The Coffee Adventures

Kaldi’s Coffee: Colombia Granja La Esperanza Geisha

2012-05-20T17:13:54Z

A few years back when I started this adventure, one of first few roasters I ordered from was Kaldi’s Coffee. I can’t remember the exact coffee I had but I remember it was good. Today, I can thankfully describe a coffee better than just good. I’m not sure why it has taken me this long to order from Kaldi’s Coffee again, but I’m glad to have found my way back to them.

What guided me back to them was when I saw this tweet:

about the Colombia Granja La Esperanza Geisha. I didn’t need to read cupping notes or hear anything else about the coffee. I knew that I just had to get my hands on a bag of this. Thankfully it was an easy tast.

Thoughts
When I first opened the bag I noticed the beans beans carried notes of blueberries, honey, and raisins. All through brewing and after I noticed an intense like sweetness reminding me of key lime pie, and then notes of blueberries, raisins, and honey. The honey note grew stronger as the cup cooled.

For awhile I just couldn’t bring myself to move my nose from the cup and take that first sip. The aroma was just so wonderful smelling.

When I finally took that first sip I found a delicate key lime pie and honey note. Each sip had a light sweetness to it. When I moved from the Woodneck to the V60 I found the notes in the coffee intensified just a bit. First, it was like I ate the biggest bite of key lime pie that I could fit into my mouth. I was hit with a juiciness, tart lime, and sweetness all at once. After that I found some sweet honey and chocolate with lingered in the finish.

Floral aroma, finishing with honeydew, key lime pie and graham cracker. ~ Kaldi’s Coffee

Verdict
If I hadn’t known any better I would have thought that someone mixed key lime pie and chocolate in a blender and handed it to me in a cup. I’m so glad I was able to enjoy this. Such a wonderful geisha.

This isn’t the most expensive Geisha around. It’s actually quite affordable so if you find out it’s still available make room in your budget to try this.

Info About This Coffee
Region: Trujilio, Valle de Cauca
Altitude: 1650-2000 meters
Processing: Washed

Favorite Brewing Method & Ratio
Brew Method: Woodneck / V60
Recipe: Woodneck / 26g beans, 340g water. Pour 30g (30sec bloom), center pour 315g within 2:30
Hario V60 / 27g beans, 396g water. Pour enough water to saturate (30sec bloom), center pour rest of water until 1:30 is reached

Call Kaldi’s at 314.727.9991 or email them at roastmaster@kaldiscoffee.com to check availability and pricing.

Brewed Over Ice: El Salvador Miralvalle From Gimme! Coffee

2012-05-17T16:02:59Z

Thoughts
This week I had my first go at Gimme! Coffee. The coffee I ordered was El Salvador Miralvalle. Turns out, my obsession this week with iced coffee proved great as this coffee was pretty awesome over ice.

Before trying this coffee over iced, I did however attempt it hot, and in every brewing method I own. Unfortunately, I just wasn’t feeling the coffee. I found as a hot brew, the cup was sweet with hints of fruit. I could not dissect the cup past that which bummed me out, but from the moment I brewed it over ice in the Hario V60 I knew I had found something great. El Salvador Miralvalle flourished over ice. Each sip carried a big sugary sweetness that tasted like I added some sugar to the cup. Underneath the sugary sweetness I found peaches, and some tart lemon play.

At times I found this coffee tasted like sweet tea and other times it was just a beautifully sweet cup with tart lemon and peach hints.

This year’s coffee from Miralvalle is dense with a very slick body. You’ll notice from the first sip a grape-like (tartaric) and melon qualities, and will finish with low intensity pepper and sweetly herbaceous. ~ Gimme! Coffee

Verdict
I may not have felt El Salvador Miralvalle as a hot brew, but over ice it was a real winner. I’m thankful to have had this coffee around as it was the perfect fit to these hot and humid days.

Info About This Coffee
Region: Apaneca-Ilamatepec
Farm/Farmer: El Ingenio de los Ausoles / Rene and Gustavo Urrutia
Altitude: 4265-4595 feet
Varietal: Pacamara
Processing: Fully washed & sun-dried
Roast Level: Medium

Favorite Brewing Method & Ratio
Brew Method: Hario V60 over ice
Recipe: 35/400g, 30 second bloom (50g of water), center pour until desired water ratio is met.

You can read more about this coffee and purchase here.

