Good morning, friends,
A funny morning here in Maine. We often have “snow days” in winter, where the schools are closed because of too much snow, but this morning we are having a flood day. A night of pounding rain and howling winds has left trees down, roads washed out and creeks high enough to cover roads. Mother Nature reminding us of who is in charge again.
I’ll be roasting this Sunday (February 28), then delivering and shipping on Monday. The coffees this week are on the website.
A reminder for those of you who live locally – I’ll deliver at no charge to your house (in Freeport or Yarmouth) if you order two pounds or more. Pick the Local’s Club option on the website when you order, or just send me an email.
Oh, and would you like your coffee free? Here’s how . . .
Go collect orders for five pounds from your friends and neighbors, and you are now a Coffee Czar! Then, send us an order for six pounds or more (to one address, please) and as the Czar, you’ll get your pound for free! Enter the coupon code CoffeeCzar at checkout.
This morning, I’d like to share ten quick tips on how to improve your daily coffee experience:
1. Grind your coffee just before brewing (yes, we know it is convenient to do it the night before, but the coffee will really taste better this way).
2. Use good water . . . if the water from your tap tastes funky, no amount of good coffee will make that taste go away.
3. If you use a brewing method with paper filters, rinse the filters first – makes your coffee taste like coffee rather than paper!
4. Be courteous to the one who follows. If you make the coffee first in your house at say, 5:30 and the next coffee drinker gets up at 7:00, do them a favor and throw out all the remaining coffee after you drink yours so they can make a freshy. Coffee is at its best in the ten minutes after brewing. The one exception here is if you use a thermal carafe . . . these help a lot.
5. Don’t use boiling water. 212F is a bit too hot for brewing, and it can overextract the coffee. Either let the water boil and then rest for a minute, or take the water off the stove when it starts to make some noise just before boiling. Ideally you’d like the water coming off the stove to be about 208.
6. If your brewing method allows it, stir the coffee as you add water to it (as in French Press or pourover methods). This ensures that all the grounds are wet and the agitation helps with the extraction.
7. Buy a good grinder. Buy a good grinder. Buy a good grinder. (Remember the concept of “subliminal seduction,” where it was said that theatre owners inserted individual frames into films that said “Eat tasty popcorn”?) Buy a good grinder.
8. Don’t ever store your coffee in the fridge. If you get your coffee from us and it was just roasted (the date is on the bottom of the bag), and you will drink your pound in a week, its OK to wrap the bag up tightly and leave it on the counter. If it will take you longer than this, leave the bag out for a few days (the coffee will improve in taste up to about the fourth day after roasting) and then freeze it. Going in and out of the fridge causes a lot of moisture to flush into your bag every time you open it, and this will make your coffee go stale sooner. Buy a good grinder.
9. At the store (if you are one of the very few readers here who don’t get their coffee from us – hint hint), pick your coffee from the back so you get the freshest roasted beans.
10. And last, if you buy espresso-based drinks from cafes, try to watch them make your drink, and get a sense if they are doing it properly. The shots themselves should take about 25 seconds to come out of the machine, and the milk should be gently and controllably frothed to about 150-160F. If you see a milk pitcher exploding with foam in the manner of a Mentos-Coke science class experiment, they have burned and overstretched your milk. Good espresso-based drinks are worth double what you paid and bad ones are just a rip off. The Royal Bean has an awesome espresso bar set up so you can watch your drink being prepared, and their friendly staff will happy to explain what they are doing to you.
In closing, I have a bonus suggestion, applicable to any brewing method or setting. Take a moment to taste your coffee and savor the experience. Close your eyes. Smell it. Wrap your hands around the warmth of the cup. Taste a little, then some more. What does it remind you of? Is it too hot, too cold, too milky or too sweet? Is it perfect?
Its funny as I move around the neighborhood in the mornings how much coffee is being consumed on auto-pilot as cars go by, as though it was an IV of caffeine rather than a food product.
Taking that special moment for the coffee is both an opportunity to taste the coffee and an opportunity for you to just relax in the simplicity of the moment.
