finding the best of the bestquot in coffee

Tips for Finding Perfect Premium Coffee...

There is coffee and THERE IS COFFEE! You likely know about the generic quality coffees you find at the supermarket, using the inferior Robusta beans. And, in contrast, there is the alternative: the coffee regularly termed Gourmet Coffee you buy direct from roasters around the country. Popular large volume roasters, like Starbucks as well as most of the the smaller roasters dispersed about town, essentially utilize this far better grade, high altitude, shade grown Arabica bean.

That being said, and broadly known by all nowadays, how can you siphon out the crème de la crème of gourmet coffee beans to purchase?

To begin with, let’s hone in specifically on taste. Nowadays, coffee has become a “drink of experts”…

evolved into an art of reflection! We’ve begun to savor our coffee…flavor identify and define the subtle hints and nuances, as well as the qualities that identify the bean’s continent of origin. You as a coffee drinker, can begin to explore and experience the undertones of your coffee’s region, but better yet, begin to revel in the independently specific flavors of the bean defined by the specific hill and farm where it’s grown.

Coffee Cupping: Defining Coffee by its “Underlying Flavors”

There are, nowadays, a limited number of coffee roasters that independently test their coffee beans for taste observations and aromas. These beans are graded and assessed just like fine wine. This activity is called Coffee Cupping or Coffee Tasting. Professionals known as Master Tasters are the assessors. The procedure involves deeply sniffing a cup of brewed coffee, then loudly slurping the coffee so it draws in air, spreads to the back of the tongue, and maximizes flavor.

These Master Tasters, much akin to wine tasters, then attempt to measure in detail, every aspect of the coffee’s taste. This assessment includes measurement of the body (the texture or mouth-feel, such as oiliness), acidity (a sharp and tangy feeling, like when biting into an orange), and balance (the innuendo and the harmony of flavors working together). Since coffee beans embody telltale flavors from their region or continent of their origin, cuppers may also attempt to predict where the coffee was grown.

There is an infinite range of vocabulary that is used to describe the tastes found in coffee. Descriptors range from the familiar (chocolaty, sweet, fruity, woody) to the conceptual (clean, vibrant, sturdy) to the wildly esoteric (summery, racy, gentlemanly).

Following are a few key characteristics as defined by Coffee Geek. ( http://coffeegeek.com/guides/beginnercupping/tastenotes )

Key Characteristics

Acidity:

The brightness or sharpness of coffee: It is through the acidity that many of the most intriguing fruit and floral flavors are delivered, and is usually the most scrutinized characteristic of the coffee. Acidity can be intense or mild, round or edgy, elegant or wild, and everything in between. Usually the acidity is best evaluated once the coffee has cooled slightly to a warm/lukewarm temperature. Tasting a coffee from Sumatra next to one from Kenya is a good way to begin to understand acidity.

Body:

This is sometimes referred to as “mouthfeel”. The body is the sense of weight or heaviness that the coffee exerts in the mouth, and can be very difficult for beginning cuppers to identify. It is useful to think about the viscosity or thickness of the coffee, and concentrate on degree to which the coffee has a physical presence. Cupping a Sulawesi versus a Mexican coffee can illustrate the range of body quite clearly.

Sweetness:

One of the most important elements in coffee, sweetness often separates the great from the good. Even the most intensely acidic coffees are lush and refreshing when there is enough sweetness to provide balance and ease the finish. Think of lemonade…starting with just water and lemon juice, one can add sugar until the level of sweetness achieves harmony with the tart citric flavor. It is the same with coffee, the sweetness is critical to allowing the other tastes to flourish and be appreciated.

Finish:

While first impressions are powerful, it is often the last impression that has the most impact. With coffee the finish (or aftertaste) is of great importance to the overall quality of the tasting experience, as it will linger long after the coffee has been swallowed. Like a great story, a great cup of coffee needs a purposeful resolution. The ideal finish to me is one that is clean (free of distraction), sweet, and refreshing with enough endurance to carry the flavor for 10-15 seconds after swallowing. A champion finish will affirm with great clarity the principal flavor of the coffee, holding it aloft with grace and confidence like a singer carries the final note of a song and then trailing off into a serene silence.

Coffee Buying Caveat

Buying coffee simply by name instead of by taste from your favorite roaster (in other words buying the same Columbian Supreme from the same ”Joe’s Cuppa Joe Roaster”) definitely has its pitfall! According to Coffee Review, “Next year's Clever-Name-Coffee Company's house blend may be radically different from this year's blend, despite bearing the same name and label. The particularly skillful coffee buyer or roaster who helped create the coffee you and I liked so much may have gotten hired elsewhere. Rain may have spoiled the crop of a key coffee in the blend. The exporter or importer of that key coffee may have gone out of business or gotten careless. And even if everyone (plus the weather) did exactly the same thing they (and it) did the year before, the retailer this time around may have spoiled everything by letting the coffee go stale before you got to it. Or you may have messed things up this year by keeping the coffee around too long, brewing it carelessly, or allowing a friend to pour hazelnut syrup into it.”

