It Was a Very Good Year

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Review of 2008 Domaine la Blaque Coteaux de Pierrevert by Jon Rimmerman

Gevalia Kaffe at American Markets

 

Kraft Foods corporation have chosen to market Gevalia, the favourite coffee of Sweden, known for its traditional medium-roast. The Swedes’ own Gevalia Kaffe brand will be available this summer at more than 20,000 retailers throughout the United States.

Gevalia, a $400 million-dollar global mail-order Swedish brand, has long had a following in the U.S.A. ”Gevalia is known and loved by millions who’ve purchased it online because it delivers on its promise of rich, smooth taste that’s never bitter,” said Domenic Borrelli, Vice President of Kraft’s U.S. coffee-branch. ”We’re telling retailers the good news now. And, we’re confident the convenience of being able to purchase Gevalia in stores will attract and delight an entirely new audience of discriminating coffee lovers.”

Kraft Foods has a $5 billion global coffee-purveying business, which includes the  French brand Carte Noire and Jacobs from Germany.

Kraft said that Swedes drink more coffee than citizens in almost any other country (rivaling Finland, another Scandinavian country), adding that Gevalia Kaffe is the top Swedish coffee brand. Gevalia is the official coffee of the Swedish Royal Court.

In my opinion, having drunk Gevalia Kaffe for half of my life, it is the natural antidote for popular over-roasted varieties that seem to all taste the same (Starbucks’ wide variety of dark roasts that are indistinguishable from one another comes to mind, all naturally-occurring flavours having been systematically burnt out of existence). The current coffee monotony will soon be passé. Americans will soon be able to taste real, high-quality coffee without establishing a mail-order contract with Gevalia. That is great news for coffee-connoisseurs!

©M-J de Mesterton 2011

>Elegant Pot-Roast

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Elegant Pot Roast of Beef I marinated the beef for two days in Burgundy wine. Then I dried it off, dusted it with salt, pepper and flour and in a hot, buttered Dutch oven, browned the meat. I added herbes de Provence, summer savoury, chopped onion, celery, carrots and new potatoes, then doused the lot with the marinade. After simmering the pot for an hour, I added more wine to it. After two hours of cooking on low heat, I had an elegant pot roast that was fit to serve company. My photo shows it in the pre-simmering stage. Cooking with wine will usually soften the toughest cuts of meat, an important tip for these days of austerity. ©M-J de Mesterton

>Elegant Japanese-Style Radish-Cucumber Salad

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This refreshing and elegant cucumber-radish salad is dressed with a rice wine vinegar-honey vinaigrette.