1. Scales in drip trays

I’ve been going on about weighing espresso for a while, as have many others in the industry. This year we are going to see busy retail operations implement scales into drip trays for use with every drink. I also think this year a manufacturer of espresso machines will start to take this seriously and start R&D on building them in a standard.

2. C-market will peak, but won’t drop back too far

A lot of people are watching the C market, aware that it will have a frustrating impact on coffee quality as producers may have less incentive to pick/prep the highest quality when the prices are high for “ok” quality. There are certainly a number of factors at play in the high prices beyond the straight supply/demand relationship. Brazil’s entry into the C will probably have some effect, but I think we’re likely looking at small crops from places like Kenya and Colombia again which will help keep prices relatively high.

3. The WBC Prediction

This is going to be hard to quantify, but I think holding the WBC in a producing country will have a rejuvenating effect for those involved in the competition. I think it will be a great event and I hope people take full advantage of it being in a coffee producing country. Also I think the Scandinavians will be back in contention again.

4. A focus on service

We’ve had some focus on one cup brewing for a while now, and I don’t think the cycle is coming back round to espresso yet. I think there will more focus than before on the practical side of customer service in coffee. More discussion, some actual techniques and ideas being shared. The coffee industry will start to pay more attention to other industries. The winning routine at WBC will drive this idea home too.

5. More brewed coffee in the UK

I think that brewed coffee will continue to grow its market share. I say this without knowing what its current market share (if anyone has any data I’d love to see it.) Starbucks have long been the only chain in the UK to really do it properly. I think that the chains will join the independents in helping grow this market, though I think they’ll likely use it as a low cost, recession focused item whereas independents will be using it to produce higher value drinks.

Thoughts, comments and your predictions always very welcome in the comments!

I’ve wanted to write about the cappuccino on here for a long time, for a lot of different reasons. The way I’ve thought about the cappuccino has changed a great deal over the years, but what has really prompted this post is pure selfishness. It is much easier now, in London certainly, to get a great espresso. If you enjoy milk in your drink then likely the best thing you’ll find is a flat white. A good cappuccino still remains pretty hard to find, and as I discovered when I logged my coffee consumption, I drink quite a lot of them!

Cappuccinos have never really been cool. It’ll be a long time yet before the word stops conjuring everything we hate about espresso based drinks gone wrong: badly brewed espresso, scalding hot milk, a looming, wobbly peak of milk froth all lovingly smothered in cheap cocoa. Delicious, no?

Around the cappuccino there remains a great deal of myth. One to get out of the way quickly: the name for the drink has nothing to do with the hoods of monk’s robes, nor the bald spot on their head. The original name for the drink was a kapuziner, and it was a Viennese drink was the 19th Century. It was small brewed coffee mixed with milk or cream until it attained the particular shade of brown that matched the colour of the Capuchin monks’ robes. Essentially the name implies the strength of the drink. If you want a genuinely traditional cappuccino then don’t even bother firing up the espresso machine. ¹

This moves me onto the next frustration I have with myths of the modern cappuccino. The strange mystery of the rule of thirds. The rule of thirds is passed around to this day, and describes a traditional cappuccino as being a third espresso, a third milk and a third foam. I was taught this very early on, as were a good number of people reading this. It didn’t take long for the oddity of it to dawn on me. Are we saying then, that if a single espresso is 25ml then a single shot cappuccino ought to be 75ml total? Nonetheless I still see cappuccinos that are labelled as being traditional with a recipe of being a double shot in a six ounce cup. This certainly fulfils the rule of thirds, but outside of the last 5 years I’ve yet to find any evidence or history of a double shot six ounce cappuccino existing to give it any form of tradition. This doesn’t make this drink any less tasty – it is a very tasty drink done well – I am just saying that traditional isn’t really a word that is accurate in its description. Would one describe a 12oz cappuccino, with a double shot at the bottom pulled long to 4oz, as traditional? I’m not slavishly devoted to, nor infatuated with, tradition. I just think we ought to use the term appropriately.

