The 10th Fargo Film Festival opened today and it will continue until the 6th. (Check out http://www.fargotheatre.org/) I have lived in the Fargo-Moorhead area for almost 3 years now, and I want to share some of my favorite things in this place with whoever is visiting town for this wonderful event. (I hope this will be useful for any future visitors, too.)

1) Enjoy more culture - Fargo has so much culture especially for its size - classical music, jazz, theater, musicals, visual arts, and so on. There are wonderful organizations such as the FM Symphony Orchestra, Fargo-Moorhead Opera, Fargo-Moorhead Community Theatre, and Theatre B to name a few. Three colleges (Concordia, Minnesota State University-Moorhead, and North Dakota State University) all have their own arts calendars, packed with orchestra concerts, band concerts, chamber music concerts and theater productions. Pop and rock events go on at the Fargodome and the Civic Center. High school productions are also very high quality and vital to the community. There are also several dance schools.

General Event Calendar can be found at the Culture Pulse Page: http://fmarea.culturepulse.org/ This is a page where anybody can upload information on any cultural event, but it is not entirely thorough.

FM Symphony: Master Works Series, Family Concerts, and Chamber Music Series http://www.fmsymphony.org/

FM Community Theatre: boasting 12 productions a year, this theater works with local talents and schools. http://www.fmct.org/

MSUM’s Cheryl Nelson Lossett Performing Arts Series: Performances ranging from Ladysmith Black Mombazo to the Guthrie Theatre’s Romeo and Juliet. http://www.mnstate.edu/perform/

Concordia Performing Arts Series: Another great performing series at a great price. http://www.cord.edu/Offices/Cultural/performingarts.php

FM Opera: Celebrating its 41st season this year with La Traviata, La Boheme and Amahl and the Night Visitors. http://www.fmopera.org/

Here is my personal invitation for this week: a fascinating presentation of abstract aesthetics in artwork and chamber music is scheduled for Thursday evening, March 4, at 7:30pm on the Gaede Stage at MSUM. Featuring the 8th Street Quartet of the FM Symphony and two guest musicians from the St. James-St. Benedict Universities.

2) Browse Downtown - Walking along Broadway is a joy. There are so many beautiful galleries and precious shops. Here are some of my favorite spots on Broadway (and a few off-Broadway as well) starting from 6th Ave N. down to Main Ave.

Beyond Running: a cozy and serious running store that’s a big part of the Fargo Marathon. They have a regular Tuesday running club and other activities such as marathon training and yoga classes. Nice shop to browse through, too.

FunkyJunque - this is a really beautiful shop. It’s like a picture from Mark Bailey’s “Simple Home” came alive. This store has charming accent cushions (felt cushion adorned with leather, saying things like “brrrrr”), a surprisingly good collection of blouses and sleep-shirts, cute gift tags and white colored plates, and other home-furniture items.

Zandbros Variety - a bookstore/gift shop, featuring an interesting collection of books (good cookbook collection, too), funny cards, cool jewelry items, bath stuff, plates, and a few clothes and bags. It’s a great store for getting gifts, girls and boys alike.

Lena K - this store has lots of pretty tops by designers such as Vince and Rebecca Taylor, designer jeans, flowing and sexy dresses, and several Juicy Couture items. Price is on the high side, but there are always some really nice sale items. If you find your size, it’s your lucky day! I also like their small jewelry collection.

O’Day Cache - this jam-packed store recently expanded to accommodate a lot of furniture from China, including some very cool antique tables and beds. It’s a good store to go to if you need a gift but can’t come up with a good idea. This store also sells Vosges chocolate, which I love, at a reasonable price. *Majority of the items on sale come from China, so many of them are not the best quality. But still pretty and fun.

Shannalee - another store with great and fun gift items. Clothes are a little bit over-priced and not my favorite style, but this store carries really cute T-shirts saying “I (love) Fargo.” * This store, Lena K, and O’Day Cache are totally girlie stores. If I were a guy, I would feel a bit out of place walking into these stores.

Boucle - a boutique-type yarn store that is just beautiful to browse through. I don’t knit, but I went to get some things for my sister in law who does. * Since I don’t knit, I have no idea if this shop is a high-end shop or over-priced, etc.

Ecce Gallery - relatively new gallery that also houses a yoga studio. They feature local artists as well as commercial items by Alessi and Jonathan Adler. I like the way this gallery feels, and I love the fact that there are things that I can actually BUY!

