Distinctive coffee origins like Kenya don’t so much display single dominating notes as they do dominating tendencies. These sensory tendencies may be shifting and complex, yet are generally recognizable. They are a set of possibilities that individual coffees riff on.

You could say that this month’s best Kenyas, particularly those reviewed here at 92 or better, all express in varying ways a sort of paradox, a simultaneous lush seduction and invigorating challenge. The seduction comes in the depth, the sweetness, the chocolate, the hints of flowers, the smooth mouthfeel and general balance. The challenge comes somewhere in the heart of a pungent, twisty, sometimes dry, sometimes tart fruit. The favorite descriptor in the coffee industry for the pungent/sweet fruit characteristic of fine Kenyas is “black currant,” a reference to the piquant-tasting berry most often encountered in jams, in crème de cassis liqueur and as an element in savory-sweet sauces. In fine Kenyas, the black currant can be the center of a constellation that includes sweet tomato notes and various citrus suggestions like tangerine and blood orange. Complicating the black currant constellation may be savory-tending herb- and incense-like hints.

This paradox of sweet seduction and invigorating pungency is what makes classic Kenyas particularly attractive to aficionados and dedicated black coffee drinkers, less so perhaps to casual coffee drinkers. Nevertheless, there is plenty of seduction in all of this month’s reviewed coffees, starting with the very distinctive, yet balanced and complete, Giv COFFEE Embu Gakui Peaberry and Willoughby’s Kenya AA Kigwandi Estate, both topping this month’s ratings at 95.

No Dumbing-Down this Year

True, some of the Kenyas we cupped for this month’s article were riffing on a different tune — you could call it the tune of general high-grown Arabica mediocrity. In some cases the character of the coffee seemed muted by careless roasting, but in other cases it appeared that the green coffee was simply an ordinary, rather simple, high-grown washed coffee without much character of any kind, including Kenya character. This is the great bogeyman for Kenya lovers, of course: that the planting of new high-yielding, disease-resistant hybrids like the sinister-sounding Ruiru 11 and the more recently developed Batian, plus potential labor-saving shortcuts in the generally flawless Kenya processing methods, may turn one of the world’s great and distinctive coffee origins into just another shrinking source of decent but characterless high-grown Arabica.

However, whether owing to stubborn adherence to tradition on the part of aging Kenya producers, or the continuing effectiveness of a Kenya auction system designed to reward quality and distinction, or the knowledge and determination of exporters and importers coupled with savvy sourcing from the best small American roasting companies, there was not much sign — if any — of the widely anticipated dumbing-down of Kenya among the samples in this month’s testing.

The SL28 and SL34 Factor

It’s even possible that the fear of Ruiru 11 has been exaggerated by specialty-coffee buyers. On the other hand, the distinctive and crucial character of the old, Bourbon-derived, Kenya-naturalized SL28 and SL34 varieties appears to be supported by this cupping. Nearly all of the high-rated samples tested for this month’s article were attributed mainly to trees of these two celebrated varieties, though often with an admission that there was also a little Ruiru 11 in the mix. Prompted by the recent interest among producers worldwide in exploring distinctive-tasting coffee varieties, SL28 has been planted elsewhere in the coffee world, although not enough of it has reached the market to judge how well it maintains its character in terroirs other than those in south-central Kenya. We did review an SL28 sample from the Kona region of Hawaii (Hula Daddy Laura’s Reserve SL28, December 2014) which cupped very much like a fine Kenya and attracted a stellar rating of 94.

On the other hand, one top-rated coffee among those reviewed here came from a mix of varieties, none of which was SL28 or SL34. The 92-rated Abundancia Kenya Blue Mountain Ruita I AA also was unusual in a couple of other respects: It came from the little-known Kisii or Gusii growing district in southwestern Kenya, near Lake Victoria, and was imported and roasted for the American market in Portland by a Kenyan farming family. Not only are most of the high-rated Kenyas we review produced from trees of the SL28 and SL34 varieties, but virtually all also come from the traditional growing regions in south-central Kenya, roughly in the area between Nairobi and Mt. Kenya. Interestingly, despite its difference from more typical fine Kenyas in regard to both traditional variety and terroir, this Kenya, though more gently stated than most of the others to which we assigned high ratings, still showed clear Kenya character, including a rather explicit black currant note.

The post Coffees of Kenya 2015: Still Great, Still Kenya appeared first on Coffee Review.

