Coffees

An inside look at private label coffee roasting

10 factors to consider when selecting a cafe coffee supplier

Over the last 18 months, the specialty coffee industry has increased it's attention and focus in the areas of sourcing Direct Trade coffees.

Airflow is just as important as heat and time when roasting coffee beans.

Most roasters use quite basic and rudimentary methods to evaluate and select beans. Unfortunately, many use price as a key criteria to their buying decisions - restricted to purchasing their beans within price-bands to ensure it fits into the operating budget so they have sufficient funds to spend on the stuff that means nothing to cup quality - like marketing and freebies that are demanded by cafes, etc. Some roasters rely solely on very small samples that are roasted by the brokers and sent in the mail to trial. We are talking here about 100 - 150g samples that are sent in waxed paper bags - reality is that these sample may provide some insight as to the bean character, but it is clearly an insufficient sample size to adequately evaluate a coffee bean's true potential. You can waste 100g trying to dial in the grinder properly, then you have 1 or 2 shots to taste the coffee - it's simply not enough.