Your savvy coffee-buying alternative is to look for roasters who buy their beans in Micro-Lots- smaller (sometimes tiny) lots of subtly distinctive specialty coffees. According to Coffee Review, “These coffee buyers buy small quantities of coffee from a single crop and single place, often a single hillside, and are sold not on the basis of consistency or brand, but as an opportunity to experience the flavor associated with a unique moment in time and space and the dedication of a single farmer or group of farmers.”

Coffee Review: Coffee Ratings

And finally, look out for the very small community coffee roasters that will submit their coffees to be 3rd-party evaluated by Coffee Review and other competitions for independent analysis and rating. Coffee Review regularly conducts blind, expert cuppings of coffees and then reports the findings in the form of 100-point reviews to coffee buyers. These valuable Overall Ratings can provide you with a summary assessment of the reviewed coffees. They are based on a scale of 50 to 100.

http://www.coffeereview.com/about_us.cfm

Bottom line for a certain premium purchase: To find the coffee that will ascertain most flavor satisfaction, seek out beans that been independently reviewed and rated. This approach will, without a doubt offer you the advantage of being able to choose the flavor profile suits you best in a bean. What’s more, it gains you certainty in quality due to its superior rating. The higher the rating, the better the flavor. True premium coffees start from the upper 80’s. By finding a roaster that consistently rates within the 90’s will ultimately buy you the best java for your buck!

Tips for Finding Perfect Premium Coffee...

THERE IS COFFEE!







Coffee Cupping: Defining Coffee by its “Underlying Flavors” “Underlying Flavors”

Coffee Cupping Coffee Tasting. Master Tasters

Master Tasters, body body acidity acidity balance balance



Coffee Geek. http://coffeegeek.com/guides/beginnercupping/tastenotes

Key Characteristics

Acidity: Acidity:

The brightness or sharpness of coffee: Sumatra Kenya

Body: Body:

“mouthfeel”. Sulawesi Mexican

Sweetness: Sweetness:

One of the most important elements in coffee,

Finish: Finish:

(or aftertaste)

Coffee Buying Caveat

by name by name by taste by taste Coffee Review,

Micro-Lots- Coffee Review,

Coffee Review: Coffee Ratings

Coffee Review Coffee Review cuppings of coffees

http://www.coffeereview.com/about_us.cfm

Bottom line for a certain premium purchase: the best java for your buck! the best java for your buck!

the new millennium is brewing

Coffee is to be no longer underrated. It's no longer that set of tin cans lining the common supermarket shelf and will likely no longer be so disrespected. Coffee is now the pride of the same connoisseur who for so many millennium prized and cherished wines and chocolates.

Coffee is finding its own now. It’s being cautiously paired with only the desserts that are a perfect match; or the right quality chocolate that enhances just the right nuance of coffee. Coffee is a ritual, a feast in itself.

Coffee is the new millennium drink of the connoisseur of every class. Now rated for its tones, its nuances, rated for the personal qualities of the world’s beans and is sold to the highest bidder.

People have always been willing to pay a premium for what they’ve perceived as bouquet wine. Putting outstanding price tags on gourmet specialty coffee beans (an $11 billion industry) has become part of the connoisseur game.

George Howell, founder of the George Howell Coffee Company and its Terroir Coffee brand based in Acton, Mass., proclaims coffee a "noble beverage," worthy of the same respect as fine wine. And in the recent years coffee has earned its worth.

Forbes Magazine has recently rated beans at the front of the race, naming 10 of the world’s most precious coffees.

Specialty beans of the finest caliber are pure in tone, superior beans costing more than $100 per pound. Do not, dare to add a drop of cream or sugar to such a brew for the sake of losing its natural charm, the beans distinct natural sweetness and fragrance.

Champion beans are grown on world estates…small family farms at high elevations by farmers who care more for their quality than quantity. Such beans are prized for their characteristics.

According Forbe Magazine the joes that hold the highest price tags include such bean beauties as:

Kopi Luwak form Indonesia

Standing at a impressive $160 per pound, Luwak Coffee is made from coffee cherries that have been eaten by local creatures, the common palm civet, which use its keen sense of smell to select the choicest and ripest beans. The digestion process removes the flesh from the crimson Sumatran berry and the beans, supposedly sweeter as a result of having passed through the animal, are hand-collected from the jungle floor. Undeniably the most unique fermentation process for coffee beans.

Hacienda La Esmeralda from Boquete, Panama

Second in line, and standing with distinction, at $104 per pound. Hacienda La Esmeralda's Geisha coffee set an online auction record when it sold for over $50 dollars per pound, unroasted, on May 30, 2006. The coffee, which is grown in the shade of old guava trees, has been widely and enthusiastically praised for its flavor and aroma. In April, it placed first in the SCAA "Best of Panama" competition, with a score of 94.6 out of 100.

Coffee Variances

Albeit not receiving such medals of honor, all regional coffee are merited for their own uniqueness in flavor.

For every mountain that grows a boutique crop of coffee, there is a primary set of qualities noted in that region. Add to this, the weather conditions, that in itself will vary from year to year, along with the method of storing and roasting that sets these unique characteristics apart from one region to another, let alone, one cuppa joe to the next.