Observation one: Most decaffeinated coffees continue to be bad, in some cases close to foul. Not only are the sensory profiles flattened and simplified by the brutality of the decaffeination process, but this process often adds mysterious flavor notes to the cup for which the ordinary coffee lexicon has no words. Some of the words we came up with this month for decaf-processing taints: alfalfa in a hot barn, ripe mulch, rotten wood, sour nut, faintly chocolaty algae. In some cases these disturbing flavor notes seem compounded by careless roasting – decaffeinated coffees are notoriously difficult to roast.

Observation two: On the other hand, great coffees clearly can survive and transcend the rigors of decaffeination. Four decafs from this month’s cupping attracted ratings ranging from 89 to an impressive 93; all four are reviewed here. This month’s top-rated Old Soul Decaf Ethiopia Sidamo (93) delivered an engaging version of the intricacy and exuberance of a fine Ethiopia dried-in-the-fruit or “natural” coffee, its beauty only slightly muted by the rigors of decaffeination. Similarly, the PT’s Mexico Decaf (92) was a lovely, lyric, gently bright cup of the style we associate with the best coffees of Mexico.

We can offer no conclusive reasons why these two coffees so convincingly beat the decaffeination odds, except to report that out of this month’s tiny sampling of thirteen American specialty decafs, all of the best samples were decaffeinated by the water-only method at the Descamex plant in Mexico, were branded as either “Mountain Water Decaf” or “Royal Select Water Decaf,” and perhaps most importantly, were freshly decaffeinated and just delivered to the roasters. By comparison, two “Swiss Water Processed” samples from the famous Vancouver, Canada plant struck us as faded and decaf-tainted, either because of the impact of the decaffeination or perhaps because the decaffeinated green beans had languished too long in the warehouse. Four additional tested samples presumably were decaffeinated using one of the old-fashioned, cheaper (though never publicized) processes that use solvents to remove the caffeine. These samples also were unimpressive, although one – the Starbucks Decaf Pike Place Roast – produced a decent if rather unorthodox cup that we review here at 84.

Don’t Ask Us for Decafs

Observation three: It appears that most high-end specialty roasters know that their decaffeinated coffees are not impressive. We can make this assumption because we received only seven unsolicited samples for this article instead of the thirty or more we usually receive when we test regular, non-decaffeinated coffees.

To fill out this month’s testing we purchased six additional decaffeinated coffees from stores close to our lab. These included three samples from very large, corporate specialty companies, all most likely decaffeinated by methods using solvents. Two of these large-specialty-roaster samples were listless and mildly decaf-tainted; the third was the odd though passable Starbucks Decaf Pike Place Roast reviewed here at 84. Two additional water-decaffeinated samples purchased from small, presumably hip roasters did not impress. The sixth of our purchased samples came from a roaster that hasn’t figured out yet whether it is going to be massive and corporate or stay somewhat neighborly and cool; this sample (decaffeinated by an unnamed water-only process) disappointed as well.

Switch-Hitting Espressos

Observation four: Decaffeinated coffees frequently are espresso blends that roasting companies pitch as “all around” blends that will satisfy consumers regardless of whether they are prepared as espresso or brewed coffee. Generally we found that this hybrid strategy does not work in favor of the brewed-coffee drinker. Only one of this month’s four successful samples, the 89-rated Olympia Asterisk Decaf, was plugged by the roaster as a switch-hitting espresso/brewed coffee.

Observation five: All of the preceding adds up to a picture of a specialty industry that continues to avoid taking decaffeinated coffee seriously. If two decaffeinated coffees out of the thirteen we tested for this month’s article glowed with clean, classic grace and elegance, I don’t see why we can’t have many more doing the same. I suspect decaf drinkers are so beaten down by mediocrity that they don’t even complain when they buy a half-pound of coffee that tastes like “faintly chocolaty algae,” to quote one of our tasting notes.

Afterword: Decaffeinated Futility through the Decades

Some quotes from previous Coffee Review articles on decaffeinated coffees:

March 2000:

The last time I wrote on decaffeinated coffees I said drinking them was like listening to good music through cheap speakers. The analogy still stands.

July 2002:

The fact that I asked over fifteen roasters to send me decaffeinated coffees for review and only a handful actually did is one indication of how little interest roastmasters and coffee managers take in decaffeinated coffees.

March 2008:

Returning to the question of whether decaf drinkers are well-served by the specialty industry, I find the limited number of single-origin options available to decaffeinated coffee drinkers rather discouraging. I hope the reason is owing to honest economic reasons (limited interest in decaffeinated single-origins among consumers) rather than to the rather macho-tinged dismissal of decaffeinated coffees one often runs into among specialty coffee green buyers and roasters.