Plains Arts Museum - this small but beautiful arts museum is located a few blocks west of Broadway on 1st Ave N. The 1st floor has a small Yamaha grand piano, and quite a few concerts happen here. Museum gift shop is also nice.

Fargo Public Library - a few blocks off from the Broadway, east on the 1st Ave N. This newly completed library has a wonderful bright and fun feeling to it, and is a very friendly place for anybody who likes libraries and books. There is also a Dunn Bros. cafe inside the library that has free Wi-Fi!

Vlana Vlee - another shop that opened recently. It’s a glitzy+girly shop with amazing quantity of “stuff” -all kinds of stuff ranging from baby-shower gifts to a chunky dinner table. It’s a fun store to browse.

Antique on Broadway - this is a huge store filled with antiques (and some items that just look old).  Fun place to look around. I recently popped in because a very long train was passing by, and I could not stand in the freezing air any more! I ended up browsing for about 30 minutes, and bought really cute copper water wagon figurine that now complements one of my mantel-top picture frames as well as a salt and pepper shaker, all for $6.

Off-Broadway, please come visit the Roberts Street Chapel on the corner of 4th Ave and Roberts Street. Marjorie Schlossman’s artwork will brighten up even your gloomiest day!

P.S. The West Acres Mall Area is not that special (it’s just like any other mall in small and medium sized cities in the States), but there is a special shop called “Stabo” inside the West Acres shopping center. I fell in love with Porsgrund (Norwegian bone china company) in this store, and they also carry other European gift-items including key-chains by Troika. (They are the best!)

3) EAT! - Please see my posts about Fargo’s restaurants.

http://jihyechang.com/wisdom/2009/04/10/my-favorite-restaurants-in-fargo-moorhead-area/

http://jihyechang.com/wisdom/2009/06/28/fargos-newest-excitements/

4) Have fun - I am not a person who goes clubbing or drinks much, but I know that the HoDo has a good night scene. Also there is a multiplex on 25th Street south of Main Ave. called “The Hub” - that place gets packed during the weekends. Also downtown has many bars and jazz-concert clubs. For families, there is the Red River Zoo (have not visited but people seem to like it).

In the middle of July, Broadway goes crazy with the Street Fair - endless carts selling hand-made jewelries, artworks, small furniture items, clothes, foods, etc. I did not get to see it in my first summer, but I enjoyed it immensely last year. If you are in town during the summer, it’s a must-see!

Moorhead has an interesting place called the “Hjemkomst Heritage Center.” It looks like the white sails of a big ship, and I thought it was an actual Viking museum.  Instead, it’s  a memorial that permanently stores the Hjemkomst Viking Ship built by Moorhead resident Robert Asp and his family. They sailed to Norway on this ship in 1984. There is also a replica of Hopperstad Stave Church in Vik, Norway outside the center. This church is used often as a wedding chapel. During the summertime, the center hosts a Scandinavian festival and a Viking festival, and there are yearly exhibitions and special events.

Oh, and there is a Curling Club (!!!!!!) by the Fargo North High School, and people do snow-mobiling, ice-fishing and hockey during the winter time. There is even a street-side hockey rink on the 12th Ave N. I still remember the first time I saw several kids playing a game in -20F weather. It was like watching a scene from “The Saddest Movie in the World.” It was so cool.

Also people have told me that there are so many beautiful lakes within a 2 or 3 hours of Fargo-Moorhead.  I must experience it this summer.

Well, I think I will now go check out the Fargo Film Festival schedule and see which ones I enjoy the most.

Last year I stumbled upon the “Belle” espresso by a micro-roastery in California while browsing the internet. There was a “coffee guru” guy (Kenneth Davids) and his website called “coffeereview.com” and the Belle espresso beans from the Klatch Coffee in CA got the highest ever score (94 points) by him. Davids described the bean as ”

So I ordered just to see how good it was and it turned out to be the best choice for my Ascaso machine. Ever since I bought that machine in 2006, I have used many different kinds of beans - Intelligentsia’s Black Cat, Barrington Coffee Roasting company’s Gold espresso, Peet’s, Gimme! Coffee’s Leftist, Counter Culture’s Toscano and Rustico, Batdorf & Goodman’s, etc. So far the Toscano from Counter Culture was my favorite, but this one provided a bit more depth and body than the Toscano. (Also the price and the shipping method used to be nicer.) It really tastes like chocolate and brandy, with really sweet smell of caramel.