Kuma Coffee: Cauca Inza, Colombia Espresso

2012-05-14T18:18:23Z

I love getting coffee surprises with my order. Cauca Inza, Colombia Espresso is another new offering from Kuma Coffee.

Thoughts
I was so busy drinking five different bags of coffee that I didn’t get to run this through the Presso, but that’s okay because the Woodneck gave me some great results.

I found figs and a beautiful sweetness like cane sugar coming up from the cup. A light fruit like cherries followed behind while the sugar cane sweetness started to morph into more of a vanilla play.

Each sip is sweet carrying notes of figs and cherries. Add to that a touch of chocolate and lemon in the finish for a pretty great cup. As the coffee begins to cool the cup gets creamier and the chocolate starts to change to more of a bittersweet dark chocolate.

Syrupy Sweet, Cocoa Powder, Tropical Fruit Nectar ~ Kuma Coffee

Verdict
From all the sweetness this coffee carried, I reckon it would have made for a really nice espresso shot. This is one enjoyable Colombian coffee. Either I haven’t noticed Colombian coffees that much in the past, or this year seems to be a good year for the coffee region.

Either way, wonderful coffee, Mark!

Info About This Coffee
Region: Inza
Farm/Farmer: Collective
Altitude: 1400-2000 Meters
Varietal: Colombia
Processing: Washed

Favorite Brewing Method & Ratio
Brew Method:Woodneck Dripper
Recipe: 27g beans, 345g water. Pour 30g (30sec bloom), center pour 315g within 2:30

You can read more about this coffee and purchase here.

Evocation Coffee Roasters: Congo Kivu Rumangabo

2012-05-11T17:50:08Z

I’d like to introduce a new roaster to the site. Let’s welcome Evocation Coffee Roasters to the table. I thank Twitter every day for all the new roasters I come across. Half of them have been around for a number of years and I am just now hearing about them.

Evocation Coffee Roasters is a micro roastery and espresso bar based out of Amarillo, Texas. They’be been around since ’09 and are very much committed to changing the way us coffee drinkers experience coffee.

My first introduction to them is with their Congo Kivu Rumangabo. After testing this coffee I realized I couldn’t have picked a better first introduction.

Thoughts
Sugar cane sweetness flows up from the cup with lime hints and berries.

The initial sip is sweet. Pretty sweet in fact featuring a sugar cane sweetness with chocolate hints underneath. Digging deeper I found some bourbon hints, although minor. As the cup cools, the sugar cane sweetness mellows out and starts to evolve bringing out some nice spice play and fruit. The spice hits you more in the back of your throat as you swallow, and the fruit is citrusy, yet I can’t place it. The lime hint I noticed in the aroma makes an appearance too. It’s enough lime play to make your tongue tingle and your face squint a tad.

In the cup, this coffee is remarkably sweet with dried apple, blackberry and brandy rounding out the flavor profile. As it cools, the acidity livens and basil and coriander become prominent in the aroma. ~ Evocation Coffee Roasters

Verdict
I loved this coffee the moment I took the first sip. I love how it carried a little sweet, a little sour, a little spice, and none of it was overpowering or dominating. A wonderful balance leading to a wonderful cup.

Info About This Coffee
Region: Congo
Varietal: Rumangabo
Processing: Fully Washed

Favorite Brewing Method & Ratio
Brew Method: Woodneck Dripper
Recipe: 26g beans, 345g water. 30g (30 sec bloom). Center pour 315g finishing within 2:30.

You can read more about this coffee and purchase here.

Re-Evaluating My Brewing Methods & Making Changes

2012-05-08T18:42:23Z

I admit, I am not one for changing my baseline brewing ratios for each brewing method not because I am lazy, but for the reason that if the coffee tastes good why go and change it? I am starting to see that something can taste good, but it can also be better too. There’s always room for improvement, especially when referring to coffee.

I used to think that if a coffee didn’t taste right then it was the brewing method to blame, or so I thought. Sure, not all coffees taste good in every brewing method, but that doesn’t mean that the brewing method should take first blame. Its quite possible that the bean to water ratio used was not suitable or even adjusted to fit the coffee. Maybe the grind size wasn’t right, or maybe you brewed too long… Now, I’m not saying that blame should be placed anywhere here either because the right bean to water ratio, grind size, or time won’t happen on the first try or even the second. This is why you need to experiment with every single coffee you come across. To be honest, if you were able to get that perfect coffee on the first try then it would take a lot of the fun out of the process of brewing coffee.