Thanks for your support folks – enjoy the weekend!
Kent
Showing posts with label Storing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Storing. Show all posts
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Freezing Coffee
Hi All,
A short one this week . . . roasting on Monday (April 19) and delivering and shipping Tuesday. The coffees for this week are shown on the website.
Included there are some nice new offerings from Papua New Guinea and Burundi - both very accessible coffees that are nice to drink all day.
Several of you have asked recently about whether (and when) it is OK to freeze coffee. My short answer is yes, if it will take you longer than a week to consume coffee after you open it. Freezing will stop the staling process, and if you keep it in a tightly closed container, and maintain it frozen, you won't see much loss in flavor. I don't recommend freezing coffee you get from us that was just roasted - leave it at room temperature for a few days to rest (the flavor improves a lot in this process) and then freeze it if you need to. I don't like refrigerating coffee.
Here's a nice article from Home Barista on the subject if you'd like to explore this further:
Thanks for your support, folks - enjoy the weekend!
Kent
A short one this week . . . roasting on Monday (April 19) and delivering and shipping Tuesday. The coffees for this week are shown on the website.
Included there are some nice new offerings from Papua New Guinea and Burundi - both very accessible coffees that are nice to drink all day.
Several of you have asked recently about whether (and when) it is OK to freeze coffee. My short answer is yes, if it will take you longer than a week to consume coffee after you open it. Freezing will stop the staling process, and if you keep it in a tightly closed container, and maintain it frozen, you won't see much loss in flavor. I don't recommend freezing coffee you get from us that was just roasted - leave it at room temperature for a few days to rest (the flavor improves a lot in this process) and then freeze it if you need to. I don't like refrigerating coffee.
Here's a nice article from Home Barista on the subject if you'd like to explore this further:
Thanks for your support, folks - enjoy the weekend!
Kent
Thursday, May 19, 2011
The Post-Roast Life of Coffee
Good morning, Friends,
This weekend, I will be roasting on Sunday, September 20, then shipping and delivering on Monday. Please have all mail orders, local deliveries and wholesale orders in by 10:00 Sunday. We have a few bags here if anyone is in need before then.
I wanted to write today on what goes on in coffee in the hours and days after it is roasted . . . and what this means for you.
Last weekend, when I was getting ready to roast, I got a panicked call from a wholesale customer saying that they had a larger than usual crowd of espresso drinkers that morning, and had run out of espresso. They asked if I had any extra on hand (sadly the answer was no), and then increased their order for the week ahead.
But this wasn't as simple as getting enough coffee to make it through the remaining hours of the afternoon until I could deliver the next morning - it was a problem that was likely to impact the coffee they served over the next 3-5 days or even a week.
Why?
In the 24-48 hour period after coffee roasts, the newly roasted beans emit a steady flow of "outgassing" carbon dioxide, and the beans go through a series of chemical changes that have a very positive impact on the taste. Thus, we try hard to plan the espresso purchases of the wholesale customers so that their coffee is roasted 3-5 days before it will be used. After "resting" for this period of time, the coffee mellows, much in the way wine does as it ages, and the acidic brightness of the coffee (that can become very pronounced with espresso extraction) fades dramatically.
So for this customer, the question was how to get through not only that day, but the better part of the week ahead.
A comment Tanji and I hear often is "wow, it must be great to be able to always drink all that coffee right after it is roasted." But we also "rest" the coffee we drink, because the differences in taste from day to day over the first week after roasting are noticeable, and I should say, very wonderful.
A lot of you around here get your coffee from us the day after roasting (your roasting date is always stamped on the bottom of the bag), so you can experiment with this phenomenon at home. Try a cup the day you get the coffee, then focus on the taste every day for the next week (or beyond). You should see the progressive mellowing and merging of flavors during the first 3-5 days, and then, if your coffee goes into the second week, you will experience the slight dulling of the tastes of the coffee and maybe even the beginnings of the coffee going stale.