The package used to look like the picture on the right side - now they have changed the packaging and their website outlook. Sure, the bag looks more modernized, and the website has a lot of useful information and cool facts about the company. The sad thing is that the price changed (upward), too. The Belle used to cost $12.95 for 1lb (about 450g), but now 12oz (350g) costs $11.95, which is similar to the Counter Culture Coffee’s pricing. Klatch still ships via USPS, and it’s much better than the usual UPS ground shipping.

Next beans to try are - Stumptown Hair Bender and Terroir.

I have been drinking only espresso macchiato and lattes for the last 3.5 years with my own espresso machine and grinder. (My husband drinks dripped coffee, and I sometimes drink a bit of what he brews.) However on a hot summer day like today, iced coffee seems to be so much more appealing, and I decided to follow the method that’s introduced at the Counter Culture Coffee’s website. (Counter Culture Coffee makes one of my favorite espresso beans, Espresso Toscano.) And the result? The BEST iced coffee I have ever tasted! It’s also much lighter tasting than iced Americano, which is made with espresso shots and ice/water. Also it gets the most aroma from the beans, and it tastes much more fresh than a lot of iced coffee that you get from the commercial places.

You can find the original instruction here:

http://www.counterculturecoffee.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=574&Itemid=

I used a coffee stand that my dear friend Robert Scott - a dentist, flutist, and a beautiful wood-worker - made for me last Christmas. It’s supposed to be a Costa Rican chorreador stand, but I think it works much better for this recipe. You can make your own following the direction here: http://www.runnerduck.com/coffee_maker.htm You can buy one at www.chorreador.com as well. (Of course the one that I bought in San Jose was much cheaper, but I am thrilled that you can finally order one in the states.)

Here is how I did:

1) Hang the coffee basket and filter on the chorreador stand (or find a similar way to suspend a basket above the glass that you’ll use for the finished coffee).

2) Boil enough water to fill a tall glass - you won’t use all of it, because the glass will have ice in it.

3) Put 3-4 tbs. of freshly ground coffee in the filter.  Today I used Coffee Klatch’s Ipanema Dulce.

4) Fill a tall glass to the top with ice cubes, and put it under the coffee basket.

5) Slowly pour the hot water over the filter.  Watch the coffee level in the glass so it doesn’t overflow.  You’ll wind up using less water than you would if you were making hot coffee with the same amount of grounds, to compensate for the dilution that happens when the hot water hits the ice cubes.

Enjoy!

It’s genius- a cafe called “Gimme! Coffee.”

Located in Ithaca (2 in Ithaca and now in a few other places, including NYC), Gimme! Coffee is one of those small, a bit snotty, and yet very charming independent coffee shops. Their Baristas know what they are doing, are friendly and cool, and they make perfect espresso macchiato with a dollop of heart-shaped milk foam, smooth latte with leafy-decoration and spectacular espresso.

I visited Gimme! Coffee on N. Cayuga St. in the spring of 2006, and I knew I would come back to Ithaca because I always go back to a place where there is a great cafe that I fall in love with. (Williamstown, Lenox, Atlanta to name a few.) Gimme! Coffee was using one of the La Marzzoco machines in 2006. This year they were using a machine named Mirage - a very sturdy, shiny machine that makes very thick, caramel-like, syrupy espresso. (The barista told me that Mirage is made by hand in Denmark.)

The Cayuga St. location has a very narrow space, small tables, and is always packed with Cornell students. It’s not fancy looking but it’s warm and cozy. Highly recommended for anybody need good coffee and decent (not as good as their coffee, but still good enough) baked goods.

* Their espresso blend, “Leftist,” is not my favorite choice for home espresso making (at least with my machine), but it tastes great in their own store.

Club Espresso in Buam-dong, Seoul (image from www.clubespresso.co.kr)

Korea’s cafe scene has changed drastically over the past 10-15 years, and now the big cities in Korea are bustling with amazing independent roastery and artisanal cafes.

The term “roasted beans” was a very strange one in the early 90s as “coffee” in Korea meant  instant powdered coffee for such a long time. The most popular and available kind back was a single packet of coffee granules with lots of sugar and palm-oil based coffee cream powder. (aka “coffee mix”, which is still readily available in supermarkets and convenient stores) In the early 90s, stores like Jardin coffee and Bremer coffee opened with the name “Wondu coffee” meaning coffee made from roasted bean (basically dripped coffee) and became very popular among young people. I was a high school student and loved giong to one of those Jardin shops with my friend in our school uniforms - it was like a very big guilty pleasure as we were not so sure if it was ok for high school students to drink coffee but it tasted good nonetheless!