The idea to start re-evaluating my brewing ratios and to start experimenting more with different ratios for each coffee didn’t come to me overnight. It has been something I’ve been pondering over for awhile now. I haven’t pushed myself to start this journey for reasons I can’t give, but after reading How Do You Brew? Magnus Hoem Iversen, 2011 Norwegian Brewers Cup Champion. in which a paragraph stuck out at me, almost as if slapping me right across the face, I realized this was a good sign to start making changes.

All baristas have their methods when it comes to brewing, but I think it is very important to put these methods away in the first stage, which I consider a more experimental phase. The reason I feel this is important is because I think we sometimes get too hung up in certain brew recipes, methods or theories, and apply them to all the new coffees that come to our table. If you are using good coffee and good methods, this will generally result in good cups of coffee, but it will almost never result in truly outstanding cups of coffee. ~ Magnus Hoem Iversen, 2011 Norwegian Brewers Cup Champion

The greatest part about the coffee industry is that you are always learning, growing, and evolving. This is why coffee can’t be just a hobby, or a fascination. You’re either in it fully, or not at all. There is no middle ground.

I’m hoping that this post doesn’t serve as just a realization to myself, but to help anyone else out there that might be doing the same thing that I’ve been doing. Don’t stop experimenting just because something tastes good to you. Experiment every day as you never what you might be missing out on.

Kuma Coffee: Bella Carmona, Guatemala

2012-05-05T16:43:46Z

You may or may not have heard quite a few people, including myself talking about a particular coffee, Bella Carmona, Guatemala on Twitter lately. That’s because Mark, roaster and founder of Kuma Coffee just released a new offering to the already amazing coffee line.

Bella Carmona is a coffee to talk about, to dream about, and to just wish you never ran out of.

Thoughts
I’ve had the luxury of drinking three bags of this, and one of those bags was a complete accident as it was roasted just slightly darker than the intended roast. It may have been an accident, but it was definitely a happy one.

The “intended” roast that you’ll receive if you choose to order features bakers chocolate in the aroma along with a light orange play. The taste carries a light and fluffy orange play with bakers chocolate underneath. As the cup cools it starts to become a little more citrusy and begins to show some white tea play.

The slightly darker roast is just as interesting. First, the aroma showcases a chocolaty sweetness with vanilla hints and an orange play underneath. The taste is wild. Sweet milky chocolate followed by mandarin oranges, a quite pronounced white tea play as the cup cools, and just a touch of tobacco and lemon to top it all off.

The slightly darker roasts is just a tad sweeter and carries a slightly fuller body than the ligher roast.

Both roast levels are completely delicious and as I mentioned to Mark, I just cannot decide which one I like better. I’d even go as to suggest he carry both roast levels and both feature characteristics, but differences at the same time.

Chocolate Cake Batter, Brown Sugar, Rose Petal, Tangelo. ~ Kuma Coffee

Verdict
What can I say? I am completely, and utterly obsessed with Bella Carmona.

Info About This Coffee
Region: Antigua
Farm/Farmer: Luis Pedro Zelaya Zemora
Altitude: 1500-1700 Meters
Varietal: Bourbon, Typica
Processing: Washed
Harvest Season/Date:
Roast Level: City+ (light-medium)

Favorite Brewing Method & Ratio
Brew Method:Woodneck Dripper
Recipe: 26g beans, 345g water. Pour 30g (30sec bloom), center pour 315g within 2:30

You can read more about this coffee and purchase here.

New Frontier Coffee: Costa Rica SHB Juan Leon Estates

2012-05-02T16:36:17Z

This bag of coffee came from LA Coffee Club, a coffee subscription service with the aim to bring you coffee from various roasters in the LA area. Meet, New Frontier Coffee.

Thoughts
From the moment you open the bag you are greeted with beans slightly speckled with oil and a quiet smell of smokiness and spice. Paying close attention to first impressions, I am a little worried.

All through brewing I could smells some smokiness. It wasn’t heavy or unpleasant necessarily, but I was worried that it was all I was going to smell. Thankfully I started to detect a nice spice play making this coffee a little more pleasing to my nose.

After brewing I sat down with my cup and began to take some good whiffs. The aroma carries a smoky spice play. The smokiness was again not heavy, but with just a smoky/spice mix in the aroma, there wasn’t a whole lot going on. As the coffee cools I started to find hints of fruit in there, but its too hard to distinguish what fruit it is.

