Filtering by Tag: coffee

Drinking a Cup of Elida Natural ASD Vuelta from Blendin Coffee Club

Added on by C. Maoxian.

I got a number of different Panamanian coffees from Blendin Coffee Club recently. The first one up is Elida Natural ASD Vuelta. Elida is the name of the Estate in Panama, “ASD” stands for Anaerobic Slow Dry, “Vuelta” is the lot.

Slightly elongated beans, fruity on the nose. A Geisha for sure.

Very, very hard to grind, definitely a Geisha.

Almost no chaff, interestingly.

Do you even sift, bro? To make a perfect cup of coffee, you need to eliminate the fines.

Lovely color.

This is what I would call a “lesser” Geisha. It’s good, very fruity, but if you’ve been drinking super high end Geishas, then you realize that you’re coming back “down” when you have a cup of something like this. The $38 pricing reflects this … it’s appropriately priced.

Brewing a Cup of El Angel Natural Pacamara from Proud Mary Coffee

Added on by C. Maoxian.

The August coffee sent to “Deluxe” subscribers at Proud Mary Coffee was a natural Pacamara from Finca El Angel in El Salvador.

Pacamara a bigger bean.

Into the sifter.

Perfectly consistent grind … this is the key.

Lovely color.

Dark.

Strong cup of strong coffee-flavored coffee. Big change if you’ve been drinking Geisha non-stop as I have. As Proud Mary says: “… a distinctive flavor profile that sets it apart from less exotic varieties.” It’s a traditional coffee flavor for sure.

Brewing a Cup of Los Rodriguez Washed Gesha from Bean & Bean Coffee

Added on by C. Maoxian.

Today I brewed a cup of washed Gesha from Los Rodriguez in Bolivia, roasted by Bean & Bean Coffee. I paid $59 for four ounces of beans, which means each cup is $14.75 … this is a bargain.

Interestingly they included a recommended resting time of 30 to 45 days, but I couldn’t quite wait the minimum recommended time.

Lovely beans, fruity aroma.

28 grams of beans will produce 20 grams of perfectly-sized grind after sifting (25 Clix using Comandante C40). Wonderful aroma on the grind, maybe hazelnuts? Something weird and unexpected.

This is where I do my usual schpiel about the importance of sifting. Do you even sift, bro? When making pour-over, you want to separate the fines (anything less than 800 microns) since small coffee grinds over-extract and make the cup muddy and bitter. 99% of people out there, and I mean coffee “professionals,” not ma and pa, make terrible cups of coffee because they don’t think about the importance of the grind. They just don’t know any better and have actually never tasted a great cup of coffee in their life.

Perfectly consistent grind, this is all-important.

Usual recipe, 15:1. 200 degree water. 50 ml to bloom, second pour to 150 ml total, then third and final pour to 300 ml total. Hand-blown Chemex (pronounced “sha-may”) of course. Look at that color.

Yay! A beautiful cup of Gesha. No coffee on the tongue, zero… then bam, coffee aftertaste. Complex sour on the aftertaste too. Good coffee, good sour, super clean. This is the good stuff. I didn’t know there was good Gesha coming out of Bolivia, but I guess it makes sense that it could grow in the high-altitude Andes. Thanks to Jiyoon for finding this coffee.

Brewing a Cup of Campo Verde Washed Gesha Bourbon from Bean & Bean Coffee

Added on by C. Maoxian.

Today I brewed a cup of washed Gesha Bourbon from Campo Verde in Peru (roasted by Bean & Bean Coffee). I paid $90 for four ounces, which works out to only $22.50 per cup of coffee (a bargain).

Biggish beans, lovely aroma…

Do you even sift, brah? 28 grams of whole beans will yield 20 grams of sifted grind using 25 Clix on the Comandante C40. Ground very easily, this is not a Gesha, it is Gesha Bourbon. Quite a bit of chaff too.

The single most important step when making pour-over is to sift out the fines (anything smaller than 800 microns). Having a perfectly consistent, correctly sized grind means you will have a perfectly consistent cup of coffee that is bright and clean.

Drained pretty fast… standard recipe, 15:1, 50 ml bloom, pour to 150 ml total on second pour, pour to 300 ml on third and final pour. Look at that color! I use a hand-blown Chemex (pronounced sha-may) 3 cup (means 1 cup).

A perfect ten ounce cup of coffee, every time:

Hmmm, this was different … I’ve never had Gesha Bourbon variety before… and I’m not super thrilled with it. It got me pretty high, but it wasn’t Gesha and it wasn’t Bourbon and I’m not sure those two should be crossed? I wouldn’t pay $22.50 a cup for this again, but it’s good to try new things.

