What’s in your cup this morning ?

Really into the Manco brazilian fazendo yellow bourbon at the moment, it’s low acidity and makes a lovely cup at 5m in the clever brewer.

https://mancoco.co.uk/collections/coffee/products/fazenda-pantano-yellow-bourbon-brazil

So reading on the yellow bourbon bean apparently one of it’s characteristics is low acidity, which I definitely prefer - what’s interesting is if you search for UK roasters with it you see such a disparity in pricing, the Manco is quite reasonable at £6.50p a bag, you can pay anything up to double that. Wondering how much difference a roaster can make (of course some will be their location, pricing strategy etc).

gotters what’s interesting is if you search for UK roasters with it you see such a disparity in pricing, the Manco is quite reasonable at £6.50p a bag, you can pay anything up to double that. Wondering how much difference a roaster can make (of course some will be their location, pricing strategy etc).

There can be quite a big difference in coffee pricing, recently there was a coffee doing the rounds which was about £4.50 more expensive for 500g from one source (supposedly at a discount), than it was from a roaster called Teeside Coffee, that’s quite a difference.

The truth of it is, as the bean rises in price, the % margin it can sustain reduces. So a non coffee example might be, if a widget costs:

1. 5 = margin of 300% - 400%
2. 10 = margin of 250 - 350%
3. 15 = margin of 200 - 300%
4. 20 margin of 150 - 250%

Of course the money made changes like this:

1. £12.50
2. £20
3. £22
4. £20

There are two ways a small roaster can go, high volume and smaller margins, the only way to make more money is to increase the size of their market. Or buy more expensive coffees, make less margin, but more money. Of course, there is more risk because of the value of stock holding and having to sell older coffees at a discount, often because consumers are led to believe a coffee 1-month-old isn’t any good. It’s why most roasters roast to order a few times a week, with a couple of set despatch days.

Sometimes roasters for whatever reason, new, staff change, business consultancy whatever…get it into their heads that they must make a fixed margin…but for coffee, that really doesn’t work and either leads to consistently cheap coffee because consumers won’t pay super high prices, or the price disparities you see, So I might buy a green bean at £12 per Kilo, but a lot of roasters won’t, especially if they are in the high volume relatively fixed margin roasting.

So a long preamble to get to the recommendation that coffee is a bit like wine. The more you pay, the more of your £ is going into the coffee quality (as most roasters to take a smaller margin).

DavecUK

yep, I think though there must be an element in there of relative costs for roasters - there are some fancy schmancy places down in London who will undoubtedly have higher rents & staff costs on top of all the shared expenses like beans, electricity, transportation etc.

a small roaster in London will have higher costs but possibly their local (not internet) market may also be willing to pay a higher price.

Those Manco beans are £6.50, and are lovely. Seems that Rave sell something very similar for £5.50 and others are charging a lot more.

So yes you can get a higher quality product if you pay more, but I suspect you can also pay a lot more for the same thing, just from somewhere with a higher overhead.

gotters So yes you can get a higher quality product if you pay more, but I suspect you can also pay a lot more for the same thing, just from somewhere with a higher overhead.

Of course…London based roasters in certain areas can have some challenges. and overheads do matter. Unfortunately, though, as consumers with something called the internet, location is not that important to us (royal us). Consumers can choose to buy the same coffee from roasters with lower overheads and greater business efficiency.

The realities for businesses are that people search around for the same product at lowest price from someone they still trust. e.g. Do you buy exactly the same product from John Lewis or AO.com if there is a big difference in price.

I was riding down in the South West so stopped at Yallah’s hatch in St. Ives. Brilliant coffee, expertly prepared as usual!

Picked up a kilo of their espresso beans too. Picture of the coffee would’ve been helpful but I only got a picture of the bike and the weather!

CRANKHOUSE Oscar Mendez Finca Genesis, natural Typica

Very tasty nectarine, apple & maple syrup (not as sweet but I get it).

94.5 on Niche. 13.8g dose, 210g water, V60 02 with Hario Drip Assist.

7 pours of 30g every 30s,each pour taking ~10s.

First 2 pours via the centre of the Drip Assist, remainder around the ring.

Bombe dry fermentation from Sidame region of Ethiopia. According to tasting notes: summer fruits, grapefruit, jasmine, hops. As I was out and about today, I took my Aeropress Go and a cheap hand grinder set as fine as I could adjust it. 15 gm in the Aeropress in shotgun configuration, enough water to cover the grounds and left to bloom for about 30 seconds then topped up, stirred for 10 seconds, filter on, and left to brew for about 2 minutes. Inverted onto mug and gently pressed out. First taste was like chewing an Opal Fruit! In the best possible way! I’ve decided I don’t use the Aeropress often enough.

Same beans today, 18g ground at 21 in Niche, choked the Barista Express producing 28g after a minute. Topped up to 280ml for a (very) long black. It was still surprisingly drinkable, no real trace of the fruits but definite hops flavour like Thornbridge Jaipur beer. I’m going to try again later this morning with a coarser grind. I’m still very happy how these beans are tasting.

Platypus Just out of interest, can you get oil on a bean just by roasting too fast but not hitting second crack?

Absolutely…you can.

If time is money and roasters push the roast too fast, it will result in a bean that shows oil without reaching anywhere near 1st crack. You can often see this on medium roast beans within 2 weeks…as the oil usually appears after 3 days to 12 days if they have been roasted too fast. I have medium roast beans 2 months old with no oil at all on them…as it should be.

The other cause can be a lack of proper training, or self-taught roasters who find the output of the “World Roasting Championships” and think that 7 or 8m is a great roasting time….forgetting that it’s a 6kg roaster with only 3kg of beans, and tried the same day, IMO an industry fluff piece.

Roasting too fast has a number of undesirable effects on the coffee……and how it keeps.

AAh! thanks! I’ve had some beans show oil that I’ve roasted myself (I’m a novice) but did not think that I’d hit second crack , maybe this was the cause. Thanks.

Had a nice batch brew from my local this morning, it was a Brew Project Natural Costa Rica. Reminded me of those danish pastry biscuits with the jam inside.

Django Santa Ana. Just arrived, but I couldn’t wait. I left the grounds to rest for 15-20 minutes.

19g in 41.2g out in 29 seconds with additional 8 sec pre-infusion.

Tasted like a boozy tropical fruit salad. Passion fruit and pinnacle were dominant, berries in the background and a hint of vanilla extract. “Crema” looks darker in photo.

Bella Barista’s Camocim Iapar - curious to try this as BB have monsooned the beans in a Norfolk salt marsh barn.

First shots pulled at 28 and 50 secs - latter taming the acidic notes more than the shorter pull. Getting lemon/lemon pith in spades - it’s a powerful espresso.

Anyone else given it a go?