I own a good number of coffee books, and I’ve gone through a lot of them. The first reference to the cappuccino recipe of thirds I’ve found was in the 50s and it was described as being “an espresso mixed with equal amounts of milk and foam.” This sentence appears, pretty much verbatim, a number of times. It is a little ambiguous as it could be saying that only the milk and foam are in equal quantities, or that all three are. So the recipe of 1:1:1 could easily be meant to be 1:2:2. The single shot, 5-6oz cappuccino does have a long tradition, and is incredibly easy to find through much of Italy and the parts of Europe that haven’t succumbed to more generous portions of coffee as retail. It is also, when done well, absolutely delicious.

I used to be a little resentful of cappuccinos, to tell the embarrassing truth, because they were really hard to pour nice latte art into. (Bearing in mind that for almost all of my coffee career I’ve worked for companies that didn’t have cups bigger than 6oz). Barista competition didn’t help. I was guilty, as most competitors are, of prioritising the six point box for appearance (latte art or traditional) over the 24 point box for taste. I’d keep the foam as close the 1cm line (that was then the minimum) as possible – despite this meaning I was adding more milk than necessary and diluting the espresso further. This spread into my coffee making outside of competition. I began to resent foam (for want of a better phrase) and the cappuccino as a result. When people would complain about the lack of foam I wouldn’t be receptive – I thought this implied being out of touch, old fashioned. The arrogance of youth….

This is not all coming to a conclusion where I detail out the perfect cappuccino (though I will share what I currently really enjoy) I’m all for interpretation and individual presentation. I’m also for differentiation and definition and all too often I see cappuccinos that are nearly identical in recipe to other drinks on the menu, and that in the hands of different staff the drinks become completely interchangeable. This is true across the entire coffee industry, regardless of city or nation, of independent or chain.

In an odd way this is a plea for foam. I love really well textured milk foam. I like a decent amount of it in my cappuccinos too. I am not ashamed of this, though a more youthful me might have been. I really don’t mind if all that can be poured in the top is a heart of maybe a tulip. I love Intelligentsia’s policy of no rosettas in cappuccinos. Latte art is a good thing, but it still carries more weight than it is worth.

Our aversion to foam has created our own worst customers. Every barista I know hates making “dry” cappuccinos. 9 out of 10 people who order one, when asked why they want a dry cappuccino, explain that they are sick of getting drinks that are basically caffe lattes with a little chocolate on top. The only way to get the amount of foam that they want (that they have found) is to order the cappuccino dry. If you don’t believe me then ask them yourself. (Not in an accusatory way, but be genuinely interested and they’ll be happy to tell you.)

So – my current cappuccino recipe. Be warned, it is detailed (though with tolerances).

- Brewed into and served in a 5oz (150-160ml) bowl shaped porcelain cup. ²
- 15 to 17g of espresso³
- 80-90g of milk, steamed to around 50-55C. ⁴
- The rest should be creamy, marshmallowy foam with bubbles so small they’re pretty much invisible. ⁵

I’m not going to label this “the perfect cappuccino” because that sort of thing makes me angry. It is just what I am really enjoying and I’d be interested to know what people think and what they are enjoying too. I suspect some people might take my thoughts about “traditional” cappuccinos above as an attack on their menu/store/brand/business. They are not. Hopefully it will generate a little discussion instead. Now don’t even get me started on flat whites….

1. If you don’t believe me, that’s ok – I haven’t linked to any information here to back up my claims. There is plenty of information but if you are genuinely interested in this then the person to speak to is Professor Jonathan Morris, who wrote The Cappuccino Conquests. More information is pretty easy to find with a minimum of google-fu.
2. No tulip cups, though they are easier to find in the smaller size.
3. One spout of a double basket, I am going to presume you’re making too because they ought to be shared, or the other espresso should be consumed to alleviate a lack of caffeination. This liquid dose is dependent on the amount of coffee brewed, so we’re going to say 20g of coffee, brewing time of approx 28s and an extraction of 19-20%
4. The cooler the better really. UPDATE – original post suggested 45C, which might be too cool for general enjoyment
5. This will give you a coffee strength of around 1.8-2.0% which means there is plenty of strength in your single shot coffee drink. Ironically an underextracted short double, in a 6oz cup without much foam isn’t much stronger than this – 2.0-2.4%

I didn’t expect to find some stages of coffee roasting to produce such unpleasant effects, or flavours in the cup. Just sniffing the cupping bowls was enough to put me off! Hard to describe, and once water hits it is very different to the aromas you’ll get when using the trier during the roast.

