I Am all in.
Oh, let's you. I Am all in with Scott Patterson, an iHeartRadio podcast.
Hey everybody, Scott Patterson, I'm All in Again podcast, Luke Steiner, and my special guest is Lance Hendrick. iHeart Podcasts listen on the iHeartRadio app. Lance has over a decade of experience in the coffee industry and creates in depth content focused on coffee equipment. His videos are meticulously researched and tested, such as his hour long analysis of various home grinders. If you're looking to build your home coffee set up or dive deeper into brewing techniques, gear Lance's page is
an essential resource. It's the ultimate hub for coffee enthusiasts and equipment fanatics who want to evaluate their coffee game. So each week we're going to be talking about one significant food moment from each episode. And as everybody in the audience knows and welcome Lance, thank you for coming on, nice to have you.
Thanks for having me.
Scott Gilmour, Girls, as you know, goes in hand with coffee. You know, Luke sers coffee at the beginning, That's how Laura's relationship begins with him or continues and at the end, he serves coffee again, so it book ends at least the pilot episode, but it is a constant in these episodes. Coffee, Luke, laural I. That's the order or Laura Luke, And so we probably think the reason they all talk so fast is because of the coffee. Maybe is diner coffee better.
Maybe I think a lot of people do like diner coffee over specialty coffees.
There's a.
You know, we'll get into talking about the Arabica versus robust beans and how some people for one or the other. I don't know how, oh, but they we will. I did not drink coffee while I was filming, That's one question. When I did, I would suffer the crash midday and that was bad, and then I'd have to drink more coffee and then I couldn't sleep. But love it, love it, love it. Alexis did not drink coffee wife while filming.
She was a water or soda. The line coffee coffee coffee became one of the most iconic lines from the show associated with Lorelei and Luke's relationship. That's originating from episode fifteen, season five, but we knew far before that. At the very first scene that their relationship had something to do with coffee. Let's address this picture that you shared. You dressed as Luke Gilmore Girl's Coffee takeover across the country. What possessed you to do this? Lance?
So yeah, at the time, I was living in Memphis in twenty sixteen when that big promotional campaign occurred and a shop that I would pull shifts at was selected as one to feature the Luke's Diner garb. So I was working the shift that day and I was like, well, screw it, let's just go out, so, you know, put on the backwards cap and on a flannel, went in there with the Luke Steiner apron. And I got so many pictures taken with me that day. Did I look like you?
No?
But I had the backwards cap in the flannel and people were loving it. So good time.
Isn't that great on those fans?
Great? Oh they were fantastic.
Just me.
They wanted me to They just wanted me to be really, you know, stubborn and stern and sarcastic. And I was like, all right, easy, do that all day.
Oh that's fantastic.
All right.
So one of the the opening scene of the first episode, laurel I walks into the diner and she begs, please, Luke, please, please please, how many cups have you had today? None? Plus five? But yours is better? You have a problem yesterday? All right? So we go through all that great stuff right Then there's a scene between Lorlai Rory and they hit up Luke's diner after having dinner to get no more. So that's the very last scene. So Luke comes up,
say what do you have coffee in a vat? I'll also have coffee and chili fries, and Luke says, that's quite a refined palate you've got there. He returns with the coffee fries.
I can't stand it.
This is so unhealthy. Rory, please put that cup.
Of coffee downe.
You don't want to grow up to be like your mom. Rory says, sorry, too late. All right, So we are imbued with coffee on this show. Let me ask you this. I've got my own line of coffee, Scotty Piece, Big Mud Coffee, and I've got some exclusive Gilmore Girls blends with a co branding deal with Warner Brothers. So I know a little bit about coffee, not as much as you and you know, we've got all kinds of blends,
any kind of blend you want. Are you a fan of seasonal coffee trends like pumpkin spice or peppermint flavors and wine?