[UPDATE: I got a big blast of cinnamon! while drinking another cup, so it’s interesting for sure, but I still wouldn’t get it again.]

Earlier:

Brewing a Cup of Serra das Três Barras Natural Catucai from Proud Mary Coffee

Brewing a Cup of Finca Los Cenizos Washed Lot 140 from Blendin Coffee Club

Brewing a Cup of Esmeralda Buenos Aires 2NC from Blendin Coffee Club

Brewing a Cup of Sitio da Pedra Cocarive Auction #1 from Proud Mary Coffee

Brewing a Cup of Mamuto AA from George Howell Coffee

Brewing a Cup of La Negrita Yellow Gesha from Blendin Coffee Club

Brewing a Cup of Finca La Soledad Cold-Ferment Typica from Bean & Bean Coffee

Brewing a Cup of Finca Momoto Natural Geisha from Proud Mary Coffee

Brewing a Cup of La Bendición CoE #1 from Bean & Bean Coffee

Brewing a Cup of Hawaii Kona Extra Fancy from Bean & Bean Coffee

Brewing a Cup of Monte Llano Bonito El Kinkajou CoE #3 from Bean & Bean Coffee

Brewing a Cup of Momokiemo CoE #2 from Bean & Bean Coffee

Brewing a Cup of Sítio Santa Luzia CoE #3 from Bean & Bean Coffee

Brewing a Cup of Ponderosa CoE #4 from Proud Mary Coffee

Brewing a Cup of El Injerto La Calaca from George Howell Coffee

Brewing a Cup of Finca La Mula from Blendin Coffee Club

Brewing a Cup of Serra das Três Barras Natural Catucai from Proud Mary Coffee

Added on by C. Maoxian.

I subscribe to Proud Mary Coffee’s monthly “deluxe” offering, and this month they sent a naturally processed Catucai from Brazil.

6th Place, eh?

Smallish beans, easy to grind, not a lot of chaff…

Into the sifter. KEY step when making pour-over. Never skip this step. If you see someone dump the grounds straight from grinder into filter, run away. I don’t care if you have a KafaTek M98V, the grind is still going to be inconsistent and you MUST sift it. (This is why it’s foolish to spend thousands on a grinder.) I use a 1Zpresso (from China) and a Comandante C40 (from Germany, but no better than the 1Zpresso, just twice the price).

Do you even sift, bro?

Lovely color, drains to drip at 3 minute 14 second mark. Recipe 15:1 … 50 ml to bloom, second pour to 150 ml, third and final pour to 300 ml. Will yield perfect 10 ounce cup of coffee.

Brewing a Cup of Finca Los Cenizos Washed Lot 140 from Blendin Coffee Club

Added on by C. Maoxian.

I paid $38 for 100 grams of Finca Los Cenizos Washed Lot 140, and I’m pleased that Blendin Coffee Club no longer scrubs the web page of coffees once they are out of stock. This is a washed Geisha from Panama. At $38 for 100 grams that means each cup is $10 or $11, which is a perfectly reasonable price.

The beans smell berry good. They are easier to grind than other Geishas, but still a bit stiff in the old Comandante. Blendin says to use 21 Clix, but you’d be crazy to grind finer than 25 Clix with any bean.

It is absolutely essential to sift your grind when making pour-over. If you learn one thing from any of my dozens? of coffee posts, it’s that you cannot include any fine grounds (less than 800 microns) when you are making coffee. You want it to be clean and bright with light mouthfeel, and if you include fines they are going to over-extract and make the coffee muddy and oily and strong. Yuck!

Do you even sift, brah? That’s what perfectly consistent grind looks like below. #Shtudy.

28 grams of beans will yield 20 grams of perfect grind, which is the correct amount for a 10 ounce cup of coffee. Same recipe every time. 15:1. 50 ml of pour to bloom, add 100 ml to 150 ml, let it drain, finally add 150 ml to get 300 ml total, it should drain completely by the three minute mark.

Look at that stunning color! Only possible when you filter the fines.

Brewing a Cup of Esmeralda Buenos Aires 2NC from Blendin Coffee Club

Added on by C. Maoxian.

I paid $52 for 100 grams of Esmeralda Buenos Aires 2NC, which will make around four cups of coffee. This is a naturally-processed Geisha from Panama. It’s no longer in stock, but the web page remains. I’m glad to see that Blendin Coffee Club no longer scrubs the web pages of the coffees they sell once they are out of stock.