I think it is definitely a worthwhile experience. The only word of caution for those thinking about it is to do with grinding raw/barely roasted coffee. It is incredibly tough stuff, and I was glad to have a VTA6 running full speed to drop the coffee into!

I posted about the little experiment online and got an interesting tweet in response. I had a spare moment this evening, so I went upstairs and rebrewed everything to see what the numbers would say.

Each bowl was done at 60g/l and had the same grind and steep time. I then poured each bowl (rather messily I might add) through a dry v60 paper into another bowl to let it cool. (There is a certain joy in making an absolute mess doing this stuff, knowing there is no one to tell you off!)

I then measured each one in the Extract Mojo. A few very important points before we look at the graph. This is based on a single cupping bowl, and a single experiment. There is plenty of room for error here. Secondly – the refractometer measures the liquid’s refractive index. Software is required to convert this to a strength of coffee liquid. That software has not been created to do accurate calculations for green/barely roasted coffee so the data shouldn’t be considered accurate. (This should be considered no more serious than Tim and I experimenting with the K-ONE written up here!)

Also – I spilled a lot!

Even so – we get an interesting line:

Extraction in a cupping bowl versus roast time

I should add that the numbers (in terms of time) are not accurate and the final sample is more than a minute ahead of the one before it, perhaps explaining the leap. First crack is evident in the jump at around 11 minutes (I realise now this is actually 12 minutes as we’re missing a sample from earlier on – apologies!)

I haven’t tried this particular product (Nescafe Green blend), but having done this cupping today I am fairly sure that Nescafe may well have created something even more disgusting than their regular instant coffee. Impressive work….

There are, however, rare instances where I think it is entirely worth it and this is one of them. There is more information about the coffee on the product page, but we want to keep up the spirit of generosity of people like Aida Batlle and Gwilym and we want to raise as much money as we can.

You can read more about this coffee and what we are doing here. I hope you’ll consider buying a bag.

I’ve another post coming on why I blog, but this reason deserved a post in its own right.  A few days ago Shaun dropped me an e-mail about the Vinturi.  He’d played with it a little bit and thought it was interesting, and thought it might be something that would interest me. I admit I was curious – so I grabbed one from the UK website.  (Clicking through may help explain the image above!)

As I write this I confess I know very little about the science of aerating wine – feel free to point me in any link-based directions!  I didn’t know if it was specific to wine/alcoholic beverages with very volatile fractions, or whether it would affect coffee too.  I’m rather lucky in having Anette who is very good at tasting things – so I gave her several different brews split into pairs of cups, one aerated and one not.  Each time she said one cup tasted noticeably better, and it was the aerated one. As I was the one conducting the tests I’m rather biased, so feel free to discount this – but I thought the aerated cup was sweeter and had better clarity.

One obvious explanation would be that the aeration cooled the coffee, so comparatively it was the easier cup to taste – I should probably check how much temperature is lost (though I did preheat the Vinturi before doing it).  I am sure a slightly cooler brew would have an advantage, and a noticeable one at that, over the same hotter brew of the same coffee.  Simply pouring into a cooler cup could well create an advantage.  However the use of aeration in wine – which, again, I don’t understand yet – does intrigue me.

Yesterday we dropped some espresso through it, and it was interesting.  We then brewed an americano, skimmed it (for this is what crema skimming was truly made for) and then aerated it.  It was the best american I think I’ve ever had.¹ Perhaps I simply wanted it to be.

I am well aware you could pull the “Emperors New Clothes” card on this one – but I still think it warrants a little attention.  If people can come up with some experiments that will isolate the aeration then I’d be willing to try them and perhaps open the doors at work to people who want to take part in a little experiment too.

