Understanding Coffee Growing Regions

This article will be the first in a series that will provide you with a foundation education in the geographic sources of coffee – with the goal of helping each of you know more about what you drink each day and what you can gain by exploring new coffees and flavors.  The world of coffee today is every bit as vast as that of wine, cheese or craft beer, but with vastness can come confusion.  I’d like to help with that.

I wrote something like this when we started Freeport Coffee Roasting in 2008, but the coffee market has changed since then.  As with many things, the mass market side of coffee has gotten much worse – and the rise of craft roasting and local cafes has greatly improved.  Read on.

Mega-Blends:

In one of my first posts on this subject, I wrote of going to our local supermarket and counting an astonishing 288 different types of whole bean coffee.  I observed then that the majority of these were blends (Sunrise Blend, Darkness Blend, Daybreak Blend, etc.) with little information on the coffees that comprise these, and a goal of these roasters of getting you hooked on a marketing identity rather than a coffee origin.  The few coffees available then that did come from specific countries were limited to Colombia, Sumatra and maybe Kenya – none with an indication of a farm, cooperative, region within each country, or other source information.

Today, my opinion is that this situation has gotten far worse.  The options are fewer, and the mix is slanted much more in the direction of blends rather than coffees from individual growing countries.  The worst example of this (and a great irony, given its beginnings) is the large international café chain that replaced brewed origin-specific coffee of any kind with a single branded blend in 2008.  

Its no small wonder the regions are a mystery, because not many people have been exposed to them. You see, blends are there for some interesting reasons. In theory, coffees are blended together to achieve a specific purpose. For example, our popular Misty Morning Espresso has coffees in it that give espresso its wonderful crema and others that add a balance flavors into the mix.

But, for most large coffee companies, it’s all about marketing and saving money.  They think that “Breakfast Blend” will stick with someone more than “Guatemala Atitlan San Pedro La Laguna,” and from a purely marketing standpoint, they are right – get the brand established in the consumer’s head, and they’ll keep buying it (though forsaking experimentation and variety). And, a dirty little secret of the big coffee companies is that large commercial blends are primarily “filler” coffees that have bland taste and some amount of body – with the taste of the blend determined by roasting style and the addition of small amounts of better coffees with unique flavors.

Small Roasters and Single Origin Coffee:

On the other side of the coin is the great proliferation of smaller roasters who dedicate themselves almost exclusively to single source coffees – with local examples here including Matt’s Wood Roasted Organic Coffee (and his excellent Speckled Ax café), Tandem Coffee (now with two great cafes in Portland), Bard and our coffee.  Each of these and the many others like them across the country source coffees from small growing cooperatives and farms within specific regions of growing countries – and this support motivates farmers to grow better and better coffee.

So my message here is that if your daily coffee habits involve blended coffee purchased at the grocery store, I think you’ll be wonderfully surprised at the world of options that awaits you.

Let’s look at where coffee is grown – and how this relates to the flavor in your cup:

Central America:

“Centrals” are grown in southern Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Panama, and good coffees from this region have a sparkling “acidity” (coffeespeak for a citrus-like effervescence in the cup), medium body and light floral and fruit notes that make these easy, accessible coffees to drink all day. In buying these coffees, look for those grown at higher elevations, and try to zero in on a specific region or cooperative, rather than something labeled “Guatemala,” for example – as many of these countries also produce a lot of bland, commodity coffees grown at lower altitudes.

Be wary of Mexican organics, and be even more diligent in your research about where these are grown (elevation counts). The Mexican coffee industry has pushed hard to increase the production of certified organic coffees to support the demand of large chains in the US (as in the famous hamburger chain now trying to become a coffee expert), and their goals are much more around getting the higher price commanded by these than about quality.

South America:

In ranking the world coffee producers, Brazil and Colombia have consistently been numbers one and two respectively – with Colombia only recently eclipsed by the surging Robusta production of Vietnam. As coffee grew in popularity around the world, the favorable climates of Brazil and Colombia allowed these countries to propagate huge coffee plantations and the processing and exporting infrastructure to support them. And so most of us grew up watching our parents drink the bland, homogenous coffees they cranked out onto the world commodity markets – sold in tin cans by the large coffee companies and used for instant coffees such as the world leader NesCafe.