So why does this happen? Much of these changes (especially with espresso) are related to the taste of carbonic acid trapped in the newly roasted beans by the carbon dioxide. When we describe coffee as "acidic," this is one of the acids you taste (and it is present in all coffees at varying degrees). As the CO2 leaves the coffee, it takes some of this acidity with it, and the sharp, piquant taste of newly roasted coffee begins to subside.
This outgassing is responsible for other phenomena too. In the first two days after roasting, coffee brewed by any method will "bloom", or foam, as a result of an intense burst of CO2 being released by the just ground coffee. The valves you see on higher end coffee bags (like ours) are there to allow coffee to be packed just after roasted, then provide a way for the CO2 gas to escape from the bag (otherwise the bags would pop!).
The CO2 also helps to protect the coffee from going stale by forming a cushion of escaping gas around the beans. This gives the beans a temporary break from being assaulted by air (which, along with light and moisture, is a natural enemy of coffee).
A quick word on packaging. The point of a good coffee package (or canister or other sealed storage method) is to guard the coffee from air, light and moisture - thereby keeping it fresher longer. So packaging is an important contributor to the taste of your coffee.
If you buy your coffee by the pound, as most people do, look for a multi-ply bag (that protects the coffee from the air) with a valve (meaning it was packaged right after roasting), and then if you keep your coffee in this bag, roll it up tightly after each use and wrap it with a rubber band. Stay away from coffee sold in bulk bins (a lot of exposure to the air - and is likely to be stale before you buy it) and from simple paper bags or those just lined with wax (almost no protection against the elements). If you need to buy in bulk, buy from a seller that turns over a lot of coffee - and if you used a paper bag with no lining, transfer the coffee into a sealed container when you get home.
Thanks for your support, folks - enjoy the weekend!
Kent
This weekend, I will be roasting on Sunday, September 20, then shipping and delivering on Monday. Please have all mail orders, local deliveries and wholesale orders in by 10:00 Sunday. We have a few bags here if anyone is in need before then.
I wanted to write today on what goes on in coffee in the hours and days after it is roasted . . . and what this means for you.
Last weekend, when I was getting ready to roast, I got a panicked call from a wholesale customer saying that they had a larger than usual crowd of espresso drinkers that morning, and had run out of espresso. They asked if I had any extra on hand (sadly the answer was no), and then increased their order for the week ahead.
But this wasn't as simple as getting enough coffee to make it through the remaining hours of the afternoon until I could deliver the next morning - it was a problem that was likely to impact the coffee they served over the next 3-5 days or even a week.
Why?
In the 24-48 hour period after coffee roasts, the newly roasted beans emit a steady flow of "outgassing" carbon dioxide, and the beans go through a series of chemical changes that have a very positive impact on the taste. Thus, we try hard to plan the espresso purchases of the wholesale customers so that their coffee is roasted 3-5 days before it will be used. After "resting" for this period of time, the coffee mellows, much in the way wine does as it ages, and the acidic brightness of the coffee (that can become very pronounced with espresso extraction) fades dramatically.
So for this customer, the question was how to get through not only that day, but the better part of the week ahead.
A comment Tanji and I hear often is "wow, it must be great to be able to always drink all that coffee right after it is roasted." But we also "rest" the coffee we drink, because the differences in taste from day to day over the first week after roasting are noticeable, and I should say, very wonderful.
A lot of you around here get your coffee from us the day after roasting (your roasting date is always stamped on the bottom of the bag), so you can experiment with this phenomenon at home. Try a cup the day you get the coffee, then focus on the taste every day for the next week (or beyond). You should see the progressive mellowing and merging of flavors during the first 3-5 days, and then, if your coffee goes into the second week, you will experience the slight dulling of the tastes of the coffee and maybe even the beginnings of the coffee going stale.
So why does this happen? Much of these changes (especially with espresso) are related to the taste of carbonic acid trapped in the newly roasted beans by the carbon dioxide. When we describe coffee as "acidic," this is one of the acids you taste (and it is present in all coffees at varying degrees). As the CO2 leaves the coffee, it takes some of this acidity with it, and the sharp, piquant taste of newly roasted coffee begins to subside.