I will keep playing with it, and report back after a bit of reading on the science (if any) behind it all…

1. But I haven’t had that many, and I never really liked them to begin with!

London Gastronomy Seminars

This month is the second in the London Gastronomy Seminars series.  The title is “From plant to cup: flavour in coffee & wine” and I am presenting along with Jamie Goode.

Those of you into wine will know Jamie from wineanorak.com and his blog is great too.  I saw Jamie present a few months ago and I learned a great deal, and hugely enjoyed his presentation.  The bar is set high for me, and I am going to work hard to make my part of the presentation as interesting and useful as I can.

If you are in London then do come down, feel free to ask me awkward and difficult questions and drink some coffee and some wine!

From plant to cup: flavour in coffee and wine
21 January 2010, 7pm
Senate House, University of London (directions are here)
(Hosted by the Centre for the Study of the Senses, Institute of Philosophy, School of Advanced Study)

Tickets (£10)

SCAA Symposium

I’m also very excited about being involved in the SCAA Symposium this year.  I helped out in one of the workshops last year, but due to WBC commitments couldn’t get as involved as I would have liked.  This year’s event looks amazing and I am delighted to be attending.

I am taking part in the first session alongside some big names in coffee.  I hope I can bring something of value to the discussion! The program looks amazing and I look forward to catching up with a lot of people there.

See you at one of these soon I hope!

My predicitons were:

1. Coffee Packaging takes a step forward

Nothing here to report.  I don’t know if anyone has done anything interesting in 2009 with roasted coffee packaging but I certainly haven’t seen it, and I don’t think it has had an impact.  A poor prediction.

2. Improved Green Coffee Packaging

This is a tricky one.  I am sure that this year people have received record quantities of vac-packed, or grainpro packed coffee.  I know that a substantial amount of coffee that we’ve bought this year has come this way.  I also know that it leaves me conflicted over the amount of waste this packaging generates.  An OK, passable, but not great effort at prediction.

3.  Someone invents a grinder worth getting excited about.

Nope. Nothing here.  I know why, from an R&D cost Vs sales perspective, this hasn’t happened.  For some reason I guess I thought it just would.  A complete failure of a prediction.

4.  Decent Coffee Press in the UK.

I am going to claim this one.  You could argue that the quality of writing hasn’t been where it could be but I think this year we’ve seen unprecedented levels of coverage for speciality coffee – mostly in response to Gwilym’s win – but also covering the blossoming of London’s coffee culture.  I hope it continues.  A pretty successful prediction.

5.  Producing countries in the WBC Top 6.

Another utterly failed prediction.  Raul was just outside the top 6, and I think there was some surprise at who made the top 6 and who didn’t.  Nonetheless I can’t even vaguely claim this one as successful.

So…  Barely 1.5 out of 5 I reckon.  Not good work.  I shall have to try harder for my prediction for 2010, or just give up entirely!  I hope next time I don’t confuse speculation and prediction with wishful thinking!

The one interesting thing, in terms of me trying to salvage my credibility, are the two main predictions that I got wrong in 2008 – the rise of pressure profiling and increase in green coffee pricing – have somewhat come true in 2009.

There can be no argument on the pressure profiling front.  From the Slayer to Strada, but also to Cimbali’s rather impressive pressure profiling machine – the technology is now here and seems to have perhaps captured the interest of manufacturers more than baristas but I think it will continue to be incorporated into new machines.

As for green coffee – it may not yet have reached the peak of March 3rd but after a steep drop it is definitely back on the rise:

(couresy of Wolfram Alpha – the rather splendid search engine for this sort of thing.)

I’ll post my predictions for 2010 around New Year.

Back in 2006 I published a recommended reading list. Since that time my collection of books has (worryingly) increased so I thought I should probably update it. I could easily write a list of coffee books that one should avoid (having learned the hard way) but I suspect that would get me into rather a lot of trouble, so I shall leave that for now. I’ve broken it down into two parts and then down into sections, and have indicated which are nice to have, and which I would consider are essential on that subject.

I will try and keep this one updated – if you think I’ve missed something obvious then let me know.  I haven’t recommended books I don’t own, so this means some books may be missing that you would expect to see here.