All of this isn’t to say that all coffee from South America is bad – but if you stay mired in the generic Colombia and Brazil coffees, you won’t taste the best the region has to offer.

One of the most important contributions to modern specialty coffee are the dry processed coffees of Brazil, which are used as the base of many espresso blends to add body and contribute the distinctive crema of a well-poured shot. These beautiful coffees also work well brewed by themselves, with deep body and rich, even flavors.

With good Colombian coffees, you won’t find exotic flavors, but you’ll experience mainstream-type tastes at a very high level of quality. If your trying to convert someone who has been drinking supermarket coffees and want to give them the entrée into better tasting coffees, this is a good place to start.

The other big player in South America is Peru, and here you need to be careful. As with Mexico, the industry has pushed into organics with a vengeance, and lower priced single origin organics and organic blends from Peru are like the Cascadian Farms of organic coffee; technically organic, but with little to show for it in quality. But at the other end of the spectrum, good Perus are wonderfully sweet, easy drinking coffees.

Indonesia:

Coffee is grown in a very large region extending from western India through parts of China and down to Australia, but here we’ll talk about origins in the Indonesian archipelago, as these are best known to US coffee consumers. India generates a lot of beautiful coffees, but they don’t get much attention in the US.  China is an up and coming producer, but without a lot of volume yet. Vietnam has a massive industry built around commodity Robusta coffee and the other growing countries in the area aren’t that distinctive as specialty grades.

Indonesian coffees fall into two groups – those from Sumatra the largest island in the chain, Sulawesi (just south of the Philippines) and Timor (north of Australia); and another set from Java and Papua New Guinea.

The first group presents rich, syrupy coffees with intense body. These are often roasted dark and they work well in French Roast blends and espressos. There is a lot of pooling here, so you won’t find estate coffees to the extent you might in Africa or Central America, and quality can be quite variable. Unlike the grading scheme used in most of the world, which puts a lot of weight on appearance a lack of physical defects, these coffees are considered more on their taste profiles. The rugged character of the coffees comes through in the cup, and it is these qualities that make them a favorite of those who like big, bold tastes.

The other island coffees of this region have more in common with Central American coffees. They are wet processed (meaning the fruit is stripped from the cherries just after harvesting) and they have a nice acidity and floral/fruit tones.

East Africa:

Look back into the history of coffee, and you’ll find a polite dispute between Yemen and Ethiopia over which country was the true birthplace of coffee. I’ll save the happy goats story for another article – but its easy to find online if you are interested.

But there isn’t much dispute over the fact that this region is where coffee all began – and these origins have the longest standing, richest coffee heritage in the world.

Coffee is grown in a band running from Yemen, through Ethiopia and down to Tanzania and Zambia. The small country of Rwanda is now emerging as a coffee producer, and we’ll be seeing more good coffees coming from Burundi in the years to come.

Writing about coffees from this region makes me smile, because here you’ll find some absolutely mind-blowing coffees. I kid you not, the surprises to be found in the coffees of this part of the world can be so distinctive and startling in the flavors that come out of the cup that you’ll wonder how such a thing is possible.

Among the coffees of East Africa, you’ll find a depth of flavor and complexity unlike any other region of the world. These aren’t necessarily for everyone, but for those who like to get a little out there in their tastes for food and beverage, you know who you are and I encourage you to take the leap and experiment.

As with any coffees, there are some stinkers out there too – and many would exploit the good name of some of these countries for marketing purposes. Unpredictability is a hallmark of these coffees, so we recommend finding a way to try before you buy.

Coffee and Global Warming:

In my next post, I’ll explain how climate change is impacting the coffee growers of today – and how it may impact the coffee of tomorrow.  This is important stuff for you to know.

Thanks for reading.

Buying Coffee at the Grocery Store

Good morning, friends,

I’ll be roasting this weekend on Sunday the 24th, then delivering and shipping on Monday. We also have several coffees here for anyone in need before Monday.