Take for example, a Monsoon roasted bean. Monsooned coffees are picked and then stored in open-sided warehouses and exposed to the steady, damp, salty monsoon winds. Shortly, these beans gain a flavor reminiscent of, but distinct from aged coffees. The most common monsooned coffee is Indian monsooned Malabar.

Coffee Profiling

Much akin to discerning wines, the coffee industry has defined flavor variances with words that conotate each coffee’s characteristics or personal flavor identity, allowing a coffee drinker to make a educated decisions on their roast preferences..

Acidity

Related both to the roast and to variety. Similarly used to the acidity in wine, and not to acid content, an alternate expression would be "bright" or "lively." Think of it more of a sensation than a taste, and is experienced on the tip of the tongue and/or the roof of the mouth. Longer roasting lowers perceived acidity. No-acidity coffees come across overly flat, lacking a pleasant palate-cleansing aspect, with a baked or “bready” quality.

Stronger acidity can often have wine-like aspects, especially in many Kenyan coffees, which, in fact seem citrusy to the taste. The more extreme the acidity, the more it will feel astringent.

You can measure by such terms from lowest to highest as “soft-mellow”, “subtle hint of tanginess”, “pleasantly tangy”, bold-pique”, “assertive-sharp”. Examples of high acidity coffees include Kenya AA (with heavy body), Puerto Rico “Yauco Selecto Estate” (with smooth light body), and Ethiopia Longberry (with bold heavy body),. More subtle, low acidity coffees include Indian Malabar “Monsooned Voyager” (with smooth light body), Jamaican Blue Mountain (with smooth light body), Kona “Volcanic Estate” (with bold heavy body), and Sumatra Mandheling (with bold heavy body).

African originated coffees would give you the sharpest taste, with a pronounced, astringently clean, assertive, robust, strong flavor, while on the other side of the acid spectrum lies the coffees of India: spicy, earthy, unusual, distinct and complex.

Balance

Roast and variety related. Look at this as the coffee’s “Flavor Hamony Ratio”. The roaster is aiming for a pleasing combination of multiple characteristics, with none overpowering. Coffees often are mixed together into “coffee blends” for just this purpose. Toning down and tuning up certain attributes for a smooth consistent flavor. In this way coffee drinkers enjoy a myriad of quality experiences, with none overpowering to the palate With coffee profiling, the ratios move along from “delicate and lean” (the India region being your most delicate), to “subtle”, to “pleasingly complex”, to “a great depth of flavor” and finally “perfect and complete” (the regions of Africa and the Carribean with the greatest extent of this).

Body

Roast and variety related. Reminiscent of wine tasting, body is truly the “mouth feel” the experience of texture, viscosity or fullness on the tongue. Body develops with the degree of roast, but falls sharply with over roasted coffee. Different origins naturally have their own distinctive body as well. Interestingly certain brewing methods impart body "thickness", like coffee from a press, where fine particulates remain suspended, or espresso, which contains emulsified coffee oils. Under-extracted or underbrewed coffee will also have a defectively light body.

In regards to the preferred bean of choice, coffee aficionados tend to prefer the higher quality Robusta bean over the Arabica. Robusta beans are the mountain grown assortment, cultivated on small plantations, whereas Arabica beans would be grown in the lower altitude, being mass market varieties found commonly in the canned coffees found in supermarkets. Robusta tends to be more bitter than do arabica beans. Arabica beans have higher caffeine content than Robusta, however. Some coffee makers will mix in some Arabica into their Robusta roasts to spike the caffeine.

Coffee & Dessert pairing

Finally, to enhance a specialty coffee experience add in a perfectly paired dessert for the experience complete!

Acidic, sweet & light roasts

Pair the more delicate fruits or berries, or key lime pie, lemon merangue, or fruit tart.

Such desserts would perfectly compliment coffees that include: Brazlian, Jamaican Blue Mountain, Guatemala Antigua, or Columbian.

Evenly balanced roasts (acidity and body)

Deserving of well textured desserts like carrot cake and tiramusu. The fruity/winey notes of Ethiopian, Zambian, Tanzanian or Kenyan, can bring carrot cake to life.

For a more full body choice of coffees, such as Yemen “Mocca” or Sumatra, the smooth silkiness of cheesecake is heaven on earth.

Full bodied coffees

The heavy tones and thick qualities of this coffee make a primo match for your most decadent desserts like heavy, rich chocolate mousse, chocolate cake and ice cream. French and Italian roasts perfectly fit the bill. And don’t forget the whipped cream!

SOURCE:

The View from the Bay

Whole Latte Love

Gragson's Coffee Tips

George Howell, George Howell,

Forbes Magazine Forbes Magazine

$100 per pound.



Forbe Magazine Forbe Magazine

Kopi Luwak form Indonesia Kopi Luwak form Indonesia



Hacienda La Esmeralda from Boquete, Panama Hacienda La Esmeralda from Boquete, Panama



Coffee Variances







Coffee Profiling



Acidity









Balance



Body





Coffee & Dessert pairing



Acidic, sweet & light roasts





Evenly balanced roasts (acidity and body)





Full bodied coffees