80 PUNCHMAGAZINE.COM Nobody likes a snob: not when it comes to cars, clothes or wine, and not when it comes to coffee either. The partners behind the Coffee Lab are determined not to create more of them. “You make your coffee the way you like, and we’re here to show you how to brew it,” says Matt Baker as we sit in the lab’s sunny space in downtown Menlo Park, gleaming with the metal and glass of scientific instruments and state-of-the-art brewing apparatus. You can forgo a fancy espresso machine. You can even pour in some of that chemical words by KATE LUCKY • photography by PAULETTE PHLIPOT EXPERIENCE coffee lab {food coloring} French vanilla creamer. Matt won’t judge. The Coffee Lab, which offers classes and tastings for corporate groups and individuals alike, is meant to be fun, not fastidious, innovative, not intimidating. And though the classes teach the science behind each cup—offering lessons on water and oxygen, projecting coffee concentration charts and demonstrating some of the most sophisticated makers on the market— Matt and his partner, Vance Bjorn, understand that coffee isn’t, first and foremost, a chemistry experiment. It’s a beloved ritual. “A lot of people wake up to the smell of coffee,” says Matt, who grew up in an Italian family with a moka pot always on the stove. “It’s nostalgia for me.” That said, the chemistry is very cool. Vance gives me an
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