Personally, no, but it's not because I have anything against them per se. It's just not I guess my cup of coffee, right. So I'm very much a bland person when it comes to coffee. I just always drink coffee black, whether it's filter coffee or espresso. But obviously being a barista for as long as I have, more than happy to make that because anything that gets people into coffee I'm all about. So they're very cool. I really enjoy.
You know, pumpkin spice Alattes is such a massive hit every year, so I'm a big fan of when shops take the extra step to really cultivate something special, make comade syrup and kind of make a presentation around that drink itself. But yeah, for me personally, I could go without. My wife loves them, So that's.
What tell us about the importance of a high quality water. Yeah, coffee is mostly water, and there's different types of water, so talk about that a little bit.
Yeah, absolutely, without getting too nerdy. Coffee in your you know, typical diner cup of coffee, we got the diner mug tattoo right here, the diner cararaft tests to you right here. Wow, in your typical filter coffee, you have over ninety eight and a half percent of that cup of coffee is water, and then an espresso about ninety percent is water. And so the water that's going into your coffee is a great dictator of flavor, and in fact, the mineral composition
of that water is essentially a flavor additive. So recently we found out through chemistry that the actual minerals are not affecting the extraction of the coffee beans. So what's being dissolved, it's not really affected by what's in the water. Instead, they're actually affecting the final flavor profile. So depending on your water and what's in it can have a great effect on the final taste. It's not just the coffee.
So one thing I always recommend people doing when they brew at home is to the bare minimum, use like some sort of you know, refrigerator filter that you just you know, a pitcher of some sort of filter in order to get out at least the chlorine because so many cities treat their tap water with chlorine, and so to get rid of the coreine taste because that will show up in the final cup, and to just kind of soften the water a bit. But water is insanely important.
And also if you're not treating the water, you can ruin your coffee machines from like scale build up and things like that. So water is definitely overlooked, I think, and will increase the quality of any coffee, regardless of if you like, you know, really dark coffees or certain blends or robusto or rabica, whatever it might be. Water is primo.
You produce a lot of content about coffee equipment, but when it comes to brewing, what is your favorite method? French press, pour over, espresso drip, what what is it?
Yeah, my favorite for sure is a V sixty So just a style of poor over. It's one of the oldest styles. Actually just brewed one right before getting on a little decaf because it's late for me. But it's just this like conicle hore over device where I can put a smaller dose in there and still get a good extraction, where I don't have to commit to a whole pot or something like that. So this is what
I make. Usually about fifteen grams is my dose. So a full cup would be I don't know, eight ounces maybe, but that's typically what I brew throughout the day, and I'll have two or three of those a day throughout the day.
Lance talk about the latest coffee trends in twenty twenty four that you've noticed.
Yeah, absolutely, there have been some really crazy ones. So on the producer level or the farmer level, you have a lot of what's called co fermented coffees that are now being produced. So, of course, coffee, as the listeners may or may not know, is actually the seed of a cherry, and in order to get that seed out you do it's called the processing method. So it's essentially just how you get the seed out in what way and what flavors will be imparted on that seed through
a fermentation process. Now they're very fermentation process, but they're all natural in the sense that some are the natural process where you put the coffee cherries outside and you let them just, you know, degrade in the sun. You have some where you take the skin off and you let it just stay in its sticky mucilage layer, and you have some where you take everything off and you wash it really well and you let it kind of ferment in its kind in its deep pulped stage prior
to washing. Now some producers have been doing which has been a huge trend in coffee, especially in the specialty world, is they are using different fruits or different extracts or different things along those lines to co ferment alongside the coffee, which will give you like sometimes there's a I've had a passion fruit coferment coffee, which literally means the producers grew passion fruit on the same farm, and they took parts of it, some of the flesh, and they added
it to the fermentation of the coffee seeds, and so it imparts some of that passion fruit flavor over onto the coffee and it makes it through even after it's been roasted. You brew the cup and it tastes like passion fruit. That's a very big trend. And then, of course, the trend that never dies in the home coffee world
is the growing abundance of coffee grinders. Thankfully, people have realized the vast importance of a coffee grinder, and more and more moving away from cheap blade grinders and are getting you know, conical burd sets, flat burth sets in their grinders, and there's been more and more players in the game, allowing for a cheaper and cheaper product with higher and higher quality. So there's been a massive influx
of sadly, what's called gear acquisition syndrome. So people will buy something and then they see something new come out and oh, shiny new and they say that it has an ionizer inside, I need it, and then they want to buy that. But the accessibility I think has been a huge trend this year, which has been great. Of course, it's throttled by competition in the market, but the end result when it comes to making things accessible and not thousands of dollars, is a great outcome.