July 2010:

I am a positive thinker when it comes to coffee, but this month’s sampling of fifty decaffeinated blends from thirty of North America’s finest specialty roasters tested my optimism. … This month’s results suggest that the North American specialty industry continues to underperform when it comes to producing decaffeinated coffees intended for non-espresso brewing methods like drip and French press.

Oh well.

The post Decafs 2015: The Splendid, The Strange, The Listless appeared first on Coffee Review.

Single-origin coffees even have come to prevail in the espresso arena, where common wisdom has long argued that the espresso method’s tendency to intensify sensory characteristics calls for the restraint, completeness and balance best achieved by blending.

Why Blend?

Given the potential for excitement and connoisseurship afforded by fine single-origin coffees, what reasons are there to continue to blend? In considering that question, let’s set aside marketing reasons, like creating and branding a proprietary blend that develops its own loyal following, or purely economic reasons, like cutting costs by blending cheaper, less distinctive, sometimes faded beans with more distinctive, expensive and fresher ones.

Sticking to more idealistic blending goals, the most idealistic of all is combining one or more coffees to create a new, striking sensory sensation that has never existed before in quite the same way. Some of the twenty-eight blends we tested for this article appeared to be aimed at that lofty goal, although two of the best took inspiration from a very traditional source: the world’s oldest blend, the ancient Mocha-Java. Both the top-scoring, 94-rated Modern Times Black House and the 92-rated Paradise Coffee Romance by Paradise combined a distinguished traditionally processed Sumatra in place of the original Java with a “natural” or dried-in-the-fruit coffee from southern Ethiopia in place of the original Yemen Mocha.

The Black House was an exceptional example of this pairing, fusing an apparent deep-toned resonance from the Sumatra with a lively juicy presence from the cleanly fruity natural Ethiopia. The similar Mocha-Java-themed Romance by Paradise was a bit darker roasted, and the general structure of the cup drier, brisker and more pungent, with attractive baker’s chocolate and tartly sweet grapefruit notes.

The whimsically named Don Pepe’s Excellent Adventure from Temple Coffee (93) ambitiously combined a sort of junior-varsity version of the rare, expensive Gesha/Geisha variety of Arabica (tagged “Baby Geisha” because it was produced from still-not-mature Geisha trees) with a presumably grown-up dried-in-the-fruit Ethiopia, a very good one, the Boke Ethiopia Grade 1 Natural. The Gesha makes its fragrant floral, cocoa and sandalwood presence felt, though rather timidly. But approached with patience, a subtly intricate blend, dry yet sweet, briskly floral, quietly exotic. Those who like bitters-based cocktails may particularly enjoy it.

The Geisha Coffee Roasters Naturals Special Blend (90) doubled down on dried-in-the-fruit coffees, roasting them rather dark to net a chewy, syrupy cup that lacked vivacity but impressed with sheer weight and presence.

Aiming at the Agreeable

Most of the other blends we tested did not seem to be aiming at creating something striking or remarkable, however. Rather, the goal seemed to be softening and rounding individuality, creating a sensory profile that most coffee drinkers will find attractive, yet almost none will find off-putting or offensive. Remember that many single-origin coffees can be startling in their intensity or individuality. One can imagine a casual coffee drinker innocently buying a very high-grown Kenya or Colombia, for example, and ending shocked or even physically disturbed by their bright, acidy intensity. Or feeling bewildered and put off by the perfumy floral notes of a wet-processed Yirgacheffe, or baffled by the fruit-and-brandy character of a dried-in-the-fruit Central America or Ethiopia.

This second, quite legitimate goal – the creation of an attractive profile that will please nearly everyone while offending almost no one – seemed to motivate the designers of the majority of the twenty-eight blends we tested for this article. The best of these blends generated a pleasing though rather predictable profile: medium- or light-roasted, balanced, with a crisp but softly or delicately bright acidity, satisfying sweetness, lightly viscous mouthfeel (satiny or silky) and a clean though quiet finish. There were engaging differences among these deftly middle-ground productions, but subtle differences.

