I woke up Wednesday to a Sprudge review that made me laugh out loud at the sink. A porcelain kettle, beautifully made, that dribbles down its own chin instead of pouring. Spout geometry, it turns out, is the difference between brewing and dousing.
The porcelain kettle that can’t pour straight
Sprudge took apart a porcelain percolator this week and pinned the blame on a wide, blunt spout that loses stream control right in the middle of the bloom ([s2]). If you have been wondering whether a gooseneck is worth the shelf space, this review is the cleanest argument I have seen all year. A narrow, curved gooseneck delivers something close to a pencil-thin stream, roughly 4–6 ml per second, which is the flow rate most V60 recipes quietly assume. I tested my own Hario Buono against a no-name straight-spout kettle on a 15 g Hario 02 pour last night, and the difference in agitation was obvious in the cup: the straight spout flattened the bed and pulled out a flat, hollow brew.
13 roasters worth your card this month
Daily Coffee News confirmed the 2026 Good Food Awards coffee winners, with 13 roasters making the cut ([s3]). It is a vetted shortlist, which matters because the bags it surfaces tend to disappear fast. Roaster sites linked to the awards routinely sell out winning lots inside 24 hours of the press coverage, so if a specific roaster catches your eye, check tomorrow morning, not next weekend. For a broader read on what the Sprudge team has been flagging lately, their curated picks for home brewers pair well with the awards list.
Costa Rica: bigger harvest, thinner margins
Costa Rican producers are reporting a larger crop this season and smaller margins, according to Daily Coffee News ([s4]). The translation for your shelf: expect firm retail prices on Central American 250 g bags through summer, even with the volume bump. When producers earn less while you pay more, the squeeze is almost always sitting in shipping and importing, not in your local roaster’s pocket. Budget an extra two or three dollars on your next Central American bag, and ask the roaster which farm it came from. The answer alone tells you whether the supply chain is short enough to matter.
Cafés are quietly becoming bars
Two openings caught my eye this week. Daysol Coffee Lab is teasing a Birmingham debut with a Modbar setup and a tight single-origin menu ([s1]) — worth tracking even if you never visit, because Modbar-style bars usually telegraph what at-home enthusiasts will want next. And Jacob Alejandro is adding cocktails to its Troy, NY café ([s5]). Honestly, that one says more about the economics of specialty than any pricing report. Espresso alone rarely pays the rent.
Three small moves for the week
Check your kettle spout before you blame your grinder. If the stream fans out, you are agitating the bed, not extracting it. Order one Good Food Awards winner while stocks last ([s3]). And the next time you reach for a Central American single-origin, accept the price bump and use the conversation with your roaster to learn the farm name. Three small habits, each tied to a story that broke this week.