This outgassing is responsible for other phenomena too. In the first two days after roasting, coffee brewed by any method will "bloom", or foam, as a result of an intense burst of CO2 being released by the just ground coffee. The valves you see on higher end coffee bags (like ours) are there to allow coffee to be packed just after roasted, then provide a way for the CO2 gas to escape from the bag (otherwise the bags would pop!).
The CO2 also helps to protect the coffee from going stale by forming a cushion of escaping gas around the beans. This gives the beans a temporary break from being assaulted by air (which, along with light and moisture, is a natural enemy of coffee).
A quick word on packaging. The point of a good coffee package (or canister or other sealed storage method) is to guard the coffee from air, light and moisture - thereby keeping it fresher longer. So packaging is an important contributor to the taste of your coffee.
If you buy your coffee by the pound, as most people do, look for a multi-ply bag (that protects the coffee from the air) with a valve (meaning it was packaged right after roasting), and then if you keep your coffee in this bag, roll it up tightly after each use and wrap it with a rubber band. Stay away from coffee sold in bulk bins (a lot of exposure to the air - and is likely to be stale before you buy it) and from simple paper bags or those just lined with wax (almost no protection against the elements). If you need to buy in bulk, buy from a seller that turns over a lot of coffee - and if you used a paper bag with no lining, transfer the coffee into a sealed container when you get home.
Thanks for your support, folks - enjoy the weekend!
Kent
Friday, November 7, 2008
Troubleshooting Coffee
Hi Friends,
I’ll roast next on Monday, November 10, and any orders received by Sunday night will be delivered and shipped on Tuesday the 4th. If you are local, email me, and away orders are easier if they go through the website (www.freeportcoffee.com).
The holiday season is coming! Next week, I’ll have a full rundown of our new holiday coffees (5-6 of these) and some special offers for you. As a reminder, if you have a large order coming that will need custom labels, please get in touch with me ASAP. I’ll be ordering green coffee and bags in the next few days, and I am trying to line my ducks up so I don’t have to order again before Christmas.
Oh. I have 8 Barack O’Java labels left – and when these are gone, that blend will become the Jamlii Holiday Blend. If you want a souvenir bag of Barack for your shelf (or to drink it in celebration!), order now – first come, first served.
Today, I am writing about troubleshooting coffee. I’d like to share some ideas on things you can do at home to fine tune your brew and to deal with those perky little strange tastes that arise from time to time.
Lets start with a refresher on making coffee. You have a certain coffee, you store it in a particular way and in a particular form (ground or whole bean) and you then measure out an amount of coffee. You get water from somewhere and heat it to a certain temperature and introduce the water into your brewing device. Maybe there are other elements to your brewing device, like a filter. You may brew it into a cup (made of something) or into some kind of holding container, which may be insulated or not and which may or not sit on some kind of a warmer. Maybe you drink it now or drink iater. You put stuff in it (or not). Maybe it stays warm or stays cool.
Then you taste it.
Coffee is a very, very complex substance, and they say there are more than 700 separate chemicals found in coffee – many of which change with time, temperature, moisture and other factors. Some of these changes happen before I ever see the coffee, and many happen after it leaves me and goes to a café or to you. And a lot of these impact flavor.
If something doesn’t seem right about your cuppa, it may be the coffee, but it can also be factors that are under your control . . . and by changing these, you can dial in your own perfect brew.
So, based on the above refresher, here’s a step by step list of some things to consider if you want to make changes at home:
Choice of Coffee: The spectrum of available coffee out there runs from the lighter roasted origins from South and Central America through to French Roasts (and even darker, though not from us), and within this spectrum, you can find rich, fruity, light, sweet, bright and all sorts of other sensations. Changing the beans you buy really can change the whole experience. Write me back if you want some ideas?
Storage: As a rule of thumb, if your coffee is relatively freshly roasted, and you’ll use your bag within a week, seal the bag and leave it at room temperature. If you will use in longer than a week, freeze it (not the fridge)
Ground or Whole Bean: Pre-ground coffee goes stale really fast! If you buy pre-ground, the freezer is your best bet across the board. Love, the Grinder Police.