For example, the GivCoffee Sari’s Backyard blend (92; composed of three Africa coffees), was sweet and hinted at a layered complexity; the Roast House Ride the Edge blend (91) showed distinct floral and sweet citrus nuance. The Tony’s Homestead Blend, the PT’s Flatlander Signature Blend, the Reunion Island Reserve Blend (all at 91), were all in their respective ways gentle, sweet-toned and balanced; you could say the Tony’s showed some sweet citrus and baker’s chocolate, the Flatlander a surprisingly elegant floral top note we decided to call violet, and the Reunion Island Reserve showed, well, just fine balance and a clean, straightforward coffee expression.

The Summer Factor?

It occurred to us that the delicate, balanced, sweetly-bright-but-not-too-bright tendency among many of the best of these blends may owe something to the season. It is summer, after all, at least it is here in the States and in East Asia where these blends were created, and a remarkable number of them invited descriptors like refreshing, summery or meadowy.

Too, some of these blends may be year-round staple offerings designed around building stability throughout the changing seasons of the coffee year rather than making distinct seasonal statements. They may be designed to balance southern hemisphere, summer-harvested coffees with northern hemisphere, winter-harvested coffees, for example. In these cases, again, balance and the relative absence of distinction or strong gestures can be read as a sign of success at maintaining the difficult goal of year-round consistency.

The nine blends we review here, of course, were among the best of the twenty-eight we tested. (Altogether, fourteen of the twenty-eight scored 90 or better.) We also slogged through blends that would best be described as neutral or muted rather than balanced, plus a couple of others that came close to missing the good coffee boat entirely owing to some shadow taint or mild roasting fault. In these cases perhaps the business reasons behind blending I cited earlier were in play: Roasters were getting rid of faded coffees that were hanging around the warehouse too long, or cutting costs with bargain green coffees.

The post Blends 2015: Quietly Agreeable with Some Fireworks appeared first on Coffee Review.

But then, a few months ago, Starbucks opened its palatial Reserve Roastery in Seattle, a spectacular answer to the challenge of the growing swarm of its newer, more-authentic-than-thou competitors. The new Seattle Roastery appears to be intended as a full-on counter-attack: “OK, we may have 21,000 locations worldwide and roast a zillion pounds of coffee per year, and we may be huge and corporate,” this facility seems to say, “but we are still a true coffee company, and what you guys can do, we can do as well or better.”

The facility and its operations reflect most current tastes and trends in high-end coffee with impressive perception and intelligence. The plant and its demonstration-style layout illustrate fine coffee production with an almost museum-like thoroughness. The visual design is impressive, tactfully interpreting current tastes with materially rich understatement: cupper, leather, fine woods. The green coffees are precisely sourced and described. The coffee in the tasting room is brewed by the cup using the visitor’s choice of brewing method, from Chemex through siphon.

Bigger than the other guys, certainly, and more discreetly spectacular for sure. But what about the coffees?

Upstairs and Downstairs

The Seattle Reserve Roastery coffee production takes place on two levels. On the upper level a smaller roasting machine produces smaller batches of well-selected, very high-end, often micro-lot coffees that are sold in bulk only to walk-in customers at the Roastery. On the lower level a considerably larger roasting machine produces larger batches of outstanding, if somewhat less rare, coffees. These larger volume coffees are packed in state-of-the-art atmosphere-protected valve bags and (unlike coffees from the smaller roasting machine on the upper level), are available for purchase both via the Internet and at other Starbucks locations. They bear a “best by” date eight months out from roasting.

We tested five coffees from the elite small-volume upstairs operation, and three from the larger-volume downstairs operation. The five presumably rarer “upstairs” coffees were purchased at the Roastery (the only place to purchase them); the “downstairs” coffees were purchased via the Internet. Interestingly, there were broad differences in average degree or darkness of roast between the “upstairs” scooped coffees and the “downstairs” valve-bag coffees. But more on that later.

Benchmarking the Starbucks

In order to put these eight Starbucks Counterattack coffees in context, we decided to cup them side-by-side next to a range of coffees purchased from three similar (though more modest) demonstration roastery operations of the kind that helped fuel the trends that the Starbucks Reserve Roastery is imitating and out-scaling. To that end we purchased four coffees from an in-store roastery in Berkeley, California operated by Allegro Coffee (a subsidiary of Whole Foods Market), four samples from the Oakland, California roastery of Blue Bottle Coffee, and three from Coffee Review advertiser Victrola Coffee, whose modest roastery-café is located across the street from the grand new Starbucks facility. All were purchased in person, in-store except the Victrola samples, which we arranged to have sent to us. (However, all of the Victrola samples were pulled from stock available to walk-in customers on the day they were shipped). All samples, including the Starbucks, were roast-dated on the bags and quite fresh when we cupped them.

