'Cook' serves up freshly roasted beans at local Coffee Exchange
By Suzanne Cristallo
Loyal customers have bought their coffee at the International Coffee Exchange in Saratoga for more than 15 years. Some say it's because the coffee has been consistently good in spite of the fact that there have been four owners during that time. It's probably because Victor Amezcua has been doing the roasting.
Amezcua bought the business for his wife, Kathleen, in 1985 and left the computer world to learn the fine art of roasting a year later. Changes in his life caused him to sell the business on Big Basin Way in 1997, but he has carried through on the roasting for three owners since then.
"Roasting is cooking," Amezcua says. "Anyone can cook, but the knowledge of timing and when to apply heat is an art. You either have it or you don't."
At the Coffee Exchange, Amezcua roasts about 40 pounds of beans at a time that come from Asia, Africa and South America. He uses a small Italian roaster--a Vittoria Classica. "It's so beautiful and well-designed," he says, explaining that a small roaster requires the cook to regulate the temperature according to the look of the beans. "Big machines do a fairly good job," he says of roasters employed in many chain coffee houses, but he feels nothing can supplant the watchful care of a person.
New owners Ty and Tek Lou and their son, David, bought the business six months ago from Jane Asher and Bobbie Schlueter, who ran it for a year and a half. Before them, the Norton brothers and their wives managed it for a year and a half after buying it from the Amezcuas.
"Over that time, many of our regular customers left," Amezcua notes. "The Lous are now in the process of winning them back." He refers to the Lou family as "incredibly hardworking people who have lots of business savvy." He says they have other pastry and coffee shops in Palo Alto and San Francisco, where Tek spends most of his time. Ty and son David run the Saratoga store. "Ty is very friendly but very shy," says Amezcua.
The Lous hope to win old customers back and keep new ones happy with a new, reasonably priced menu that offers breakfasts, salads, sandwiches and wraps in addition to an extensive coffee and espresso menu.
For breakfast, there's a $3 turkey or ham croissant with Dijon mustard and Swiss, cheddar or jack cheese. There's also a breakfast bagel or croissant with eggs, cheese and bacon, which can be accompanied by freshly squeezed orange or carrot juice.
Salads run the gamut: chicken curry, chicken Caesar, tuna and house, the last containing mixed greens, tomatoes, cucumbers, mushrooms, and carrots with balsamic vinaigrette.
Sandwiches and wraps (made with spinach or tomato-basil tortillas) are prepared to order on sourdough, wheat, croissant or bagel. Ham, turkey, bacon, avocado, chicken, curry, tuna, vegetarian, and pesto, can be mixed or matched--all for less than $6.
Amezcua, 56, a part-time college instructor, sold the store when he and his wife decided that their son, Ethan, then 15, needed a private, therapeutic school to help him through some social and academic problems. They also sold their home in Saratoga to help finance it. Today, 20-year-old Ethan is enrolled at Cabrillo College with plans to study biological sciences at UC-Santa Cruz. That would have made Ethan's mother proud, Amezcua says. Kathleen died of cancer in 1998.
International Coffee Exchange, 14471 Big Basin Way, Saratoga, is open Monday through Friday, 6:30 a.m.-6 p.m., Saturday 7 a.m.-6 p.m., and Sunday 7:30 a.m.-4 p.m. Call 408.741.1185 for more information.
|
Los Gatos, California Since 1881
