Learn
Reading
How to taste a coffee properly, without being a taster
Cupping is not guessing at exotic flavours: it is paying attention in a fixed order. Fragrance, aroma, acidity, body, sweetness and aftertaste. It can be done at ...
Shade-grown coffee: why a tree overhead makes a better cup
Growing coffee under trees yields fewer kilos per hectare and better coffee. Shade lowers the temperature, the bean ripens more slowly, the soil holds and the bir...
From cherry to cup: the steps almost nobody sees
There are eight steps between a cherry on the branch and coffee in a cup, and seven of them happen before the bean leaves the farm. Here is what each one does, an...
Washed, honey and natural: three processes, three different coffees
The same bean, from the same farm, gives three coffees with nothing in common. What separates them is not the variety or the altitude: it is time. How many hours ...
Why altitude changes the taste of coffee
Higher up it is colder, coffee ripens more slowly and the bean grows denser. That slowness is what concentrates sugars and acids: it is why a coffee from 1,700 me...
What a single-origin coffee is, and why it changes what you drink
A single-origin coffee is one where the farm, the altitude, the variety and the process are known. It is not a quality grade: it is a chain of facts that can be c...