The big sales point of such “wondu coffee” shops were flavored coffees. It was fun for a while but soon I learned that those French vanilla flavored and Raspberry chocolate flavored coffee beans were old coffee beans with new make-up. Then in 1999 the first Starbucks shop opened in Korea - I was back for a summer break from my graduate studies at Indiana University, Bloomington, where one of the first Starbucks shops suffered a window damage from a local vandalism. After the huge success of the first Starbucks store located in the biggest women’s college in Korea, almost every universities in Seoul had to have one nearby. Every summer break I would go back home and there would be more Starbucks stores.
Then smaller chains started catching up, providing cheaper espresso drinks. Big shopping areas like Myungdong and a lot of college areas were covered with big and small coffee shops.

I cannot recall when the artisanal cafe movement began in Korea, but I remember visiting a small coffee shop near Korea University where the owner was roasting his own beans and served really fresh and super-tasting coffee as early as 1996 or 1997. I would also hear about and visit some independent coffee shops with ridiculously high price tag ($8-9 for a cup of dripped coffee or cappuccino!) since the late 90s. Also many cake shops opened with small coffee bar as well as big bakery-cafe chains such as “Twosome place” and “Paris Croissant.” (Korean bakeries are very much like Japanese bakeries, which was largely influenced by French baking style. The cakes are much smaller and lighter than the American varieties, and the selection is much larger.)

Quite a few really awesome cafes with great coffess with $4-5 price tag became popular during the past 3-4 years. These shops are usually run by young people who recently finished their barista training, who roast their own coffee in the store, and who run a coffee academy along with the cafe. This kind of artisanal cafes seem to be replacing the cheap, small chains and become more and more popular. In 2007, a soap opera called “Coffee Prince No. 1″featured a high-end cafe that hired only men as their baristas and became a mega-hit in the TV box office. I think that raised the awareness on the good coffee, barista, and so on. One interesting thing is that a lot of these artisanal coffee shops focus on the hand-dripped coffee. To me, it’s like a very delicate version of Costa Rican Chorreador - the barista takes great care of the water temperature, texture of the coffee, and height and direction of the water poured into the ground beans. Watching this kind of coffee-making is almost like watching a painter working on an art-work. This kind of dripped coffee is 10 times better than machine dripped coffee, but still my passion lies on espresso drinks…

One of the best coffee shops I visted in Korea is called “Club Espresso,” and this shop serves really amazing espresso drinks. They have a big roasting machine in the store, and they sell freshly roasted beans by the bag. Pretty spacious and comfortable as well. This shop also serves really fantastic cookies, cakes, and cheese cakes, all baked in the store. The only problem is that it is a little difficult to get to unless you have a car. The owner here worked in various coffee shops in the early 90s and self-taught a lot of things before he went to Japan to learn some more.

Here is the direction:

Take the subway line 3 (orange line) and get off at the “Gyungbokgung” station.
Take a bus (1020, 7022, and 7018) and get off at the “Buam dong office” - it’s on the way to the “Bookak san” road.

Website: www.clubespresso.co.kr  (only in Korean)

* There is a very famous dumpling restaurant called “Sonmandoo” if you follow the “Bookak san” road. They serve homemade Korena style dumplings at its best with nice view of the Bookak Mountain. Have a bol of dumpling soup or steamed dumpling there and walk down to get some coffee at the Club Espresso - a perfect day.

Octane Coffee Bar and Lounge, Atlanta, GA

Recently I visited Montgomery, AL, to attend a music festival (See www.clefworks.org). Since I had a few extra days after the festival, I took a day trip to Atlanta to visit a few coffee shops in the city. My dear friend Deborah, who is one of the sweetest people I know but directionally challanged almost to the same level as I am, kindly agreed to drive with me. (Her husband Charles got worried and spent considerable amount of time teaching her how to use the GPS machine…)

I did some research through http://www.indiecoffeeshops.com/ and reviews on google and yahoo. After a few days of web-browsing, I came up with a list of 3 coffee shops: Octane Coffee Bar and Lounge, Joe’s East Atlanta Coffee Shop, and Aurora Cafe. (Java Monkey and Dancing Goat looked great but they were more like a smaller “chain” not an independent coffee shop. However the beans from Dancing Goat turned out to be really great, so I am sure I will visit that cafe next time I am in Atlanta.) 

