by me through the very first Shard I wrote on coffee.
This journey has led me on so many fascinating mini-adventures on my quest of getting to know Austin and the coffee it roasts and serves. Coincidentally (and much expectedly), it has also led me to so many amazing walks of people that make up its community. Down below I will attempt to detail as much about the individual stories I’ve had the fortune to experience with each of the roasters (and coffee shops) around town, their people, their roasting and taste philosophies, etc. These stories are forever expanding, and as I continue my stories with each of them, I expect each of these sections to continually expand as well. Specialty coffee, above all, is about its people and their individual stories, all the way along the production chain, and I am doing my best to do every single one of them justice, as much within my power as a mere enthusiastic consumer and diligent scholar as I can.
Please note, though, that all of these notes are only intended to serve as datapoints for you to get a head start on your own journey so you can eventually draw your own conclusions. None of what I detail below are meant to present concrete irrefutable conclusions about any one business, bar, barista, or brew. Heck, these notes are dynamic and ever-growing as long as I am still physically connected to Austin, so even each bullet point themselves are subject to further revisions down the road as I gain more experience with any roaster, team, etc. I would advise you to use them as a starting point to explore the world of Austin coffee according to your own taste preferences, so you can experience each of what these teams have to offer, so you can eventually use my logbook notes below as more data points for you to check your own experiences against. Specialty coffee is a collective and community experience, and I fully intend to keep it that way and do the best in my abilities to expand upon that.
Austin Coffee Community Logbook