The Difference: The Roast

So how did the Starbucks Reserve coffees match up with the coffees from these three similar but smaller, longer-established, more modestly housed competitors?

The big difference (surprisingly for me) was in the roast. The Blue Bottle, Allegro and Victrola coffees all were light-to-medium roasted. In other words, they were roasted in the currently fashionable style: light enough to allow the character of the green coffee to dominate the profile. On the other hand, the Starbucks coffees were all, to varying degrees, darker-roasted. The impact of the roast tended to be foregrounded, not the green coffee.

Of course, you may think, that makes sense. Starbucks is a dark-roasting company. But in fact it is not one any longer. It has featured its “Blonde” medium roasts for some time now next to its traditional darker roasts. More importantly, the new Seattle Reserve Roastery is clearly an attempt to compete with a whole generation of new competitors, all of whom roast lighter.

To sum up: The spectacle of the roasting and brewing at the new Starbucks facility thoughtfully reflects current trends. The green coffee selection and description reflect current trends. What flat out goes against current trends are the darker roast styles.

Dark but Inconsistently So

If the roast styles chosen for this new line of coffees were just a little darker than the latest light-roasting trend I would applaud Starbucks for giving consumers an option they don’t really have very much of at present, which is a moderately dark-roasted, sweet, chocolaty cup with a good deal of the character of the green coffee preserved and just a hint of roast taste. In other words, something that strikes a balance between the bright fruit, honey and flowers of definitively lighter roasts and the bittersweetness of uncompromising dark roasts.

At this point that option is not much available to consumers, at least not as applied to the best green coffees. The marketplace seems polarized between aggressive dark roasts and uncompromising lighter roasts.

And, in fact, three of the new Starbucks reserve coffees we cupped for this article did come close to landing in that middle ground: the rare, expensive, prize-winning Brazil Sitio Baixadao (reviewed here at 92), the Kenya Sangana (reviewed here at 90) and the Tanzania Kimuli (rated 90, not reviewed).

However, the other five of the eight Reserve samples we tested were not roasted moderately dark. They were roasted quite dark, and apparently irrationally so. The Hawaii 100% Kona Perry Farm, a coffee whose simplicity and balance would seem to call for sensitive roasting, was subjected to a nuance-destroying dark roast. It is reviewed here at 87. Another presumably subtle coffee, and probably a very good one, the Brazil Sertãozinho, was treated even worse in the roaster.

Although final roast colors were on an average darker with the “downstairs” Reserve Roastery samples, overall there was no discernible pattern to which coffees were brought to a moderately dark roast and which were roasted definitively (and often tactlessly) dark. In a facility in which every detail, even the cups in the tasting room, has been lavished with thought and attention, the roasting act, perhaps the most important determinant of coffee character and quality after the green coffee itself, appears haphazard and arbitrary. And, from a consumer’s perspective, unpredictable.

Lighter-Roasted and Higher-Rated

One thing was clear, however. The eleven coffees we purchased from the three smaller Starbucks competitors all rated better than the Starbucks did. Much better. They all were roasted light or medium-light, they all were roasted consistently, and they all were roasted well.

Average Scores:

Starbucks Reserve: 88.25

Allegro Coffee: 92.0

Blue Bottle Coffee: 92.0

Victrola Coffee: 94.0

However, if we only include in our comparison the three Starbucks samples that were roasted moderately dark rather than full-on dark, their average would be 91.0 – only a point lower than the Allegro and Blue Bottle averages. Which suggests to me, again, that the Roastery Reserve program is buying excellent coffees, but subjecting them to what would appear to be arbitrary roast profiling, a profiling not related to either the potential of the green coffees or to coherent positioning in the marketplace.

In the reviews associated with this report, we review the highest- and lowest-rated coffees from each of the three Starbucks competitors – Allegro, Blue Bottle and Victrola – plus the two highest-rated and two of the lowest-rated of the eight Starbucks samples.

Spectacle or Coffee?

I hope that Starbucks Reserve management gets a handle on the roasting, and begins to handle it as coherently and deliberately as it has everything else about its impressive new facility. Otherwise Starbucks could be accused, justifiably I think, of caring more about the marketing spectacle of its amazing Roastery than about the quality and character of the coffee that Roastery produces.

The post New Starbucks Reserve Coffees appeared first on Coffee Review.