The coffees for this week are on the website – and among these, you’ll see an amazing microlot coffee from the Rwabisindu washing station in Rwanda. This is our first experience with a coffee vacuum packed and sealed in mylar bags at origin, and experiments are now showing that this method preserves the original flavors of coffee during shipping far better than traditional jute bags. In the cup, you’ll find a sweet, elegant and complex coffee and a truly special example of this exciting origin.

Those of you who are local will have noticed that our coffee has disappeared from the shelves of local grocery stores. This was a conscious choice on my part, as the more I see of mass market coffee, the more I come to the conclusion that this is just not a good way to sell coffee. I think most grocery store coffee sits there for too long after roasting, and with the way stores work, you’ll never see the actual roasting date unless you are a cryptographer. And since I somehow feel the journey of every bean that leaves our little roastery, I’ve elected to step out of that game.

But, I know that for many of you, this will be the place you’ll buy the majority of your coffee. It takes time and effort to break away and buy specialty products of any kind, be they cheeses from a local shop, fresh produce from a farmers market or fresh coffee from a microroaster. In the cycle of chores we boogie through every week, sometimes the convenience of buying from a grocery store is a necessity.

So, since I still want you all drinking the best, even if it doesn’t come from us, here are some simple tips that should help you navigate the shelves of your local store:

1. Turnover. If the store sells lots of coffee, it will therefore buy newly roasted coffee more often, and your coffee will be fresher, regardless of whether you follow the rest of the advice below or not. See if it looks like they sell a lot of your brand of coffee, and if not, be suspicious. Also, note that the prime shelf space is right there in the middle shelf – and this is where the fast sellers are. Be wary if your favorite coffee is on the bottom shelf.

2. Roasting dates. In a perfect world, all coffee would have a clear roasting date on the bag (like ours), and you would then buy your coffee in the sweet spot of within three weeks of roasting. But, in general, you won’t see these on grocery store coffee – for the simple reason that if they showed them, it would reveal that almost everything on the shelf is past its prime. But, you will often see a coded form of the date that uses the Julian calendar, a sequential rendering of the days of the year. June 1 in this format is 153, while January 1 is 001 and December 31, 365. Dig around a bit on the shelf so you can see how these numbers are used in labeling your favorite coffee.

3. Pick from the back. The stores put the new products in the back so the old ones in front will sell first. Just wait until no one is looking, then reach behind all the bags in front and grab a fresh one from the back. It’s your coffee, and you shouldn’t feel any shame in doing this. Then, with this power, move on to the dairy case, the meat counter and the produce bins – all homes to this strategy from the stores.

4. Is there a valve? Those funny little plastic fittings on the front of our coffee bags are one-way valves that allow the coffee to be packaged just after roasting. Coffee “outgases” CO2 for several days after roasting, and without this valve, well packaged coffee bags would literally pop! What this means is that, if there is no valve, the roaster will have “pre-staled” the coffee by letting it sit for a half day or so before packaging it. This saves them a whopping nickel or so on each bag, so boo hiss on those who do this.

5. Smell the valve. I know, this sounds funny, but the cool thing about these valves is that they let you sample the smell of what’s inside. Put the bag up to your nose and squeeze it – and if what comes out smells funky, you may want to move on to another bag (or roaster).
(I pause for a moment to apologize if I have now turned you into a lurking, bag sniffing, from the back grabbing coffee snob. It’s worth it, though.)

6. Learn what stale coffee smells like. I think coffee is fascinating, because it goes through so many chemical changes as it ages. Very freshly roasted coffee doesn’t have a lot of smell. Several days later, it smells amazing (as it “rests”), and it stays in this place for ten days or so – and then it starts to begin a decline to staleness. The smells between the peak of good flavor and staleness can still be good smells, but with some practice you’ll learn to spot coffee on its way down and can use this skill in combination with the valve sniffing to inform your purchases.

7. Buy local. According to Google Maps, it is 515 miles between here and York, Pennsylvania, which is the location of Starbucks’ nearest roasting plant. Pownal (home of Matt’s Coffee) is right next door. Coffee by Design is in Portland and Wicked Joe is in Brunswick. Look for locally roasted coffee and you’ll almost always find a product that turns over faster and that uses more unique, smaller lot coffees. If you aren’t local to Maine, do a Google search on the name of your town and “coffee roaster” to find my brethren near you.

