Lamplighter Daily Offerings

Staff pick of the day; Costa Rican pour overs.

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 12:13:06 -0400

Staff pick of the day; Costa Rican pour overs.

Finally warm enough to open up the windows!

Mon, 08 Apr 2013 20:58:28 -0400

Finally warm enough to open up the windows!

Pour over coffee in our new roastery space.

Mon, 08 Apr 2013 20:57:50 -0400

Pour over coffee in our new roastery space.

Dialing in Today at our new roastery on Summit ave.

Wed, 30 Jan 2013 22:46:09 -0500

Dialing in Today at our new roastery on Summit ave.

When our new roastery location opens at 1719 Summit ave. we will...

Tue, 08 Jan 2013 12:09:00 -0500

When our new roastery location opens at 1719 Summit ave. we will be holding free public cuppings every Friday at 4pm. Meanwhile we will be hard at work finishing the build-out and installing our new equipment. Drive by and check out the bright orange building on the block.

See you soon!

New tracks installed and sliding window restoration complete....

Fri, 26 Oct 2012 20:46:50 -0400

New tracks installed and sliding window restoration complete. Just in time for the pre Blizardcane winds to blow through!

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Fri, 26 Oct 2012 20:43:34 -0400

The gingers love the ginger bread latte! Made with real ginger...

Sun, 21 Oct 2012 14:07:21 -0400

The gingers love the ginger bread latte! Made with real ginger and vanilla house made syrups.

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Mon, 15 Oct 2012 22:55:53 -0400

Renovations are in full swing at our new roastery on Summit....

Mon, 15 Oct 2012 22:51:54 -0400

Renovations are in full swing at our new roastery on Summit. These amazing old windows are being lovingly restored.

My how the time flies! We’ve been hard at work building...

Thu, 20 Sep 2012 10:45:46 -0400

My how the time flies!

We’ve been hard at work building our new roastery in Scotts Addition. Demolition is completed and framing is underway. We hope to open in the late fall/early winter.

For now we have suspended our cuppings and tastings at the kickstand and are focussing all of our attention on the new building.

When its open our new location will be home to our 2 roasters as well as a full espresso bar, grab and go food, and several pour over methods. We look forward to sharing a cup with you there soon!

The times for the cuppings at the Kickstand have changed! Now...

Thu, 28 Jun 2012 17:29:08 -0400

The times for the cuppings at the Kickstand have changed! Now only on Fridays, but we will do two. The first one starts at 11am, the second one at 3pm. Come taste some delicious coffee with your favorite baristas and roasters! It’s free and you can show up any time between 11am and 4ish.

The Kickstand is changing its hours and will now only be open...

Tue, 19 Jun 2012 13:34:00 -0400

The Kickstand is changing its hours and will now only be open for these cuppings. We are doing a renovation to the warehouse next door to expand our retail and roasting space, so until the buildout is complete, the Kickstand will serve as our cupping lab! Please come by if you can, it is free and open to the public and should be fun!

Our collab with Need Supply Co. has hit the shelves! I am so...

Tue, 19 Jun 2012 12:53:06 -0400

Our collab with Need Supply Co. has hit the shelves! I am so stoked on this; I have been shopping at Need since I moved into town and have always been impressed with the attention they give to craft and in choosing the products they sell. Very proud to be a part of it all!

Read the Need Blog for more info!

Iced Coffee

Thu, 03 May 2012 12:19:42 -0400

We have been working on a way to sell our iced coffee commercially in some sort of easy to transport container, and while looking for inspiration I stumbled upon this nice article by the Gothamist: http://gothamist.com/2011/04/27/growlers_for_your_64_oz_iced_coffee.php

Nice label on the growler and a nice little blurb about why coffee concentrate is the way to go!

Here’s another one of Shannon’s awesome lattes. In...

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 12:47:00 -0400

Here’s another one of Shannon’s awesome lattes. In other news, Lamplighter now has two solar panels installed on the roof!!! Courtesy of Urban Grid, a Richmond based company. Their offices are actually over in Scott’s Addition right by the Kickstand.

Weekend Beans

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 13:58:24 -0400

This weekend at the Lamplighter we will be retailing

Honduras Cerro Azul at a French roast as our darkest offering,

Ethiopian Sidamo Natural Processed / Peruvian Chanchamayo blend @ full city (currently our espresso)

Papua New Guinea Sigri A @ full city

Kenya Gititu Estate AA @ a true medium

Nicaragua Segovia @ light medium

Guatemala Finca Ceylan @ a light city

The last two are our newest Central Americans to come in and they are both delicious. Those will be alternating as our drip brew all weekend long. Here are the notes for both.

Nicaragua Segovia: Sweet and malty with a mild acidity. Notes of hazelnut and caramel stand out with subtler notes of stone fruit and tobacco at the darker roasts. The Nueva Segovia region is at the northern border that Nicaragua shares with Honduras. This specific lot comes from a co-op that uses revenues from Fair Trade sales to provide education to members and their children, build better pulping and processing facilities, provide disaster relief funds, provide health care, and to build a cupping lab. The PRODECOOP was founded in 1993 with the mission of creating integrated systems of production and conservation. Members have consistently competed in the Cup of Excellence competition and won top awards.

Guatemala Finca Ceylan: Nice and bright with a sweet vanilla note and floral finish. This is a really clean cup, great in the morning. Guatemala is often considered the gold standard of Central American coffee producers because the government coffee authority, ANACAFE, encourages sustainable growing practices and has created a strong infrastructure for coffee production and sales. This specific estate has been family owned and operated for over 130 years and has always been dedicated to environmentally friendly coffee production. The farm is both Rain Forest Alliance and bird friendly certified and hunting is prohibited on the estate.

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Tue, 17 Apr 2012 11:08:32 -0400

The old and the new. The Probat L5 on the left next to our new...

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 11:06:04 -0400

The old and the new. The Probat L5 on the left next to our new Diedrich! I have been pretty lucky to get to roast on two such fine machines, and I am sad to see the Probat sitting and not getting used for now, but using the big ol’ Diedrich is awesome! SO much coffee.

The Probat has been through it all - she was in the flood in Shockoe some years back and has been lovingly rebuilt. During the time that I have been here (two years) I have seen, and helped solve, nearly every conceivable maintenance issue you can have with a roaster, and it has been really great. From tightening the manifold, to replacing a belt, balancing the motor, to various electrical and switch replacements - it has been a labor of love. The learning process has been unbeatable and so hands on. But now we are on to a new era here at the Lamplighter, which is also wonderful, because we are so busy that we needed a bigger machine. Eventually we will offer roastery tours and you can come check them both out!

Weekend Madness

Thu, 29 Mar 2012 14:14:59 -0400

There is a LOT going on in RVA this weekend. The French Film festival will be going down and we are providing a few pots of coffee to the Byrd Theater for all those early movie-goers. There are also a bunch of bike related events happening, for which I urge you to scoot over to the RideRichmond website for more info. We are re-starting our Final Fridays block party/ art market event tomorrow night with this awesome event:

Also, we are officially back to Summer hours: 7am-8pm, seven days a week!

PS If you haven’t tried the Kenyan Estate grown coffee we have in right now, you should consider it. It is delicious.