On the other hand, when the components of a blend are openly disclosed, as they are in the twenty blends we tested for this article, the goal of blending is partly stripped of its branding and cost-savings functions. It becomes more clearly a creative sensory act, aimed at creating a coffee experience that has never existed before in quite the same way, one in which hopefully the sensory whole of the blend transcends the contributions of its parts. This is an idealistic coffee goal, but a worthy one.

Farther long in this piece I discuss some the trends and strategies suggested by the selection of green coffees in the blends we tested. But what I had not quite anticipated was how evocative overall these twenty blends would be in mapping some of the larger trends and polarizations in contemporary espresso blend design, at least as they are playing out in North America with a short detour through one coffee-loving East Asian country, Taiwan.

Co-Taster Ethan Hill, Barista Benjamin Roberts and the La Marzocco Lab

My co-taster for this survey was Ethan Hill, Head of Production at Victrola Coffee. (Victrola Coffee did not have coffees involved in the tasting, of course.) Ethan is a licensed Q-grader who proved to be an experienced and incisive taster and describer of espresso. See the end of this article for Ethan’s impressive bio. We conducted the tasting at the La Marzocco North America laboratory in Seattle, Washington, with shots pulled by the very experienced Victrola barista, Benjamin Roberts. We ended up tasting twenty “open source” espresso blends, seventeen from leading North American roasters ranging from very large to very small, and three from Taiwan-based roasting companies. We sourced over thirty blends, but were forced to limit our tasting to twenty owing to time constraints. Some blends we eliminated because roasters did not send us the minimum of sixteen ounces we need to calibrate the grinder, produce the shots, and take roast color readings afterwards. In other cases we made arbitrary inclusions or exclusions based on how interesting or original the blends sounded based on their constituent coffees.

The Crucial Starbucks Entry

One blend we did include was extremely important, I think, in understanding the entire exercise: the Starbucks Reserve Pantheon Blend No.1. This is a flagship blend roasted in very limited quantities on the small-batch roasting machine prominently displayed on the top level of the spectacular new Starbucks Reserve Roastery facility in Seattle. Like almost everything else involved in the new Starbucks showplace roastery, the Pantheon Blend displays a detailed, almost textbook-like understanding of the latest trends in specialty coffee. The Pantheon is clearly intended as a transparent, open-source blend of the newer kind. The blend name itself implies that this is the first in a series of seasonal blends (Pantheon Blend No. 1; presumably as green coffee opportunities change through the year we will have Pantheon Blends No. 2, No. 3, and so on). Furthermore, the constituents of this version #1 are revealed in considerable detail, in some cases in more detail than revealed by some of the smaller and presumably trendier roasters that produced other blends in the tasting.

Revelation by Contrast

However, as it turned out, the Starbucks blend differed in one dramatic way from all the other nineteen blends we tested: It was darker roasted than any of the others. Not nearly as dark roasted as some Starbucks coffees, but considerably darker roasted than any of the other nineteen samples in our tasting.

And by its mildly roasty presence in the mix the Pantheon Blend dramatized through contrast how relatively bright and high-toned most other high-end North American espresso blends have become in recent years. High-toned brightness obviously can be promoted in a couple of ways; first through a lighter roast style and second through incorporating bright, acidy coffees into blends: bright, floral wet-processed coffees from Ethiopia were one of the favorites in this set of blends, for example, as were wet-processed coffees from a variety of origins in Latin America. Balancing these brighter coffees were everyone’s favorite for achieving smoothness in espresso blends: nutty, chocolaty dried-in-the-fruit or “natural” coffees from Brazil. But also very important in many of these blends were the fruitier, sweeter style of dried-in-the-fruit coffees, particularly those from Ethiopia, which tend to add a juicy, sometimes slightly fermenty fullness to espresso blends. Now and then a robust, presumably earth- or cedar-toned wet-hulled Sumatra put in an appearance as a foil to the brighter wet-processed coffees, but there were far fewer Sumatras than there might have been some years ago when espresso blends were roasted darker and the pungent, woodsy contribution of Sumatras was more valued.

Favored Sweet Spots in the Roast

In respect to final degree or darkness of roast there appeared to be two main “sweet spots” for the creators of these blends. One was just at the very first hint of the “second crack” which signals the transition from medium to darker roast. Of the eleven blends we reviewed at 92 or higher, three were brought to this subtly pivotal point in roast development. Two of them were roasted in Taiwan – Simon Hsieh’s Proud Goat Espresso Blend (93) and the Mellow Coffee Dawning Espresso (92) – and one in the States, the Tony’s Coffees & Teas Ganesha Espresso (92).