The first sip I took greeted me with chocolaty spice, slight hints of fruit, mild acidity, and a small amount of smokiness which grows and becomes the dominant note in the cup. A sweet nutty play started shined as the cup started to cool.

This “Hard Bean” is a great mild coffee with good balance, acidity, body and character, a hint of spice and some nutty overtones. ~ New Frontier Coffee

Verdict
I am back and forth on this coffee. Taste wise it isn’t bad, but at the same time it isn’t good either. I wouldn’t call this a good example of what Costa Rican coffees can bring to the table. I feel a lighter roast could help this coffee by bringing out more fruity notes.

Info About This Coffee

You can read more about this coffee and purchase here.

Iced Aeropress Method: A Comparison Between Rob Dunne and Ben Blake

2012-04-29T15:03:30Z

This week I finally scrounged up some time to play around with some iced aeropress recipes I’ve been hearing a lot about on Twitter. It seems that cold brew coffee and the aeropress is the popular choice right now.

It all started with a recipe that Ben Blake aka Draw Coffee posted on his blog in which he tweaked a recipe he got from Rob Dunne. I decided to give both recipes a shot and then compare to see what I came up with.

Below are the recipes from both Ben and Rob, as well as my findings.

Rob Dunne’s Recipe
- 16.5g of coffee
- 250g of water at 32 degrees C (90 degrees F)
- Brew for 3 hours, plunge

As far as grind size goes I suggest going with your normal grind for the Aeropress and adjust to taste.

Ben Blake’s Recipe
- 17g of coffee / grind at 23 on a Baratza Maestro (in between a pourover and a chemex)
- 260g of water at around 55-60 degrees F
- Pour in a circular motion, stir when finished, cap
- Steep for 3 hours, plunge.

The Bottom Line
Originally, I started with Cuvee Coffee’s Reserva which at the time was halfway through its lifespan so I decided to whip up a few more experiments with an even fresher coffee, Mpito Tanzania from Handsome Roasters just to be safe.

Cuvee Coffee’s Reserva Blend
Starting with Rob’s recipe first. I found this cup yielded a mellow acidity cup with notes of sweet sugar cane, chocolate, and spice. My first go around with his recipe, I accidentally went over and brewed for 4 1/2 hours which resulted in a much sweeter cup, but under the sweetness the cup was very boring. For Rob’s recipe I wouldn’t suggest going over the 3 hour steep time.

Ben’s recipe yielded a little more acidity than Rob’s. I found a light sugar cane sweetness and very mild hints of chocolate. With a 1.5g increment and a 10g water increase this tasted surprisingly lighter than Rob’s did.

For this experiment If I had to choose I would go with Rob’s recipe overall.

Handsome Roaster’s Mpito Tanzania

Rob’s recipe carried a sweet and citrusy aroma with an herbal play. Each sip reminded me of sweetened tea with citrus hints, oranges, and a nice chocolate like sweetness underneath. I actually found there to be very mild acidity in cup.

With Ben’s recipe, I found the aroma carried a tea like play with a light hint of fruit. The aroma was quite mellow. At first sip, I noticed the coffee tasted like unsweetened tea. Yeah, Rob’s tasted like sweetened and Ben’s didn’t. It reminded me exactly of Nestle’s powder mix of unsweetened tea my grandmother used to drink. Digging deeper there are some sugar hints to the cup with a slight hint of fruit.

Overall, both recipes had some nice characteristics to it. In the end, they both won me over. Depending on the coffee, both of these recipes can result in some really good iced coffee.

Follow both Rob and Ben on Twitter for more coffee goodness:

@DunneFrankowski

@DrawCoffee

MadCap Coffee Company: Rwanda Gishamwana

2012-04-26T15:16:27Z

MadCap’s Spring Fling was a hit for me so now its time to merge away from blends for a moment and check out one of their single origin coffees, Rwanda Gishamwana. This coffee is a serious eye opener, along with an explosion of flavor. Just go ahead and read and see for yourself.

Thoughts
The aroma didn’t give me much to go on. It was sweet with some tropical fruit play. Other than that, I was going in pretty blind with the taste. I am glad to because what came next was just awesome.

Think fruit punch… A fruit punch bomb tasting like blue raspberry Kool-Aid. That’s what the first sip, second, and last drop tasted like. Underneath, add juicy pineapple, cherries, oranges, and chocolate hints lingering in the aftertaste.

At this point I’m beginning to feel like I could mistake this coffee for a glass of Kool-Aid. Its just that freaking good.