This is quite a large post so if you want to skip down just click on the relevant section:

Part 1:

Espresso Preparation
Coffee History
Coffee Science
Coffee Origins

Part 2:

Coffee Growing
Coffee Roasting
Coffee Equipment
Hard to find/Rare Books

Espresso Preparaion

The Professional Barista’s Handbook – Scott Rao [Essential]

It often feels like no one is writing books on coffee any more, but this was a breath of fresh air. Detailed information on technique and theory, some new ideas well presented and written with an open mind.

Espresso Coffee: Professional Techniques – David Schomer [Essential]

I don’t think I know many coffee professionals who haven’t read this book. Whether you agree with some of his ideas, or his strict opinions on espresso preparation, you have to acknowledge the influence of both Schomer and his book. I read it twice through in one sitting when it first arrived, and it felt good to finally have a book that went some way to quenching my thirst for knowledge.

Technique may have moved on, but I think this will be a good and useful read for many more years.

Espresso Italiano Speciailist – Luigi Odello [Nice to have]

We often, as an industry, romanticise Italian Espresso while trying to do something totally different with our espresso set up. This is a great book for understanding where Italian Espresso is now, to get an idea of how it is seen and defined in Italy. There may be lots to disagree with, but there is also a lot of what we do put into better context.

Coffee History

Black Gold – Anthony Wild [Essential]

I will admit that this isn’t the liveliest book on coffee, and its approach to coffee trade and Fair Trade in particular are somewhat frustrating. To some extent it is a product of the time it was written in.

What makes this book valuable is the quality of research that went into it. This wasn’t a case of the author just spouting and regurgitating coffee’s history. Myths are debunked, accurate dates and events are given. This was particularly useful for me when trying to understand the real timeline for coffee’s spread across the globe – as both drink and crop.

Heavy reading but worth it.

Uncommon Grounds – Mark Pendergrast [Essential]

Very much a US-centric history of coffee, but nonethless still very interesting. Valuable again due to the quality of its research and the fact that the author came to clearly know and love his subject.

The Coffee-House: A Cultural History – Markman Ellis [Nice to have]

There are a number of good books on the coffeehouses of old – I also particularly like Anthony Clayton’s london centric one, as well as Ulla Heise’s more general book on European ones. This is a great overview, even if there is a little bit more detail in other texts. The coffee house society is something I find particularly fascinating, perhaps because I’d like to see a lot of that culture make a return!

Also recommended:

The Devil’s Cup – Stewart Lee Allen

Coffee – H.E. Jacob

Coffee Science

Espresso Coffee: The Science of Quality – Viani & Illy [Essential]

No great surprise here, but then no one has published anything that is both as broad and concise. A great wealth of information on coffee and espresso, from agronomy to roasting to tasting. And this is just the stuff the chose to publish – have no doubts that there is plenty they aren’t releasing. An amazing company, no matter what you think of the coffee. (Assuming you’ve had it fresh!)

Coffee: Recent Developments – Clarke & Vitzthum [Essential]

Following on from the Illy book, this is a pretty hardcore text but I consult it often when looking for specific research. It covers everything from instant coffee to espresso (though is woefully light on other brewing methods). It briefly appeared on Scribd but I think it has disappeared since.

Coffee Flavor Chemistry – Ivon Flament [Nice to have]

The title is at once completely accurate and slightly misleading. This book is essentially a reference text cataloguing the individual aromatic compounds found in both green and roasted coffee. It should be deeply boring, and I suppose it is. I am amazed, however, at both the range of compounds that smell similar as well as the baffling complexity of coffee. Sometimes the extra detail on how they identified which compound, or in which coffee it is often found is very interesting. If pictures of aldehydes sound like a terrible thing then this book is best avoided.

Coffee Volumes 1-6 – R.J.Clarke [Nice to have]

I spent a very long time looking for the complete collection of these 6 books, and if you see anywhere for under £300 then I would advise buying it for no other reason than it would be a great investment. (I am grateful to a blog reader who kindly sent me a link to a scandalously cheap collection). A huge collection of information on just about every aspect of coffee (the volumes are titled, in order: Chemistry, Technology, Physiology, Agronomy, Related Beverages & Commercial and Technological Aspects)

It is perhaps a little outdated, but I still find a great deal of valuable information inside them and I’ve barely dipped a toe.

