The Results, In More Detail

We started off by brewing two pots of coffee, one of each. We had only one grinder, though, and it belonged to Foofus, so he naturally ground first. This put Mark at an unfair disadvantage in two ways: not only was he unfamiliar with the grinder, but also his coffee would not be the first to finish brewing. This latter fact caused him to fall victim to what shall henceforth be known as:

I'm reasonably sure that this principle is written down in all sorts of important books, and is recognized as a fundamental fact of the fabric of the universe, just like conservation of mass, or the fact that scissors cuts paper, but gets smashed by rock. It should be noted that the author of the theorem cited above made sure to have six or seven cups of coffee before showing up at CoffeeWars. Phew! It should also be noted that Shrdlu's Second Theorem of Coffee involves a lot of words unfit for the eyes of the gentle reading public.

OK, so Ancora d'Oro was the first coffee to be sampled. There was general praise for its aroma (both of the beans in the bag, and of the fully brewed beverage). In fact, it is safe to say that if aroma had been the only category of judgement, Foofus would probably have won. The exception to this was a guy in a purple RSA t-shirt, who preferred the Kenya AA's aroma. Of course, even though he smelled both, he only actually drank the Kenya AA, so perhaps that's to be expected.

Mark's coffee was good, but at the end of the first pot, the core team (Mark, Foofus, and Shrdlu) expressed a slight preference for Ancora d'Oro. In fact, upon tasting it, Shrdlu was observed to squint, and make roaring noises, which was interpreted by this reporter as a form of praise. When we brewed the second pot, however, Kenya AA was back in the game.

By this point, Mark had improved his mad phat skillz with the grinder. Not only that, but the second pots were judged on a more even footing than the first: we had all had some coffee by that point, after all. The second pot of Kenya AA was very mellow, and delicious.

One of our tasters was a heavy-set guy in a grey polo shirt. He claimed to be in Las Vegas on vacation, and to have left his family at their hotel room, and come over to the conference just to see what it was like. He was an ex-employee of the federal government, but it was not clear what branch, or in what capacity. Anyway, despite his rather hokey explanation for being at the con, this guy was a very personable and a real enthusiast-- it was a pleasure having him there. His comments on the second pot of Kenya AA were that it was "very mild," and that it obviously "had not been sitting in the pot for three days."

It was this mildness that gave the second pot of Mark's coffee the edge: the second pot that Foofus brewed seemed bitter and harsh by comparison. At this point a brusque gentleman smoking a cigar arrived, and asked for some coffee. In previous Coffee Wars, one of the categories of judgement was "tastes good with a cigarette." None of the core judges were smokers this year, but we can all say with confidence that neither of these coffees tasted better while second-hand smoking a stogie. I generally don't mind the smell of a cigar, but in the morning, and in the heat, it was quite oppressive.

So, there we were. A total of four pots of coffee. Cups were given out to a number of people, but most didn't hang around to let their impressions be recorded. Some tried to pay us for the coffee, but we declined. One guy saw the CoffeeWars 3.0 sign, and thought it meant that coffee was $3. He actually tried to give us $3 for a cup of coffee! What a nut! That's robbery even by the lamest of coffee-shop standards!

But I digress. There were two rounds of coffee combat, and two different results. Foofus came out ahead in the first, and Mark in the second. In the absense of any objectively agreeable means of making a decision, and in the interests of goodwill, we declared a tie. A final toast was offered in honor of all the previous CoffeeWars participants who couldn't be there, and we packed up.