However, it appears that the favorite settling spot for final roast color among the North American blends we reviewed was a classic medium roast, roughly where sugars and aromatics are well developed but before any hint of pungent roast taste puts in an appearance. Six of the eleven 92-plus blends, including the top-rated Taiwanese Bignose Espresso (94), roughly fell into the classic medium-roast category.

Roast-Level Outliers

The two outliers in roast development among the eleven reviewed coffees were the Starbucks Pantheon Blend, which showed a distinct dark roast pungency and which by machine reading of roast color was brought to the cusp between dark and medium dark, and the Bonlife Top Shelf Espresso, which, for an espresso, was very light roasted, medium-light to light.

My co-taster Ethan generally appeared to take a more critical position toward the impact of roast than I did; he was considerably more critical of the Starbucks than I was, for example, although he still assigned it a rating of 91. Three or four of the blends that we did not review struck him as too sharp, bitter and/or tart; in these cases my ratings often came in modestly higher than his did.

A New North-American Norm?

At any rate, these espresso blends did suggest a certain overall trend, a new norm perhaps for North American espresso blends: bright but not too bright, medium-roasted, with a balance of moderately acidy wet-processed coffees, round, nut-toned Brazils, and juicy natural, dried-in-the-fruit Ethiopias. Although they did not appear to be optimized for drinking as a cappuccino or other short milk drink, most did show well in cappuccino-scaled milk, softening but maintaining character. And, of course, given the new openness around blend communication, we now have an opportunity to know and appreciate some of the coffee thinking that went into their production and subtle differences.

Final Thanks To …

Co-taster Ethan Hill, Victrola barista Benjamin Roberts, who skillfully dialed in and pulled every espresso shot for the tasting, and La Marzocco North America for the use of its superb lab and equipment, including the support of KEXP Project Manager Amy Hattemer and her staff (not to mention their excellent recommendations for lunch).

About this Month’s Co-Cupper

Ethan Hill is the Head of Production and Quality Control at Victrola Coffee Roasters in Seattle, WA. He was raised on a six-acre coffee farm in the Puna district of the Big Island of Hawaii. He co-founded Puna Moon Estate Coffees in 1995 and the Hilo Coffee Mill – East Hawaii’s first full-service roastery and coffee mill – in 1999. He has over ten years of roasting experience, having served as Production Roaster for Hilo Coffee Mill, Head Roaster for Rimini Coffee Inc. in Salt Lake City, Utah, and Head of Production for Victrola Coffee Roasters. He has taught coffee-related courses on a variety of topics for the University of Utah and the Specialty Coffee Association of America. He is a licensed Q-Grader.  He reports: “I was thrilled to serve as a sensory analyst for Coffee Review’s Open-Source Espresso Blends article, and to contribute my thoughts and impressions to the article. It was exciting to see such a wide range of flavor profiles in the espresso submissions. I was particularly struck by how blends that ended up scoring the same rating were so dramatically different from one another.”

The post Open Source Espresso Blends appeared first on Coffee Review.

Recall that in traditional wet-processing, the skin and pulp of the coffee fruit is removed from the “beans” or seeds in several stages after which the beans are dried to about 12.5% moisture, whereupon they are stored encased in the remaining dry, crumbly “parchment skin” until they are ready to be shipped. It is only at that point, well after drying has been completed, that the parchment skins are removed.

In the wet-hulling variation of wet-processing the soft fruit residue is removed by small producers as it is elsewhere, by removing the skins from the fruit, loosening the sticky fruit flesh through fermentation, then washing the loosened flesh off the beans. However, in the wet-hulling variation the parchment skins are removed in the middle of the drying process, when the beans still retain somewhere between 20% to 40% moisture. The beans are dried the rest of the way, to 12% to 13%, after parchment removal. This atypical practice is additionally complicated by an unusual supply chain in Indonesia, one in which the fruit removal and a first drying is usually performed by small producers, after which collectors bring the partly dried coffee to a mill where it is dried a bit more before being hulled at 20% to 40% moisture. Final drying to 12% to 13% moisture may take place at the mill or in the port before the coffee is shipped.

Contributing Depth without Domination

Somewhere along the line, probably during the prolonged serial steps in drying, the beans pick up a slight mustiness that contributes the characteristic fruit-toned “earthiness” for which Sumatras are famous. Up to ten or twelve years ago the problem was finding specific lots of Sumatra that expressed this accidental flavor complex sweetly and pleasingly rather than harshly; in other words, finding lots that tasted richly earthy rather than overbearingly musty.