Interesting what you say about the coffee cherry or the cascara. What we're doing with two of our blends, the House Blend and the Breakfast Blend. We are taking the coffee cherry and we're grinding it into a powder and we're adding it to both blends percentage to each back, and that is providing fiber and nutrients and iron and all kinds of great stuff. So we're also it's helping. You know that that coffee cherry is usually discarded, uh in in sourced countries and it and it creates a tremendous
amount of environmental negative environmental impact, lots of pollution. So we're we're using the coffee cherry, we're not discarding it, and we're utilizing it in our house and breakfast blends. It gives it a nice little kick, a little bit of a cherry flavored A little bit, not a lot. You know, it's like some of those like some of those africans as you get that are that are so
fine and grown at such such heights. Oh yeah, have you ever experimented lance with adding unusual ingredients to your coffees like spices, butter or citrus.
I have done it kind of for fun and for kind of drink making competitions. So yes, I've definitely played around with adding different things, adding different oils in different yeah, different spices, as you say, different even essential oils, which is another, by the way, another co fermentation process. People have an essential oil to the coffees which can really prove the aromas, which is you know a majority of our taste sensation is from aroma. But yeah, I've definitely
played around with things. There are lots of trends on TikTok, you know, if people who are adding things to their pucks. So if people are listening to this and thinking that's what we're talking about, please don't do that. You will ruin your expresso machine. Do a lot of these influencers just make the picture with the you know whatever they put in their portafilter and then they actually a regular shot. Don't mess up your machines. But there are some cool
things you can do. In fact, there's one that works pretty well. If you take like a slice of an orange and you put it on top of your bed of coffee and brew through the orange so that the water goes through the orange into the coffee. You can get some nice natural aroma and citrus oil citris zest into your coffee. So there are cool things you can
do along those lines. When it comes to things like butter, I don't I've never done that because it's such an overpowering flavor, all the fats in it, that it takes away from why I drink coffee, which is not necessarily for the caffeine. I mean, right now I'm drinking a really nice decalf, which this was actually co fermented as we were discussing earlier, and it's the best way that I have found a salvage decalf is to have some sort of artificial flavor in it. But I do think
flavors are are important. The vast majority of people don't drink, especially as you said, and so there are lots of people who aren't really you know, into the types of beverages that I might be into, and I think that a great way to get into it is through this type of flavoring.
Right, what's your favorite coffee recipe? Lance that you make it home like?
That's not just straight coffee, right, Yeah, I really the only things I enjoyed doing would be revolving around cold coffee. So I'm not even though I love straight coffee, when it comes to cold coffee, I don't actually like it straight. I'm just, for whatever reason, whenever a coffee is cold, I just don't like the taste as much. I want it to be hot. That's where you're getting most of those vault organic compounds blasting in the face. And it's
great well when it's cold. Honestly, my favorite, without question is very simple it's just an espresso tonic where literally you add espresso to tonic water over ice and you can zest some orange on it. You can accentuate it with whatever you want. There's some great flavored tonic waters out there. You can play around with the different flavors to match your espresso. But that's definitely my favorite. But I also make a lot of the things I do citrus,
you know, infews. So I might do some sort of chocolate chocolate rimmed glass with like a cold brew concentrate in a little bit of oat milk and add some citrus spice to or citrus es to it in order to kind of bring it out and then have chocolate coating on the rim. Things like that my wife really loves and I enjoy making on occasion. But also making
like cold cold brew ice cubes is really fun. We've been playing around with that a lot in order to put into, you know, a cup of oat milk or something, and it's interesting.