Coffee Origins

Cafe De El Salvador, Land of Coffee [Essential]

I had to debate whether to put this one in under essential, but as it is my favourite book on origin then I think I have to. I am not sure of the best place to buy this – if anyone has a link please let me know.

I may be a sucker for El Salvador but I think this is one of the most beautifully photographed books on coffee growing, as well as the most detailed. It covers each of El Salvadors growing regions well – in a way that makes me wish I had a book like this for every producing country.

The History of Coffee in Guatemala – Regina Wagner [Essential]

Much like the previous book I wish there were one of these for every producing country.  The level of detail in the history of Guatemalan coffee is superb.

Brown Gold – Andrew Uribe C. [Nice to have]

This probably belongs in the rare and hard to find section, but I do think it is a great book. Written over 50 years ago it offers amazing insight into the world of coffee at that time. The photos are pretty amazing too, but you can ignore the recipes thrown in at the end – I assume they were to make the book more saleable at the time.

Look for Part 2 before new year.  Comments, recommendations or thoughts welcome!

I wish I could have wandered around Vienna for longer, in the end I only had a chance to pop into one coffee house – Hawelka – and those places are just no fun unless you have an afternoon to kill with a newspaper and an unusual desire for large quantities of whipped cream with your coffee.  They are possibly less fun if you are looking for an excellent shot of straight espresso, but I didn’t sample enough to know where local expectation lay, and how my own preferenes would fit into that.

The day after the awards was the symposium.  I don’t mind confessing that I felt a bit like the odd one out again – the speakers and fellow attendees came from Europe’s larger coffee companies and manufacturers.  However I am always interested in how that section of the industry views things, what is important, what their challenges are and what I can learn from them.

First up in the day was Jim Slater – the marketing director for Costa Coffee.  For those of you reading in the UK you’ll no doubt have noticed that Costa have pushed their marketing very hard this year.  Whether it is the “7 out of 10 Coffee Lovers prefer Costa” campaign, through to news stories about insuring their head cupper’s tongue for £1m, to more recent ads talking about their coffee being “Handmade by Baristas and Not Button Pushers”.

One thing that Jim said that really stuck was talking about the need to agitate the market.  I think that really is a perfect word for what is necessary.  Agitation is as much about movement, preventing stagnation, as it is about irritation.  You can’t really argue that those adverts agitate the industry.

Compared to the rest of the industry the Speciality Coffee sector has comparatively little budget/muscle when it comes to advertising and marketing.  However we should ask if what we are doing is agitating the industry and the public sufficiently.  I am not saying that we need to turn around and start throwing muck, start name calling and trying to pick on the rest of the industry.  Are we being too nice, too hopeful that people want to listen to our very specific message, rather than talking up traceability in a way that makes people question why the exact origin of the coffee they drink has been obscured. ².

To and from Vienna I consumed Made to Stick, which is a fun read on why some ideas stick and some don’t.  Simplicity of message is a key part of it, and it has made me think more about trying to condense down to a minimum number of words, with a maximum impact, what my business/speciality coffee does to distinguish itself.  This, combined with a goal of agitating the industry, is great for giving me direction and a goal.

That aside – I only managed to stay until just after lunch before having to hop on a flight back.  It was interesting to hear Paul Ettinger from Caffe Nero talk about their challenges and goals, and also to see their figures (they are a private company so rarely give much detail).  He, quite worryingly, mentioned an interest in facial recognition software to help baristas remember customers and their drinks.  I couldn’t quite tell if he was being serious.

Darcy Willson-Rhymer talked about Starbucks’  areas of focus.  They believe the shift in customer’s value expectations will last long after we’ve recovered from the recession.  He mentioned some new UK concepts would be unveiled soon, though I don’t think they will be anywhere near as radical as the 15th Avenue experiment.

I wish I had stayed for the Fair Trade debate – apparently it got quite juicy, and rumour has it that Fair Trade didn’t come out of it as well as they would have liked.  Anyone with more info please let me know!