8. Buy whole bean coffee. Do this simple experiment. Take a coffee bean and measure the surface area. Write this down. Then grind it. Measure the surface area of the particles and write this down. Compare the massive number from the second measurement to the small one from the first. That is the difference in how much of your coffee is being exposed to air, which is the enemy of coffee. This is why I obsess over grinding your coffee fresh – it really matters. And OK, I lied – that wasn’t a simple experiment.

I hope this helps you all enjoy a better morning cuppa. Oh, and what I really meant by all of this is that you should buy your coffee from us. In the interest of full disclosure and all.
Thanks for your support, folks - enjoy the weekend!

Kent

Supporting Local Business

Hi Folks,

Happy midwinter to you all! I'll be roasting coffee this Sunday (February 7), then delivering and shipping on Monday. Please send us your orders by 10:00 Sunday - though we'll run some extras and we also have several coffees here now if you need something before then.

This week is the realization of a packaging change we've been working on for the last few months, and can get a look at the new bag on our website. This has been a group effort, and I'd like to extend my thanks to those who've made this work.

First, a shout out to Charlie Pollock at Pennisi Lamare in Portland for his conversion of our logo into the simple yet elegant woodblock design. I've loved working with these people over the years because of their efficiency and amazing ability to translate words and emotions into art.

Getting the new design onto the bags was no small feat, and after being told over and over that it wasn't possible, Scott at Freeport's Ascensius Press rolled up his sleeves and worked hard to make the vision of this project a reality. With all the chatter over the last few weeks about the iPad and what this will mean for the book and the printed page, I think it is important to recognize a true artisan in the field of traditional book printing.

And last but not least, a thanks to my son Conor for a nice job setting up and photographing the new package for our website.

Which brings me to today's rant/discourse about local business.

The project to change our packaging gave me a nice reminder about what local businesses are in our world. Here in Freeport, we have a long strip of chain outlet stores that are physically and functionally identical to every other version of that chain in the country. They are devoid of originality, local character, craftsmanship and enduring customer relationships. At 6:00 each day, most of them close, leaving a main street in our town that is as stale and bland as a slice of American cheese on Wonder Bread. And this makes me sad.

The character of great towns and cities is to me defined by their small businesses. Family owned businesses that have been handed down over generations. Great recipes unchanged with time. Craftsmanship. Originality. Color. Relationships. THINGS THAT ARE DIFFERENT.

OMG, what are we doing??? Why are there eight damn gazillion Dunkin Donuts out there? Why must the main streets of so many towns look the same now? Who invented the MALL, for gods sake?

Next month, Tanji and I will go to New York City on vacation, and so much of our time there will be dedicated to the simple bliss of walking streets filled with original, personal, wonderful small businesses. New York is the temple of small businesses, and I am so very thankful that we still have a place like that to go.

As we all work to make smarter decisions with our money in these times of economic hardship, I'd like to throw out a reminder about small businesses - simply that whether these little enterprises fly or fail depends on the outcome of choices made by people. Do I buy my cheese at Shaws where I can get it on sale, or do I take the time go to the local cheese shop where I will pay a bit more? I am hungry - do I drive through McDonalds and enjoy the fruits of the dollar menu, or do I park, go into the local sandwich shop and wait while they make me a handcrafted sandwich? Do I take the easy way out and order a book from Amazon, or do I go to a local bookseller?

Buying local is harder. It takes more time. It can cost more. It may require work or travel to find a local outlet for the things you need. But damn it, we are all worth it. We can't let this country disintegrate into a land of chain stores, malls and strip shopping centers. Local character is fun, but if we don't support it, in too many places it is not long for this world. And I know how much we'll miss it if it goes.

Thanks for listening - have an awesome weekend.

Kent

Musings on the Economy and Coffee

Good morning, Friends,

We’ll be roasting coffee next on Sunday, March 8, and then delivering and shipping on Monday the 9th. Please send your orders by 8:00 Sunday morning.