Amount of Coffee to Use: The rule of thumb here is two level tablespoons of ground coffee per 6 ounces of water. Note that brewers, carafes, etc. will use this amount as a “cup of coffee” measure (as in, this is an “8 Cup Coffee Maker”), but in reality, most of us use cups larger than this. If your coffee taste seems off, you can play with the amount you are using upwards or downwards, and don’t assume if your cup is bitter that you are using too much coffee. You may in fact be using too little.
Water: Our water comes from a well source in Freeport, and we notice a pronounced difference in the taste over the course of a year. A while back, I was getting a funny taste in my coffee, and when I drank a glass of tap water next to the coffee, there was a similarity in the off tastes. If you think your water source is the culprit, try getting some water from somewhere else (I am NOT recommending out of a plastic bottle) and tasting them side by side. There are a lot of ways out there to filter out the bad tastes, and you may want to experiment with using filtered water to brew your coffee.
Water Temperature: If you heat the water on the stove for making coffee, note that the temperature of a rolling boil (212’) is really too hot for coffee. You’d like the ideal temperature to be closer to 200, so maybe get in the habit of boiling the water and letting it sit for a minute or so before you brew – you should notice a big difference.
Brewing Device: I’ll save a discussion of the different ways of brewing coffee for another day, but for here, I’ll just say that results are very different from device to device – and you may find that using a different apparatus gets you closer to the coffee you want. Have a look at this link on the Coffee Review site for an excellent discussion of the methods available: http://www.coffeereview.com/reference.cfm?ID=164.
Other Elements: You might use a paper filter or a gold filter or some kind of metal filter as part of your brewer. Paper filters can leach flavor and should be rinsed before using. Other filter types need regular cleaning to eliminate the tastes of old coffee oils.
Cup: The material your favorite cup is made of makes a difference, and if you use a metal or plastic cup, give it a sniff, and chances are you’ll discover a strong smell you don’t equate with delicious, fresh coffee. Those metal travel mugs a lot of people drink from on the way to work can develop a buildup very quickly, and they are great at holding the scent of teas. It might be necessary to go at this gunk with espresso machine cleaner or cleanser, as these are very tenacious substances.
The Coffee Pot: If you brew into a glass coffee pot that sits on a warmer, you will have trouble if the coffee stays there longer than a few minutes – switch to storing the coffee in some kind of a thermal carafe and you’ll notice a big difference. If you are the person who gets up late in your household and you come downstairs to find something akin to sludge waiting for you in the family pot, treat yourself and brew up your own fresh one. You have rights too!
I hope this helps. I am happy to answer any questions about this, or if you are in Freeport or Yarmouth, I’ll come over and have a look at what you are using if you like.
Enjoy the weekend, and thanks for all your support.
Kent
I’ll roast next on Monday, November 10, and any orders received by Sunday night will be delivered and shipped on Tuesday the 4th. If you are local, email me, and away orders are easier if they go through the website (www.freeportcoffee.com).
The holiday season is coming! Next week, I’ll have a full rundown of our new holiday coffees (5-6 of these) and some special offers for you. As a reminder, if you have a large order coming that will need custom labels, please get in touch with me ASAP. I’ll be ordering green coffee and bags in the next few days, and I am trying to line my ducks up so I don’t have to order again before Christmas.
Oh. I have 8 Barack O’Java labels left – and when these are gone, that blend will become the Jamlii Holiday Blend. If you want a souvenir bag of Barack for your shelf (or to drink it in celebration!), order now – first come, first served.
Today, I am writing about troubleshooting coffee. I’d like to share some ideas on things you can do at home to fine tune your brew and to deal with those perky little strange tastes that arise from time to time.
Lets start with a refresher on making coffee. You have a certain coffee, you store it in a particular way and in a particular form (ground or whole bean) and you then measure out an amount of coffee. You get water from somewhere and heat it to a certain temperature and introduce the water into your brewing device. Maybe there are other elements to your brewing device, like a filter. You may brew it into a cup (made of something) or into some kind of holding container, which may be insulated or not and which may or not sit on some kind of a warmer. Maybe you drink it now or drink iater. You put stuff in it (or not). Maybe it stays warm or stays cool.