1. Outstanding Contribution to the European Coffee Industry 2009
2. On a side note I’ve been thinking about how traceability could really be the best indicator of quality available, simply because the extra cost and work of keeping a lot separate is only likely to be done if that coffee is going to be able to fetch the higher price it needs to based on its cup quality – a discussion for another day perhaps

However, it is probably a bit of a rant.

There was much discussion on Twitter the other day (I know, that sentence still seems awkward and embarrassing to me too) about naturally processed coffees.  The discussion had started about how everyone seemed to be ignoring washed coffees from Yirgacheffe, having become distracted by the naturals – often the microlots from Beloya and Aricha. ¹

The problem wasn’t so much that people weren’t excited by washed Yirgacheffe coffees – more that these new darlings of the coffee industry contained flavours that many would consider defective.  Reading this I began to worry in an odd sort of way about our approach to coffee, as well as our approach to the consumer. ²

Firstly – I get why people really don’t like some naturally processed coffees.  There are undeniably strong fruit flavours within them but often the wild, barnyard, almost manure quality will deter some seasoned coffee tasters and amateurs alike.  Where I think we run into difficulty is when we start thinking how a coffee from Yirgacheffe ought to taste.  Granted – we want any coffee to taste clean (I hope – more on this in a second), but our expectations can start to work against us quite quickly.  When it comes to being a professional taster (outside of the realm of coffee) you can start to lose value when you stop tasting as objectively as possible and start to develop “oughts” – i.e. how things ought to taste.

However, I think if we focus on the negatives of the natural process then we close of some potential.  A lot of people love the quantity of fruit flavours you get in the cup, and they are extremely accessible to anyone tasting coffee.  That potential interests and excites me.

A quick aside on the natural process, and all processing in general.  Their roots are not in flavour development.  The natural processed is favoured in areas where access to large quantities of clean water is limited, and it is therefore most effective way of processing the coffee.  It is also the cheapest so lower quality/unripes will often be processed that way.  The wet process became the preferred process for speciality coffees not because of the increased acidity, or cleaner body, but because it resulted in a much lower rate of defective beans.  If your coffee is going to be worth more because you did a better job of cultivating it then you want to minimise damage post harvest.

Only relatively recently have people begun to explore the potentials of each processing method, and these Ethiopian microlots and other microlots of natural processed coffees are really just baby steps.  Processing great coffee this way is risky, and few producers are capable of taking the financial hit should something go wrong.  However, I’ve been lucky enough to taste a couple of naturals this year that really feel like a progression.  I look forward to cupping them more now they’ve landed, but one in particular made me very excited.  If we can experiment and improve this processes, and end up with something that is super clean but tastes nothing like “coffee” then isn’t this worth exploring?  Maybe it will amount to nothing, maybe it will turn out to be the emperors new clothes, but surely as an industry we have to pay attention to coffees that excite and interest so many people even if we don’t like them ourselves.

I don’t particularly like most coffees from Indonesia.  I find the earthier tones they have off putting.  However, lots of people really like them.  It does take a certain kind of arrogance for me to presume that what I like is somehow better/more correct/superiour than what someone else likes. ³  My subjective experience is more correct and important than someone else’s?  It frustrates me that, as a cupper, I just switch off when I hit a table of Indonesian coffees – because I don’t like any of them I am poor at distinguishing which might be appealing to people who like them.  I don’t do very well at finding the better one and I think that is a failure on my part. ⁴

I will, however, keep cupping tables of coffees from Indonesia because there is great potential there.  Whichever way you look at it there is potential – amazing soil, some interesting varieties and, if nothing else, huge potential gains to be made with better processing controls.  If we, as an industry, were to walk away from coffees like that now then we wouldn’t give them a real chance.  This would be a terrible shame.

1. I am aware that it really start with the discussion of the rather disturbing word “Beloyagasm” but that is kind of beside the point
2. It should be added that if twitter could work out a way to nicely present a conversation amongst multiple users then I would be very happy!
3. I do concede that it takes a certain type of arrogance to run a blog too, full of videos of myself, but that isn’t the point!
4. Another reason I am very grateful to work with Anette, who has a great objective palate.