I'm gonna where do you live?
What stadium? I live in Porto, Portugal.
You're in Portugal?
I am wow, wow, Yes, I've moved out here recently.
Hello, okay, yeah, two years.
About two years I come back to the States sort of frequently. But yeah, about two years ago I moved out here.
Let me ask you, do you think coffee cocktails, espresso martinis are over hyped? Do they deserve the attention they're getting.
You know, if you can get a good espresso martini, it is very good, and in fact, I'll recommend if people want to know how to make the best one. Dan Fellows on YouTube he's a multiple Coffee and Good Spirits World Champion, which literally is a competition and that over fifty countries participate in. And it's literally a mixology competition and you have to have coffee as the main ingredient. And so he has an incredible YouTube where he posts
all these recipes in his espresso martini. It is I mean he does things like an old fashion but coffee, coffee, bass, and all these different things where he has that's another good cold coffee. By the way, if you do a cold brew concentrain and say of the whiskey and make like an old fashion oh, some simple syrup in there and some model cherry, Oh it's.
Good, fantastic. Do you ever use coffee and recipes beyond just drinking it? Oh?
Yeah, like in meat rubs and things like that, which may not be everyone's taste, but I think it can be really good when you're out doing barbecues to have a little bit of espresso grounds in some of a meat rub. And then my favorite food ever that's built around coffee is Tyrmaso. I actually had the privilege of going to the original restaurant that had Tier massouon Treviza, Italy last year, and it was its awesome.
Well, let's talk a little bit about that. That's a that's a classic Italian dessert, features layers of coffee soaked lady fingers. Mass carpone.
Yeah, well, I can give my pronunciation.
But what is your pronunciation on that?
I just say marscapone, but that's most wrong.
Moscapone uh, not to be confused with alcopone cream cocoa powder. The coffee brings a rich flavor that balances the sweetness of the cream and the bitterness of cocoa. What about espresso brownies? Have you ever made espresso brownies?
Lance?
I've personally not made them because I'm not a great well, I just don't cook very often. But I have had espresso brownies, and even better, I've had white chocolate. Espresso scones ooh those lights out, lights out, all.
Right, Espresso brownies, it's an espresso powder or brewed coffee is often added to brownie batter to intensify the chocolate flavor, creating a deeper and rich dessert. How about a coffee rub steak? What you talked about? Coffee grounds are used as part of a dry rub for steak, often mixed with spices like paprika, human brown sugar, and coffee. Oh man, I'm getting hungry, Lance, It's almost lunchtime and I'm getting hungry. The coffee enhances the savory flavors and creates a unique
crust when grilled or seared. Mocha ice cream combining coffee.
And chocko chocko.
Well, yes, Lance, I tell you. I tell you. If you're ever back in the United States, you gotta let us know because I want to. I want to have dinner with you, and I want to go over some recipes, and I want to hire you to do a coffee party because yeah, it sound like you know what you're doing, and you could make some fantastic drinks and we could have a great time. I appreciate your time continued success to you, Lance, and Portugal is lucky to have you. Do they know you're even there? Yeah?
Absolutely, I'm very much present in the coffee community out here in Portugal, so fantastic. Yeah, it's been great.
Give everybody my best over there. Beautiful country. I've been to Farah in the summertime, very hot, one hundred and twenty degrees.
I'm up north. It's not that hot up here.
Right right, right, all right, pleasure talking to you, Lance, much appreciated, and good luck with everything, Okay, you all right?
Take care, Hey
Everybody, don't forget Follow us on Instagram at I Am all In podcast and email us at Gilmore at iHeartRadio dot com.