– Can you please introduce yourself in a few words.
I am a freelance writer and producer. I am the author of The Culinary Cyclist and Fika: The Art of the Swedish Coffee Break. I write for a lot of different publications on a variety of topics, but most often am writing about coffee, food and bikes.
– How and when did you get to specialize as a coffee journalist?
I am originally from the Pacific Northwest, and also have a Swedish mother, so coffee culture came at an early age. I lived in Portland for 10 years, and saw the growth of the specialty coffee movement. But it wasn’t until I moved to Paris in early 2013 that I started writing about it. When I came to Paris, that was just at the moment when the specialty coffee scene was really kicking into gear. I started covering it for Sprudge, and everything took off from there.
– What makes you special/different?
I’m a tall, trilingual, Pacific Northwest girl who brews her own kombucha and will ride a bicycle just about anywhere.
– What was your first coffee experience?
I started drinking coffee when I was studying in high school for a year in Sweden. I was 17 at the time, and every time I got invited over to someone’s house, it was always for fika, the Swedish coffee break. In the beginning, as I didn’t drink coffee, I would always ask for something else. But then it got to a point where I just felt like an awkward outsider, and I thought it would just be easier if I started drinking coffee like everyone else.
– What was your best coffee experience?
It’s hard to choose one, but I will say that my best coffee experiences are always the ones outdoors. I love cafe culture, but for me there is nothing better than brewing coffee outside, on a camp stove.
– Do you prepare coffee at home ? If yes, what method do you use?
Oh yes. I switch between French press and Chemex.
– How do you like your coffee? Black, sugar and milk, iced, vietnamese style,…?
I drink my coffee black, and when it’s warm out, I love making cold brew.
– How would you qualify yourself as coffee drinker (occasional, heavy, addict…)?
Addict. But I do make an effort to make my coffee routine special. It’s not the first thing that I drink in the morning, but it’s my first mid-morning break. For me, appreciating good coffee is about slowing down, so I like to ensure that I am not just gulping it down because I feel like I need the caffeine. I want to enjoy the process.
– Do you have another passion or a hobby besides journalism?
I love cycling, which is perfect, because I feel that coffee and bikes go together very well. I also like doing art related things, although I don’t make enough time for it. I design earrings out of bike tubes, and I also have been getting really into paper cutting recently.
– What other place would you recommend (coffee or not), anywhere in the world?
Any coffee lover has to go to Portland. I am biased because I lived there for a long time, and the Pacific Northwest will always be home, but there is something really special about the coffee culture and the people there.
– What would you say to people who don’t know much about coffee?
I would say that it’s important to treat coffee just like all the other products that we love: good food, good wine, etc. When you think about everything that goes into producing coffee and getting it into the cup in front of you, it is an everyday product that really should be a luxury product. This is why for me it’s so important to know who I am buying my coffee from, and ensure that they are doing a good job of ensuring that everyone along the coffee production line is getting paid fairly for a job well done.
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UPDATE
Working together with photographer Jeff Hargrove, Anna wrote Paris Coffee Revolution, a book about the story of the growth of specialty coffee culture in Paris.
At the end of 2015 she left Paris to move back to the Pacific Northwest and is now writing about coffee in the middle of the woods.