My wife and I are iced coffee fanatics. It’s what we drink every morning, 365 days a year. I have a full air pot of coffee in the fridge at all times, and a stash of coffee ice cubes in the freezer so that not one precious drop of this elixir is diluted. When we go away on vacation, I will bring containers of this already brewed coffee with us. If we go somewhere with a kitchen and a coffee maker, I will grind the beans at home in pre-measured amounts and then seal it in Ziploc bags, brewing it immediately upon arrival so that we have our cold coffee ready the next morning, ice cubes included. When we travel to a destination where bringing this coffee is absolutely impossible, we try to look at it as an opportunity to perhaps discover a newer, better coffee. It has yet to happen.
The coffee is called Caffe Chicco D’Oro, which means “nugget of gold,” and we discovered it in Switzerland, near the Italian border, about 9 years ago. My brother-in-law’s family was living in Basel at the time and my wife and I traveled there to be a part of a large family Christmas holiday gathering. The journey across the pond included a scenic road trip to the spectacular Grand Hotel Villa Castagnola in Ticino/Lugano, close to the Italian border but still in Switzerland despite its Italian name. We stopped at a popular Autogrill rest area in southern Switzerland and sipped cappucinos that totally blew us away….so much so that we needed to know the brand of this incredible coffee. Once we were home in the United States, I was on a mission to find a way to buy this coffee for our every day use. Fortunately, they had an office here in the states, and it was relatively easy for me to buy Caffe Chicco D’Oro online. After a few years, they shut their operation down and transferred the rights to sell their product to a company called The Swiss Bakery in Virginia. To this day, these folks are the exclusive importers of Caffe Chicco D’Oro. (www.chiccodoro-usa.com)
The variety I buy is in the gold package, known as “Tradition.” I have tried the “Elite” when they were sold out of my favorite, and was not as happy with it.
I buy the coffee by the case: 12 whole bean bags (250g) at a time. Shipping is free. I keep them in a cool, dry place and I’ve never had a problem with spoilage. Besides, we drink a lot of it and it doesn’t sit around very long!
Live the Live ™ 