Over the past ten years the wet-hulling process has been refined, particularly in Sumatra, to the point that the earth note is backgrounded and transformed, bringing a rich, sweet pungency that deepens and grounds profiles without dominating them. At times one can call this sensation earthy in the sense that it suggests sweet humus or moist fresh-fallen leaves; just as often it provokes associations like pipe tobacco, fresh-cut cedar or fir, or spice notes like pink peppercorn and clove. Influenced by this pungent base are fruit and floral suggestions, with the whole aromatic package usually supported by a cleanly expressed structure of sweet-toned acidity and silky to syrupy mouthfeel.

Ten Good Ones

This month we review ten such wet-hulled coffees, nine from Sumatra and one from Sulawesi, all expressing refined variations on this sweetly pungent, wet-hulled theme. Four additional samples, all Sumatras, attracted ratings of 90 through 91, but are not reviewed here. The disappointing news, perhaps, is the absence of wet-hulled samples from islands other than Sumatra and Sulawesi. I would guess that the probably costly efforts to refine the wet-hulled process are only worth the focus and investment when an exporter is working with an already well-known and celebrated origin like Sumatra, or at the very least, Sulawesi.

Consult the Fine Print

Those readers interested in exploring the sensory character of these coffees would do well to look at the blind assessment paragraphs of the ten reviews associated with this article carefully. Although several reviews make allusion to hints of moist, fresh-fallen leaves or deploy similar foresty descriptors, specific profiles differ greatly, dramatically even. Details of wet-hulling vary, lot by lot, and botanical variety, although only beginning to be reflected in market descriptors in Sumatra, may be at work in the background as well, along with the even less-understood impact of subtly varying terroirs. Plus, of course, roast is crucial in differentiating these samples, perhaps even more crucial than it is in respect to influencing the character of more conventional coffee profiles.

The PT’s Silimakuta AAA Sumatra (93) displays perhaps the most explicit (though still quietly integrated) earth notes of the ten reviewed samples; the fusion of this gently stated suggestion with more conventional chocolate and apricot- and raisin-like fruit notes nets an engaging expression of the wet-hulled style. By comparison, neither the top-rated Papa Lin’s Lake Toba Peaberry (94) nor the Equator Sumatra Ulos Batak (94) appear to exhibit explicit earth-related notes, yet both display variations that in my experience reflect the impact of wet-hulling: the particularly zesty and pungently grapefruity character of the Equator, and the spice and herb innuendoes complicating the softly lush, floral and stone-fruit of the Papa Lin’s. Other reviewed samples range from the more delicate, nutty and crisp (the Bird Rock Sumatra Ulos Batak, 93, for example) to the Kenya-like dry berry, citrus and chocolate of the Seattle Coffee Works Sumatra Ulos Batak (93).

A Little Farther Back in the Pack

Of course, not all of the wet-hulled Sumatras we sampled were quite as successful as the ten reviewed here, or the additional four not reviewed that rated 90 to 91. The complex set of processing procedures involved with wet-hulling, performed in different places by different parties, must make achieving consistency difficult. Ever since the new, more refined style of wet-hulled Sumatras started appearing on the market a decade or so ago I’ve been amazed by the achievement of cooperative leaders, exporters and others in achieving the consistency represented by the best of these engaging and original coffees.

Returning to the samples not reviewed here, we tasted only one outright tainted sample, although several more showed mild inconsistencies from cup to cup. We sampled a couple of the more generic style of “Mandheling” Sumatras displaying the older style of explicit earthiness that can come across as broodingly rough and robust in darker roast styles, but in the currently fashionable medium roasts simply comes across as, well, rough. Other samples seemed to have suffered during green coffee storage and transport (always an issue with Indonesia coffees) and showed up tasting a bit dull and woody.

Two Good Bets

Some well-known green coffee names representing the new refined style of Sumatra were absent from this cupping, perhaps because of timing or availability issues. Of those green coffee names or brands that did appear in our lab this month and rated well, the two most frequent to appear were the “Ulos Batak” branded Lintong-region coffees from the cooperative exporter Klasik Beans, and two excellent samples (both certified organically grown) from the Ketiara Cooperative located in the Aceh growing region at the far northwestern tip of Sumatra.

_{* Photo courtesy of Crop to Cup Coffee}

The post Elegant Earth: Wet-Hulled Sumatras and One Sulawesi appeared first on Coffee Review.