Then you taste it.
Coffee is a very, very complex substance, and they say there are more than 700 separate chemicals found in coffee – many of which change with time, temperature, moisture and other factors. Some of these changes happen before I ever see the coffee, and many happen after it leaves me and goes to a café or to you. And a lot of these impact flavor.
If something doesn’t seem right about your cuppa, it may be the coffee, but it can also be factors that are under your control . . . and by changing these, you can dial in your own perfect brew.
So, based on the above refresher, here’s a step by step list of some things to consider if you want to make changes at home:
Choice of Coffee: The spectrum of available coffee out there runs from the lighter roasted origins from South and Central America through to French Roasts (and even darker, though not from us), and within this spectrum, you can find rich, fruity, light, sweet, bright and all sorts of other sensations. Changing the beans you buy really can change the whole experience. Write me back if you want some ideas?
Storage: As a rule of thumb, if your coffee is relatively freshly roasted, and you’ll use your bag within a week, seal the bag and leave it at room temperature. If you will use in longer than a week, freeze it (not the fridge)
Ground or Whole Bean: Pre-ground coffee goes stale really fast! If you buy pre-ground, the freezer is your best bet across the board. Love, the Grinder Police.
Amount of Coffee to Use: The rule of thumb here is two level tablespoons of ground coffee per 6 ounces of water. Note that brewers, carafes, etc. will use this amount as a “cup of coffee” measure (as in, this is an “8 Cup Coffee Maker”), but in reality, most of us use cups larger than this. If your coffee taste seems off, you can play with the amount you are using upwards or downwards, and don’t assume if your cup is bitter that you are using too much coffee. You may in fact be using too little.
Water: Our water comes from a well source in Freeport, and we notice a pronounced difference in the taste over the course of a year. A while back, I was getting a funny taste in my coffee, and when I drank a glass of tap water next to the coffee, there was a similarity in the off tastes. If you think your water source is the culprit, try getting some water from somewhere else (I am NOT recommending out of a plastic bottle) and tasting them side by side. There are a lot of ways out there to filter out the bad tastes, and you may want to experiment with using filtered water to brew your coffee.
Water Temperature: If you heat the water on the stove for making coffee, note that the temperature of a rolling boil (212’) is really too hot for coffee. You’d like the ideal temperature to be closer to 200, so maybe get in the habit of boiling the water and letting it sit for a minute or so before you brew – you should notice a big difference.
Brewing Device: I’ll save a discussion of the different ways of brewing coffee for another day, but for here, I’ll just say that results are very different from device to device – and you may find that using a different apparatus gets you closer to the coffee you want. Have a look at this link on the Coffee Review site for an excellent discussion of the methods available: http://www.coffeereview.com/reference.cfm?ID=164.
Other Elements: You might use a paper filter or a gold filter or some kind of metal filter as part of your brewer. Paper filters can leach flavor and should be rinsed before using. Other filter types need regular cleaning to eliminate the tastes of old coffee oils.
Cup: The material your favorite cup is made of makes a difference, and if you use a metal or plastic cup, give it a sniff, and chances are you’ll discover a strong smell you don’t equate with delicious, fresh coffee. Those metal travel mugs a lot of people drink from on the way to work can develop a buildup very quickly, and they are great at holding the scent of teas. It might be necessary to go at this gunk with espresso machine cleaner or cleanser, as these are very tenacious substances.
The Coffee Pot: If you brew into a glass coffee pot that sits on a warmer, you will have trouble if the coffee stays there longer than a few minutes – switch to storing the coffee in some kind of a thermal carafe and you’ll notice a big difference. If you are the person who gets up late in your household and you come downstairs to find something akin to sludge waiting for you in the family pot, treat yourself and brew up your own fresh one. You have rights too!
I hope this helps. I am happy to answer any questions about this, or if you are in Freeport or Yarmouth, I’ll come over and have a look at what you are using if you like.
Enjoy the weekend, and thanks for all your support.
Kent
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