Tom and Jerry, Bonnie and Clyde, Chips and Salsa, Mulder and Scully… some things are just meant to be paired up. We have one more duo to add to that list this week: Doughnuts and Coffee. June 1st is National Doughnut Day!

Clearly, there is only one way to commemorate National Doughnut Day, and that’s by stopping by your local bakery. We can help you out with one aspect of this celebration though, and that’s the type of coffee to enjoy alongside your doughnut.

It’s time for a doughnut and coffee pairing.

Beaujolais Blend + Maple Bacon Doughnut

Ahhh, the maple bacon doughnut. Love it or hate it, you can’t deny that the collision of savory and sweet has made this dessert one of the most popular choices at the corner doughnut shop. Our Fairtrade and Organic Beaujolais Blend is also a balance of unique flavors, with coffees sourced from Africa, Central America, and Indonesia. This Medium Roast is full-bodied and complex, and holds its own alongside the contrasting flavors of bacon and maple.

Ethiopia Yirgacheffe + Beignet

Our Ethiopian Gedeb Yirgacheffe is a light roast, with rich notes of ripe cherry and golden raisin. This coffee alone can be a sweet treat, so pairing it with something overly sugary isn’t the right choice. Instead, we chose the beignet. A simple fried pastry with a dusting of powdered sugar can enhance the flavors of this award-winning single origin.

Noyo Harbor French + Apple Fritter

No Doughnut Day blog post can go by without mentioning the over-the-top apple fritter. This glazed explosion of sugar will go great with your dark cup of Noyo Harbor French this morning. The hint of roasted nuts in this coffee and that classic smoky french roast flavor enhances every sweet bite of the apple fritter, making these two the perfect companions.

Whatever pastry or roast you choose this morning, all of us here at Thanksgiving Coffee wish you an excellent National Doughnut Day!

National Trails Day – The First Saturday of June
Pelican Bluffs Trail Work Day: June 2, 2018 from 10am-12pm
hosted by the Mendocino Land Trust

A mile south of the town of Point Arena, a beautiful new addition to the California Coastal trail has been created at the 70 acre Pelican Bluffs Preserve. Owned and maintained by the Mendocino Land Trust, this epic landscape is free and open for the public to enjoy. Because the Land Trust is not funded by taxes like other parks, the work and energy it takes to maintain open spaces is a burden carried by community members, whether through monetary donations or ‘sweat equity’. Over the past year, volunteers from near and far, in addition to service organizations like the California Conservation Corps, have all come together to build over two miles of trail along this breathtaking blufftop.

From the parking lot, the newly completed loop trail leads visitors up through a coastal prairie that climbs to a crested hill. At the top, the wide expanse of Pelican Bluffs is revealed. Wildflowers speckle the bluff top, while dramatic white cliffs drop away to the rocky beach below. The sound of the waves tumbling over the shore and the smell of the ocean breeze is a feast for all senses. Continue to follow the trail along the coast and you might see seals resting on the beach and whales spouting in the distance, while an osprey soars overhead. Home to Peregrine falcons and the endangered Point Arena Mountain Beaver, Pelican Bluffs is a beautiful place for people and wildlife in equal measure.

This National Trails Day, spend some time helping to take care of the trails and the wild places you love. It’s time well spent, and always worth the effort.

Mendocino Land Trust and Thanksgiving Coffee Company

Thanksgiving Coffee and the Mendocino Land Trust have collaborated to create Fog Dodger, a Cause Coffee benefiting the MLT and their efforts building trails all over our county.

This past weekend, Thanksgiving Coffee had the opportunity to sample our coffees at the Taste of Mendocino event in San Francisco! This annual event highlights the many wineries, resorts, restaurants and food producers of beautiful Mendocino County. No Mendocino foodie event is complete without Thanksgiving Coffee, and we were happy to be among fifty of the best food and drink purveyors of Mendocino County.

A few of the restaurants and hotels featured at the event also happen to serve Thanksgiving Coffee at their locations:

Kemmy’s Pies

299 E Commercial St
Willits, CA 95490
(707) 367-5498
www.kemmyspies.com

Inn at Newport Ranch

31502 CA-1
Fort Bragg, CA 95437
(707) 962-4818
www.theinnatnewportranch.com

Mendocino Botanical Gardens (Rhody’s Garden Café)

18220 CA-1
Fort Bragg, CA 95437
(707) 964-4352
www.gardenbythesea.org

Noyo Harbor Inn

500 Casa Del Noyo
Fort Bragg, CA 95437
(707) 961-8000
www.noyoharborinn.com

Winesong

September 7 and 8, 2018
www.winesong.org
Winesong is an annual charity auction and tasting at the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens, featuring local restaurants and vendors! Check out our Winesong 2017 blog post for more information on how Thanksgiving Coffee participated.

Thanks to everyone who came out for Taste of Mendocino 2018. We were honored to participate, and we hope to see you all when you visit our fine Mendocino coast.

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Nope, that’s not the pi(e) that we care about. The pie we care about is filled with sugar and fruits, and wrapped up in a warm yummy crust. We’re talking about pie. It may be Pi Day (3/14), but we’re celebrating good old pie today.

You can find Thanksgiving Coffee at two different pie shops in Northern California, Petaluma Pie Company and Kemmy’s Pies! Both of these companies are blow-your-mind good, and use organic, local, wholesome ingredients. Plus, they can serve you a cup Thanksgiving Coffee alongside a slice of your favorite pie.

Visit Kemmy’s Pies in Willits, in the Skunk Train Depot, and Petaluma Pie Company in downtown Petaluma, in the Helen Putnam Plaza.