Rich body, clean, cherry tobacco ~ MadCap Coffee Company

Verdict
This is another really great offering from MadCap Coffee Company. This was probably my favorite Rwandan coffee I’ve had in a long time. A big juicy fruited cup that I can’t get out of my head.

Info About This Coffee
Region: Gishamwana in Lake Kivu
Farm: Gishamwana Washing Station
Altitude: 1,500-1,650 masl
Varietal: Bourbon
Processing: Washed and sun dried in raised beds
Harvest Season/Date: May-August 2011

You can read more about this coffee and purchase here.

Experimenting With The Disk Fine From Able Brewing

2012-04-23T16:33:19Z

On March 30th, 2012 Prima Coffee and Able Brewing partnered up to host a contest. The prize was a pre-release of the new Aeropress stainless steel disk titled, “Disk Fine.” Including me, there were 100 winners chosen to test the new prototype to see whether or not Able Brewing should move forward with full production.

So, who is behind Able Brewing anyways?

It all started with Keith Gehrke a once roaster at Coava Coffee and creator of the Kone, a stainless steel filter for the Chemex, as well as the Disk, a stainless steel filter for the Aeropress. If you are familiar with the Kone, you know that it once held the Coava name, but now Keith has since moved from Coava Coffee where the Kone and Disk lie under the new name, Able Brewing.

The Kone has two generations under its belt now, and with each generation featuring even smaller holes and proving better than the last. It seems now that a third generation Kone is in sight. You can see a preview of the third generation Kone over at NY Times. The Disk should be making rounds too marking its third generation as well if there is enough positive feedback to proceed with full production.

I was very honored to be one of the lucky 100 to have the opportunity to give this new filter a good run through.

Left to right comparison: 2nd gen vs 3rd gen

When the Disk arrived I wasn’t sure what to expect from it. I had a lot of questions running through my head and fear for feeling slightly on the spot for feedback. Would the sediment in the bottom of the cup be gone completely? How would the Disk hold up now being even thinner?

This new design of the Disk answers the call for an even finer metal filter. The holes measure to half of the diameter of the standard Disk, therefore resulting in a greater density of precisely etched holes. To achieve this, however, the metal had to be thinner. This finer Disk is a bit more delicate; while the standard Disk has the potential to hold up for a lifetime, the finer Disk sacrifices some durability to achieve a greater degree of fineness, resulting in an even cleaner cup. While thin, the Fine is still made of high quality stainless steel and with careful cleaning and storage techniques, the user should ensure that they get lots of use from the finer Disk. ~ Able Brewing

What about the taste? How would the even smaller holes affect the outcome of the cup?

… We do feel that the standard Disk yields a considerably clear cup, but of course there are others who want an even cleaner, less sediment-containing brew. We have experimented with this finer version, and the results were extraordinary! The cup tasted like it had been brewed using a cloth filter, with oils present but sediment unperceived. For those desiring a cleaner metal filter, the finer Disk is a success. ~ Able Brewing

For my experimenting I’ve been using the following baseline parameters:

Grind: On the fine side. Baratza Virtuoso Preciso #22
Ratio: 17 grams coffee to 220 grams water
Steps:

Invert the Aeropress and place ground coffee inside.
Pour in 220 grams of water and give a quick stir.
Seal on cap and let brew for 1 minute then flip over cup and press within 45 seconds.

Total brew time: 1 minute 45 seconds

The results with the new Disk Fine were definitely extraordinary, and maybe even a tad magical. What I found was that the Disk Fine produced an even tastier cup than the standard disk currently on the market. The cup was noticeably less acidic, sweeter, much cleaner, and on top of that did not have near as much sediment. From the taste, it was like the little sediment that was there was nonexistent.

With the Disk I have now, I normally don’t plunge all the water out to keep the sediment in the cup down, but with the Disk Fine I have found that I don’t need to worry about this step as the sediment is so minimal that it’s starting to become an unnecessary step.

Overall, I love the new Disk Fine. This new Disk for the Aeropress is like the icing on the cake to an even cleaner, less sediment filled cup. I’m glad to see that they will be keeping the current Disk around and adding the Disk Fine as an option, though I think current users will find that this Disk is even better than the last if they are coming from previous versions. And to the completely new users out there, I think you’ll find this Disk makes for a spectacular cup of coffee.

Check out Able Brewing’s site on May 1st, 2012 for product details and more…