12 tips to choose a good specialty coffee

1. Is there a better coffee than another?

Hmm... Difficult to answer. But this is a similar case to wine: there are many profiles of different high-quality coffees. Fortunately, there is no one supreme in relation to the rest, rather there are parameters that allow obtaining great results with various origins. Here, the best coffee will be the one you like the most, not the one imposed on you. It is best to vary and identify which origins you like best for each type of preparation. 

Here are some observations that will help you as a guide:

 

2. Shine

A good coffee should not shine. The brightness shows an excess of temperature during roasting and will cause it to enter the rancidity process, since the coffee oils will be on the surface ready to start absorbing external odors and lose their own. They are also usually coffees with harvest defects that are roasted darker to hide traces of pests or poor selection. Marketing will tell you it's dark “intense”, it sounds nice, but it's not real, intensity has nothing to do with color.

As ridiculous as it sounds, you should look for a "brown" color in brown, opaque and never tending to black. Also, when you see the bag say “tradition”, “Italian”, “French” or “intense”, you better run, they are just marketing tricks to sell you a bad grain at a high price.

 

3. Date of roasting

Think of the grain as a chemically active food. This, over time, will change, similar to bread, which when fresh is very aromatic and rich, but with time it becomes harder and with a flatter flavor. Fresh will have a great aroma as a result of its volatility, but this also means that it is "losing itself to the air" and you should take advantage of it when it still has most of its essence. 

The first few days it will have a lot of gas from the roasting. It is ideal to allow at least two days to pass from the date of roasting to achieve balance. A week will begin to show the best of himself. After a month, so much CO2 will be gone that it will be "unprotected", which will begin its loss of characteristics in an accelerated way. 

For this reason, it is not advisable to buy high-quality coffee in the supermarket, there it will probably have been left in the warehouse for several months and by the time you buy it, you will already be paying a lot for a product that has lost its characteristics. It's always best to look for local roasters.

 

4. Does coffee expire?

Practically not. What happens is that over time it loses its quality and as many days go by, the exposure of an edible material to environmental conditions can induce it to generate fungi or a bad taste as a result of absorbing bad odors. It is similar to storing flour. Keep it dry, dark, and as airtight as possible, and you won't have these problems.

 

5. Is Colombia the best producer in the world?

No, but it has an ideal soil and climate for its cultivation. It's like what happens to us in Chile with wine: our characteristics make it easy for us to have good results. In fact, the coffees with the best scores usually come from Africa, the birthplace of this bean.

 

6. Is Brazil a bad supplier of coffee?

For nothing in the world! Brazil also has a great climate for coffee production, but it has lower terrain. For the same reason, they have prioritized growing more Robusta instead of Arabica. In general, Robusta has a more commercial objective. This plant is more resistant to pests, produces much higher volumes and is not cultivated with such care.

Anyway, Brazil also produces Arabica and has everything you need to get excellent results. Some Brazilian vintages have had very important participations in barista championships.

 

7. Is the best coffee in the world taken in Italy?

 

No. Well, maybe yes, but it would be ironically hard to find. In Italy you drink a lot of coffee but not necessarily good. Italy has a tradition of drinking a very commercial coffee, which they obtained at a very low cost from their colonies in Brazil. Also, in turn, such a demand required them to roast quickly and without much care, and as you will learn, roasting is a world of complexity, making it fast is often a bad idea.

 

8. Arabica, Robusta or Blend?

 

In general, the rule is simple: 100% Arabica aims to prioritize quality and Robusta is mainly used to lower costs. So, the more percentage of Robusta the bag has, the more they aim to lower its cost by sacrificing quality.

The quality of a blend is very subjective, there are good ones and bad ones. They are blends that can be Arabica and Robusta or only Arabica, but from different origins. In general, the use of blend is usually to lower costs or take advantage of the coffee balances that remain in the cellar. 

This does not mean that a strategic blend cannot be made that seeks a good result using two different origins that are well balanced and of great quality. If the origins were roasted separately and then combined under many cupping tests, very good results could come out of it. Curious fact: if you really like wine, you may already know this, but the bottles only have 70% of the variety that the label says, the rest is a delicate and complex balance of flavors that a sommelier must determine vintage after vintage, since that inevitably the weather will change the rules year after year. 

So, making a good blend requires a lot of expertise. 

 

9. Is darker coffee better and stronger?

 

No. The color only has to do with the degree of roasting and as you already know, dark roasts seek to hide defects and make the roasting process considerably easier than roasting it to its correct point.

The amount of "strength" your coffee has will depend on other factors: the type of bean, the grind, the method you use to obtain it, the time in contact with the water, etc.

 

10. Is espresso going to wake me up more?

 

Yes, but because of the impact of the flavor, not because of the caffeine. This is obtained in contact with water. The espresso is obtained between 20 to 30 seconds, while a French press goes from 4 and a half minutes to 5 minutes, with which you will clearly have more caffeine in the press, even so, it is not that simple, it is not that the press is going to have a very different amount than espresso, there is another factor that influences that of percolation or immersion (they are already more advanced topics), but in simple words, the difference is not that great, so the effect they have on It will depend on how much coffee you drink.

Caffeine does not have an immediate effect, it will take a couple of minutes. And it will not give you energy either, but it will only postpone your feeling of tiredness. Now, what you love so much in the morning isn't that it really keeps you up at night. Yes it does, but what your brain likes is that it vasodilates your body and helps you feel more clear-headed and focused.

 

11. Coffee makes me sick to my stomach, is it better to drink decaffeinated?

 

In general, what is bad is the carbonization of a coffee that is too roasted or the result of what a poorly stored coffee has absorbed. A well-processed coffee should not negatively affect your health unless you have a disease affected by caffeine. 

 

12. Is coffee beans better than ground coffee?

 

Yes, whenever you have the possibility, try to grind the coffee yourself, just before consumption. With this you will get better results and you can do it easily with manual and electric grinders that are available for all types of users. 

Now , if you do not have a grinder, it is important that you ask us for the ground coffee specifying the method you will use. We have very consistent grinders for this purpose and you can order anything from quarter to kilos ground if that is what you need. Here the important thing is to keep the coffee stored in the bag in which it comes. It is designed to keep you in good condition.

 

Check our website to know more about ethiopian coffee on our website.