Posts Tagged ‘single origin coffee’

When we started up, and we’re just about to celebrate our tenth anniversary, we floated the [then slightly sacrilegious] notion that Melbourne might not, after all, be Australia’s coffee capital – in fact the things that were happening in the Sydney coffee scene were rather leaving Melbourne in the shade. Since then, however, coffee in Australia has taken many leaps forward and we’ve enjoyed riding the wave as coffee in Melbourne, in particular, has surged forward.

We have recently concluded a coffee-hopping trip [including the erstwhile capital of modern world espresso - Seattle] and we now firmly believe that Melbourne takes its place – not just as Australia’s but pretty much the world’s, coffee capital – and as you’ve probably guessed, we don’t make that sort of statement lightly!

However, coffee has got to such a stage in Melbourne, that there may not be much further you can go with espresso. The ‘third wave’ in coffee has seen more emphasis on brewing with different methods – syphon, pour-over, chemex, french press and clover – to the extent that some roasts are optimised for these brewing methods & may actually not be quite so good for espresso… a quandary that probably no other city in Australia may be experiencing.

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by Rob Stewart

My love affair with eating chillies is something that has developed over a number of years; I simply can’t resist the sensation of a good hot chilli! I love exploring the various levels of heat and the subtle unique flavours that individual chillies have such as the ‘Guajillo’, which has a red berry flavour and the’ Ancho’ with its smokey dried fruit notes. This fascination for chillies has evolved into a deep appreciation for Mexican cuisine. I have also come to value that there is more to the country than tequila and tacos, Mexico also grows some pretty good coffee too. (more…)

By Rob Stewart

By now I guess you have heard the term ‘third wave’ in coffee. It refers to a worldwide movement whereby specialty coffee roasters and boutique cafes are devoting their efforts to exploring the pure flavour of the single origin coffee and it’s something that the coffee industry and its consumers in Australia have embraced. The movement is also about innovation and patience which is seeing brewing systems like the Clover, Siphon and temperature controlled espresso machines such as the Synesso and Slayer becoming commonplace in our cafe strips. We are also seeing the green bean standard raised with access to Cup of Excellence, micro-lots, Rainforest Alliance, Fairtrade and roasters creating direct routes to the farms. One such country I believe has always been able to deliver coffee to the standard we are demanding today is Papua New Guinea. (more…)

Dean Morgan is a Sydney-based coffee roaster and owner of Morgan’s Handcrafted Coffee. In late 2003 he and his wife Michelle travelled to Guatemala, to track the beans that he roasts, to their source and also to witness first-hand the life of a small coffee farmer trying to make ends meet in a coffee-producing country. We asked Dean to relate some of their experiences to us – he talks first about his motivation for going to Guatemala, followed by some of his impressions once he got there…

As a specialty roaster, I felt it was important to put a face to an actual product. Every day I roast coffee from different parts of the world, but I wanted to make some sort of connection between the coffee I buy and the people behind it – to me, that’s the difference between specialty and bulk producers. Another motivation was to find out more about fair trade…I support the concept of fair trade, but wanted to see how it actually works in context. (more…)

Uganda is not only home to the endangered Mountain Gorilla and Jose Chameleon (Africa’s answer to Ricky Martin); but is also the 7th largest coffee producer in the World and 2nd largest in Africa, simply due to the massive quantity of Robusta the country grows.  (more…)