The beans were SUPER hard to grind, which is often the case with Geishas. It’s like grinding up little stones. Strong berry aroma.

Here’s the 28 grams of grind in the sifter after using the Comandante C40 at 25 Clix. This will yield 20 grams of perfect grind after sifting.

No grounds smaller than 800 microns. This is all-important when making pour-over. When I see people dump coffee ground straight from the grinder into the filter, it makes me shudder. Do you even sift, bro?

Usual recipe: 15:1, 200-degree Fahrenheit water, three pours, 50 ml to 30 seconds, 150 ml to 90 seconds, 300 ml to 150-180 seconds. Hand-blown sha-may. When I see people make coffee in anything but a Chemex, it makes me shudder. Yes, again.

Lovely color.

This Geisha is much more coffee-forward than other Geishas I’ve tried. The really superb Geisha don’t taste of coffee at all on the tongue. It’s like a sneak attack. The coffee flavor hits and hits hard only after a minute. This Buenos Aires 2NC has coffee right up front, which makes me think it’s a lesser Geisha, but I could be wrong about that. It’s still good. Maybe my expectations were too high. Anything from Hacienda La Esmeralda commands a super premium price, even if it’s one of their lesser crops. That’s my opinion anyway.

Brewing a Cup of Sitio da Pedra Cocarive Auction #1 from Proud Mary Coffee

Added on by C. Maoxian.

I subscribe to Proud Mary’s monthly “deluxe” offering for $39. Every month they send me 100 grams of a special coffee. For June they sent Sitio da Pedra’s Cocarive Auction #1, which is a naturally processed Arara (a variety I’ve never had before) from Brazil.

The beans smell lovely. They were roasted on June 2nd, so they have been resting a little over two weeks, which may be the perfect time.

Here are the ground beans (Comandante C40 at 25 clix) in the sifter:

28 grams of ground coffee yields 20 grams of consistent grind once you filter out the fines using a sifter. It’s very important that you get this step of the coffee making right when making pour-over. Coffee that is too finely ground will extract quickly and make it taste too strong and muddy. Spend $100 on a sifter, you won’t regret it!

Here’s the perfectly consistent grind (no grind finer than 800 microns):

I use a Chemex (hand-blown of course, and pronounced “sha-may”) to make coffee. 200 degree Fahrenheit water with three pours: first pour to 50 grams (30 seconds), second pour to 150 grams (90 seconds), third and final pour to 300 grams (150 to 180 seconds).

A “three-cup” Chemex makes one cup of coffee. A “five cup” Chemex makes two cups of coffee. That’s a three-cup Chemex below:

This method makes a perfect 10 ounce cup of coffee.

Brewing a Cup of Mamuto AA from George Howell Coffee

Added on by C. Maoxian.

This week’s coffee is a washed SL28 from the Mamuto farm in Kenya. This is a medium roast.

I paid $35 for 8 ounces, which works out to only $4.38 a cup (beans only). I forgot to get a picture of the roast date, but it was a March 10 roast. This means that the coffee has been resting for about three weeks, which could be a perfect amount of time.

Lovely aroma from the whole beans. Quite a bit of chaff on the grind.

Do you even sift, bro? It’s extremely important that you sift out your fines when making pour over. The fines will muddy everything up and ruin your beautiful cup of coffee. Set them aside!

Comandante C40 notes:

25 Clix: 1100 microns: 12.5 grams, 800 microns: 8.1 grams

25 Clix (another grind): 1100 microns: 11.2 grams, 800 microns: 8.7 grams

25 Clix (yet another grind): 1100 microns: 11.2 grams, 800 microns: 8.9 grams

25 Clix (yet yet another grind): 1100 microns: 11.0 grams, 800 microns: 8.8 grams

24 Clix: 1100 microns: 11.5 grams, 800 microns: 8.9 grams

24 Clix (another grind): 1100 microns: 9.5 grams, 800 microns: 9.6 grams

23 Clix: 1100 microns: 6.5 grams, 800 microns: 10.3 grams (WAY too fine, never ever use Comandante C40 below 24 Clix for pour over)

20 grams of perfectly consistent grind after sifting. The usual recipe, 15:1 … 200-degree Fahrenheit water, 50 ml and 30 seconds to bloom, second pour of 150 ml, final pour to 300 ml total. Of course I use a hand-blown Chemex because it costs three times as much, which means it’s three times as good. It’s also important that you pronounce Chemex, “sha-may.”

Bloom pour of 50 ml.

Second pour of 100 ml to 150 ml total.

Final pour of 150 ml to 300 ml. Lovely dark color. Drained to drip at the two minute 45 second mark.