Here’s a Japanese commercial featuring Brad Pitt. He’s upset, he’s drinking coffee, everything works out in the end. Good stuff! I would never have imagined the huge market that canned coffee has in Japan. There are a ton of varieties, hot and cold, and they take up a lot of space at the convenience stores. It seems unreal. Each can costs ¥100-150.

Yeah… I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it or not but I’m 15 minutes away from 6 Starbucks Coffee shops here in Fukuoka. Now that’s going north, south, and east. I haven’t checked west yet…. there’s probably 3 more that way somewhere. One of the Starbucks is across the street from another Starbucks and about 3 blocks or so from another one down the side street.

So here we are… going into the Starbucks that’s inside Tsutaya.

For the record… Tsutaya is pretty sweet. It’s 6 stories and you can rent DVDs, CDs, buy them, get books and magazines, and enjoy some Starbucks. The DVD releases that have been out for a while usually run on a special that’s 4 DVDs for 1000 Yen. I’d say about $9-10 US.

Here’s kind of a cool photo

And here’s a picture I took from Starbucks of Starbucks across the street while enjoying some coffee with some friends.

By having so many Starbucks so close to me I’d have to say

1. It’s kind of crazy in my opinion
2. They are is busy and the city is big
3. I love it!

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Out with the cheap coffee maker, in with the …. WHAT WHAT!? I just read this article at the New York Times website and had to share. The Japanese siphon coffee maker at the Blue Bottle Café in San Francisco was imported from Japan and cost more than $20,000 USD (That’s 2,130,399 Yen at the time of this post. See the conversion at Yahoo). It’s halogen-powered and looks like a chemistry set. That’s a ton of cash for the Japanese coffee maker. Are they serious about coffee? I’m going with “Yes” but are they a bit crazy about coffee? I’m going with “Yes” on that one too. Hmmm, I wonder if that cost included the shipping as well.

Ready for some pictures? Click the picture to see the slide show of images at the New York Times showing the step-by-step process of how coffee is made using the siphon bar.

And an awesome quote from the article:

“The whirlpool, it messes with your mind,” said Mr. Freeman, who practiced stirring plain water for months to develop muscle memory before he brewed his first cup of siphon coffee. “There’s no way to rush it.”

Here’s another interesting quote:

“Siphon coffee is very delicate,” he said. “It’s sweeter and juicier, and the flavors change as the temperature changes. Sometimes it has a texture so light it’s almost moussey.”

Here’s an informational siphon coffee machine video I found on youtube which you might find interesting.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjH1hzl-Iq0[/youtube]

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Running low on my regular coffee I decided to give some instant Japanese coffee a try. I didn’t have much hope because instant Folders coffee in the U.S. tastes like ass but my choices were slim so I went for it. The result: Pretty OK. Yep, it’s not terrible like the instant coffee I remember and it was pretty ok (now I didn’t say good). I would choose this over no coffee but I’d choose no coffee over the U.S. instant coffee. There’s one more reason to add to the list of why Japan rocks!