With the GPS shouting out loud, we had almost no problem finding the lovely store, tucked in betwen Jefferson Street and Marietta Street.  (The store is right on the corner, so it’s easy to miss.) As soon as we entered the store, we knew it was going to be good - it was a large space with nice and relaxed atmosphere, high ceiling, and a lot of customers, and a La Marzocco machine!

We ordered a small latte and a double espresso macchiato along with some yogurt+granola and hummus snack plate. At Octane, they call the prepared coffee and the customers go to pick them up. I think this system works better because the time that coffee sits around, making the espresso go rancid, is shorter. Both drinks were prepared with such care and high quality - caramel colored espresso with pleasant aroma, deep and balanced flavor, and golden crema topped with beautiful foam and some art.

Before my visit I contacted them via email, and only the manager from Octane replied. He was not there when I arrived but one of the baristas was happy to help. (Thanks again, John!)

From John Deborah and I learned why La Marzocco machine is good - I always knew I liked espresso coming out of that machine, but did not exactly know why. John told us that it’s because of the separate boiler system that allows the supreme consistency and controll over steaming and extracting. We also learned that they use coffee beans from the Counter Culture - famous roastery in North Carolina. John explained that the baristas are trained with 3 steps - consistency (focusing on the consistency of dosing, extracting, and foaming), 100 Q and A test, and then a mock barista competition! Also they have a latte-art competition that’s purely for the visual pleasure and fun. 

Their granola was a bit too cinammon-y for my taste, and hummus was on the salty side, but for a cafe-food they were good enough. Their main focus is coffee, and they do have one of the best coffees I have tasted.

It is always nice to see people who really care about what they do and who are proud of their work. I will continue my journey to meet more people like the ones at Octane! (more information on this shop at www.octanecoffee.com)  

* I changed my plan and went to the “Tilt” coffee room as John recommended. Tilt was a beautiful looking cafe, but the drinks (latte and macchiato) tasted too bitter. I think I am just not a big fan of Intelligentsia beans.. Joe’s East Atlanta Coffee Shop was very much like the Soma cafe in Bloomington, IN - a bit smelly, not-organized, but comfortable. Their espresso drinks were too mild and lacked the intensity and flavor. Joe’s cafe is one of the oldest independent cafes in Atlanta, and it seems to be still very popular.

Lenox Coffee in Lenox, MA

I love drinking espresso and espresso macchiato. It all started when a guitarist from Argentina at Indiana University told me that he considered dripped coffee as “polluted water.” I tried what he was drinking and loved it instantly. Since then I have been very interested in independent cafes that take pride in making great espresso. Interestingly I always found one or two great coffee shops whenever I was in a music festival or music residency! The first one was in Sarasota, but I will start from the one near Tanglewood as it is one of my favorite places in the world.
I was an instrumental piano fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center in 2004. At TMC fellows get free meals but the meals are cafeteria-style..hence no good coffee. I was craving espresso so much and one morning I decided to explore the small downtown in Lenox, which is in between Tanglewood campus and the dormitory fellows stay. I asked someone randomly, and the person directed me to the “one and only” cafe there. There it was - Lenox Coffee. It was a very small, warm, crowded place with one person writing down orders on a small post-it/ one person making the drinks/ one person handing out the drinks and cleaning up the tables. That’s where I learned about the La Marzcco machine and leaf-art on a cup of latte. Boston Symphony’s driver (I think he drove the conductors), who is an Italian, would come to drink their espresso and say “Bravissimo!.” The service was slow and the guys who worked there were not too friendly but they knew how to make really good coffee. I never cared for milk-based espresso drinks until I ordered a small cappuccino with double shots there - until this moment I cannot forget that wonderfully aromatic cup of cappuccino, with perfect foam, in a brown cup! I went back in 2005 and they were still busy and great.

This year, 2007, I had a house concert in Berkshire at the home of Claudia and Carl Shuster’s. I met them in 2005 during one of the rehearsals for Ligeti Horn Trio. They were so supportive and friendly, and we have kept in touch since then. They host a house concert all year long at their beautiful house in Stockbridge, and this October I was invited to perform. The first thing I did when I arrived from Hartford airport was to visit Lenox Coffee. And…sadly it had changed. The place smelled a bit funny, probably due to careless cleaning, and their machine was Synesso. The person who made my small-double-cappuccino said he preferred it to La Marzocco, but the cappuccino was not as good as I remembered. Still good, but not as good. But still I would visit just for the fond memories I have from 2004 and 2005. That place made me happy and smile.