If you love coffee or are just exploring your new interest in coffee, you’ll feel right at home here at Wizard of Coffee. We are 2 coffee lovers who have a background in digital marketing and a common love for those magical beans.
Our goal is to share our reviews of coffee and the accessories, the dos and don’ts of home-brewed coffee, and how to enjoy your best coffee life. We would love to hear from you or any topic ideas you might like to see on this site.
Who Is Wizard of Coffee?
We’re Will, Randy, and Courtney — good friends, co-workers, and coffee enthusiasts.
Come along with us on our journey to master at-home coffee, review equipment for the said journey, and read some funny stories of our triumphs and failures in our quest for the perfect cup of coffee.
About Will
I didn’t get into coffee until I was in college.
I know that’s unusual, especially for a kid from small-town Texas.
Everybody around me drank coffee, mostly gas station stuff out of Styrofoam cups. The old people drank it all day. Even some of the other kids enjoyed a sip.
I guess I didn’t need coffee until college all-nighters and part-time job double-shifts converged. I saw it as a cheap wake-up aid that wouldn’t make my teeth fall out or get me arrested.
In the years since then, I’ve grown closer to coffee. I like the ritual. I like the way I make coffee pretty much the way my dad made it, and my grandfather, too. I like the global market for gourmet beans. The variety of flavor and aroma profiles from different parts of the world excites me.
Most of all, I like coffee as a kind of medicine. It can be a stimulant, like a shot of light-roast Colombian first thing in the morning. It can be part of my relaxation process, like a French roast espresso thinned with hot water while I finish a cigar in the late evening.
In my professional life, I’m a teacher. Coffee is as big a part of my teacher-life as chalk and textbooks. Teachers meet and share and chat over coffee (and tea). We use it to make friends, make amends, and make future plans. I guess I’ll always tie my life with coffee up with my career in education.
Favorite coffee drink: a tall cup of dark roast drip coffee
Favorite coffee bean: Ethiopian Yirgacheffe
Least Favorite Coffee Drink: iced coffee is always dull and flat to me, regardless of how it’s made
About Courtney
I’m a life long coffee lover. Originally from Austin, my enthusiasm for coffee, making coffee, and how it applies to all seasons of the year started in my early 20s. Many late nights studying while working a full-time job made coffee a necessity for me. I started out drinking strong brewed canned coffee just like my parents did. #gross.
I went on to fall in love with Starbucks and their vanilla lattes with an extra shot. I was tired of paying $5.00 a day for my coffee habit and wanted to start making my own lattes at home. Little did I know I had no idea what I was doing.
I moved from Texas to Colorado in the early 2000s. Coffee had a new meaning for me.
Pro Tip- Coffee keeps you warm. Boulder, CO is a great city for coffee. Colorado takes its coffee almost as seriously as they do their craft beer and outdoor sports. I was all in. I’ve never looked back.
6 coffee makers, 2 espresso machines, 2 Italian Bialetti Moka espresso makers, and 3 French presses later, I leave that coveted vanilla latte (now with coconut milk) for the pros. I have since learned what I can (and can’t) do at home, what are the best at-home coffee brewing equipment, and what’s the deal with coffee drinks that taste more like candy than coffee?
I have a small family that makes caffeine worth its weight in gold. I have a wonderful husband (who I’ll refer to as B) and a toddler girl (who I will call A). I work for a small boutique SEO marketing group and mentor new bloggers on best marketing strategies for their websites. I try to balance my time between work, my hobbies (including coffee of course), and my family. Being a new mom requires a lot of focus, and I don’t know if I could do it without coffee.
In recent years, I was the director of marketing for a local coffee roaster and learned a lot about what goes into roasting the coveted perfect cup of coffee. I’m looking forward to sharing my experience (amateur and professional) with you.
Favorite coffee drink: Iced cold brew with vanilla almond milk creamer or vanilla coconut latte with an extra shot
Favorite coffee bean: Single-origin Sumatra dark roast
Least Favorite Coffee Drink: Anything with whipped cream. I’m here for caffeine, not dessert.
About Randy
I started drinking coffee as a teenager in Bonham, Texas. I worked at the Dairy Queen there, and in the 1980s, that’s where people in Bonham went to drink coffee. It was far from gourmet, but it was almost always fresh because we had so many customers drinking coffee at all hours of the day.
I drank even more coffee in college, and in the late 80s and early 90s, Starbucks was just starting to get popular in north Texas.
I’ve always preferred my coffee black regardless of where it’s from. I played around with cappucinos and lattes when I was in my 20s, but by the time I hit my 30s, I’d realized that simplicity was the ultimate sophistication.
These days my go-to coffee drink is an Americano, although I used a plain old drip-brewer at home. In my cabinet today, you can find bags of Death Wish Coffee, Dunkin, and Starbucks (2 different flavors).
I usually prefer to drink coffee when I’m smoking cigars, and you can read what I have to say about cigars at our sister site, Cigarzine.
One of my daughters, Maddie, never acquired the taste for coffee. Mary, on the other hand, likes coffee as much as I do. College has been good for them. I still have hope for Maddie.
Favorite coffee drink: Americano
Favorite coffee bean: Starbucks Espresso
Least Favorite Coffee Drink: Anything thick and sweet — if I want a candy bar, I don’t want it melted.