Wow. Its quite a ride this country is going through right now, isn’t it? I use the New York Times as my homepage, and its an amazing progression of news I see each day. I know that we as a country are all waiting for something good to happen.

So, since our leaders aren’t coming up with anything in the good category (though I think many of these programs will bear fruit), I wanted to share a trend I am seeing – really in the hope that you will see it too and then spread the word.

My daily travels put me in touch with a lot of people, including the scientists all over the world I ask to help me with my conferences, and the universe of people I connect with at the café and around town in the world of coffee.

And I have noticed something cool of late. People are getting kinder and kinder by the day. When I ask people to help with my research or to speak at a conference, they respond with open arms and a graciousness I have never seen before. And when I meet strangers for the first time at The Royal Bean or around town, I see generosity and compassion and an honest desire to want to know others and to help them.

And yeah, these connections don’t put food on our tables and pay the rent, but there is a way that they are worth much more than money. Are you seeing this too?

You were waiting for me to tie this to coffee somehow, weren’t you?

Last week, I was watching “Lost” on the Internet with Galen, and the show had as its single sponsor the Discover Card. They showed just one ad (over and over), featuring a friendly sort of guy asking the question “Do you know how much you spent on coffee last month?”

Boo hiss, I say to that company. There’s been a lot in the press lately about how fru-fru coffee drinks are the first thing many people cut out in a down economy, but please! Sure, cutting out the ice and the sugar and the flavorings (which can run the price of a drink up to $6 in a downtown chain store) makes sense, but let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater here.

Good coffee made at home will cost you about a dime a cup. A great hand brewed cup at your local café is less than $2, and a handmade cappuccino made with high quality fresh roasted beans is under $3. Maybe you won’t indulge every day, but I submit that great coffee is still a good deal.

Another thing I have been reading about lately is that a certain large national coffee chain is now quietly removing the big comfortable chairs and couches from their stores. The message (and the intent) is that they don’t WANT you to stay there. They don’t want you to get to know other people or read a book or work on your computer. At our local version of this chain, I endeavored during one of our recent power outages to go there and use my computer. No WIFI. I bought my son a fru-fru drink for five bucks and asked if I could use the “free” WIFI. Answer, no. I was told that I needed to go online, sign up for an account, get a special card, then bring it back, buy something and THEN I could have “free” WIFI.

Um . . . go online, where, exactly?

So the message here is not one of compassion and community. The message is come in, spend a lot of money, sit until you are uncomfortable, then leave in a short time so we can do the same thing to someone else.

Your local café will serve you better than this. Way better.

We’ve had a long, hard winter here in Maine, and our house has been without power for eight days of it (three separate power outages). When this happens, most people in our town and the town next door bear the same fate, and many people (like me) who work from home end up in the more generous of local cafes as a place to work for the day.

And I am very grateful we have a place like that to go.

In closing, I’d like to throw out a reminder of the things we are trying to do at Freeport Coffee Roasting to make it possible for all of you to enjoy freshly roasted amazing coffee from around the world during these hard times:

- Want to try a coffee? Samples are free – let me know what you’d like to try. (Shipping for these is not free, however, so this works better for locals)
- Shipping IS free on all orders over $40
- Check out the CuppaJoe Recession Buster Coffee, just $9.99 for a pound

And in general, our coffee is less expensive than the whole bean coffee you buy at the store. In the manner of yogurt, ice cream and tunafish, the once sacred one pound bag of coffee is shrinking. You’ll see that what is offered at the store is typically $9.99 or $10.49 for a 12 ounce bag (the metric pound?). This equates to $13.32/$13.98 a pound, and most of ours are just $12/pound (and ours are absolutely fresher).

Thanks for listening to all this. I guess in general, the message I would like to convey is that I hope you’ll support local businesses through these times. This includes coffee roasters, cafes, local farmers, fishermen, those who make cheeses and keep chickens and the stores that sell these things. Let’s not come out of the recession into a world of chain stores and mass-market foods!

Enjoy the weekend, everyone, and thanks for your continued support.

Kent

Reply

Forward