Petaluma Pie Company is open from 9am to 7pm on 3/14: 125 Petaluma Blvd. N. Petaluma, CA 94952

Kemmy’s Pies is open from 6am to 2pm on 3/14: 299 E Commercial St, Willits, CA 95490

Daylight Savings Time began on Sunday, and we are feeling it. If your office is anything like the Thanksgiving Coffee headquarters, there will be a lot of coffee consumed this week to make up for that lost hour.

Need that extra kick of caffeine? Our Pony Express is called The Jackhammer of Coffees for a reason. Pick up a bag, and get ready to take on your day with a lot more gusto.

March 3 is World Wildlife Day

This Saturday is the perfect opportunity to spread the word about how wildlife inspires you. It’s also a chance to raise awareness for organizations that are doing the work to protect these creatures. Because of your support, we are able to partner with these groundbreaking non-profits, who are making a difference for wildlife all over the world:

Click the links below to learn more about each of these organizations:

American Birding Association

American Wild Horse Campaign

Baby Rhino Rescue

Defenders of Wildlife

Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International

Friends of the Earth

Need some coffee? Head on over to our World Wildlife Day coffee category to order a bag of coffee benefiting one of the organizations above!

Cities and communities across the line of totality have been preparing for a once in a lifetime experience: a coast to coast total solar eclipse in the United States. From West Coast to East, the line of totality touches Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming, Nebraska, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia and South Carolina. The last time we had a total solar eclipse this viewable from North America was in 1918. It’s been almost a century, and folks have been waiting for this event for a long time. Do you have enough coffee to get you through the two minutes you’ll be in complete darkness? (we suggest a light roast to balance out the event)

(We had a little bit of fun creating a coffee bean eclipse below… enjoy! If it isn’t loading for you, you can view it on YouTube)

Foggy in Fort Bragg

Here along the Mendocino Coast, we’re keeping our fingers crossed for blue skies. We’re dead in the middle of Fog-ust (that’s coastal living for you!), so we’ll get the darkness, likely without that view of the ring around the sun. Below is a shot of a partial solar eclipse (which is what we’ll have here in Fort Bragg), in foggy Austria back in 2011.

Cristaudo’s in Carbondale

We have one account that is exactly on the line of totality, in Southern Illinois. As one of the best spots for viewing (the longest duration and most perfect eclipse), Cristaudo’s Cafe in Carbondale is preparing for a crazy weekend ahead. If you’re traveling that way to view the eclipse, be sure to stop by and grab a cup of coffee! They’ve stocked up on adorable eclipse-themed cookies, and have a great selection of Thanksgiving Coffee to offer.

Good luck out there!

In the heat of Northern Georgia, the coffee roasting world is coming together for 18th annual Roasters Guild Retreat! We sent our Roastmaster Jacob Long, Roaster Joshua Long and Roastmaster Emeritus Paul Katzeff to the Lake Lanier Islands for a four-day roasting event.

Learn more: www.roastersguild.org

We’ll upload more pictures as the event continues. You can follow along on Instagram at the #RGRetreat hashtag, or on the @RoastersGuild Instagram page!

We had so much fun participating in Mendocino County’s Fourth of July parade! Check out a couple shots of our piece of the parade, and a few photos of the day…

A great drone flyover video of the July Fourth parade in Mendocino, from California Poppy Films. What a crowd!

The photos below of our Thanksgiving Coffee families were captured by Sam Koski Jones – thanks for sharing!

This weekend is the 24th annual Sierra Nevada World Music Festival, and it’s one of the Mendocino County events that is not to be missed. As you’re driving to and from the festival and need a coffee fix, here are a couple places to stop by and grab a cup of Thanksgiving Coffee!

BOONVILLE

Lizbby’s Restaurant and Bar
Anderson Valley Market
Redwood Drive In

PHILO

Stone and Embers
Lemon’s Market
The Bewildered Pig

NAVARRO

Navarro General Store

YORKVILLE

Yorkville Market

CLOVERDALE

Dahlia and Sage
Eagles Nest Deli

The Upsetter (Espresso)

Did you know that our Upsetter Espresso Blend is a reference to one of our favorite reggae artists? Lee “Scratch” Perry will be performing at Sierra Nevada this year. The label design on our Upsetter (a light roast espresso blend) is a reference to his label: Upsetter Records. Can’t wait to see him perform this weekend!

Have fun at Sierra Nevada… maybe we’ll see you out there!

Here in the United States, we sometimes claim a cultural ownership of beautiful birds like the Baltimore Oriole, perhaps forgetting that the very same species could just as easily be named the ‘Panama Oriole’, or the ‘Nicaraguan Oriole’, as it spends half it’s life in Central and South America. IMBD is a reminder that the health and abundance of these birds that are so much a part of our heritage does not stop at our own backyard feeders. If we wish to enjoy their beauty and their songs for generations to come, we must care for them and their well being across all borders.

The growing demand for coffee, and the rise of the mono-cultured full sun coffee plantations, has demolished much of the wintering habitat for iconic birds like Orioles. In fact, many of these species are now referred to as ‘Coffee Birds’ because the only forest home left to them are the shade-grown coffee farms that preserve the jungle canopy.

For over 20 year, Song Bird Coffee has been a leader in supporting the farmers who protect their native forests by growing delicious coffees under the jungle canopy, preserving priceless habitat and biodiversity. This year, on International Migratory Bird Day, we hope you will join us in protecting our precious songbirds, just by enjoying a great cup of shade-grown coffee.