Help needed choosing coffee

Snikom

Hiya

I am new to single varietal coffee (I have been drinking singles for just over a year but not really “thought” about it). I have a subscription with White Rose Coffee and have bought a few top up bags from Rave, James Gourmet and Jolly Bean Roastery (possibly a couple of others)

Theses have mainly been used for filter (v60 and moccamaster) and some of the less acidic ones for espresso

Generally the coffee has been good and we have enjoyed trying to spot flavours etc.

However I have now had two bags of coffee (from different roasters) I find pretty much undrinkable, to me it has a smell and tang of sour milk.
I didnt record the first coffee so dont know what it was (I actually thought it was just a bad batch or something) and dont want to call out a roaster for what may for all I know be a prized characteristic but I can say the second bag was a columbian, natural geisha (my only geisha so far). This has settled down having been left but still not that “nice” to my palette

Now I understand its horses for courses and I am always reminded of the first time I tried a chardonnay and I took it back to the off license I used and asked the owner if there was something wrong with it. She confirmed there wasnt took it home for herself and gave me a nice bottle one of my more usual bottles instead :)

But I am wondering if there is something I should be avoiding in tasting notes or processing that would give this flavour.

Thanks for any help

MWJB

No easy answer to this, really just make notes of the origins that you have particularly enjoyed & roaster/roast level. I wouldn’t put too much store in the notes, more use them as a guide to avoid things you suspect you won’t like, but don’t always expect to detect the flavours described on the bag.

Always worth asking the roaster directly what they would recommend, given your preference.

Are you confident that your brew regime & grind size are otherwise giving representative results?

Good filter roasts seem to be the hardest to find.

Out of interest what were the notes on the 2 bags you didn’t like so much?

Snikom

I can’t recall the first bag, the second has notes of pineapple and cherry bit all I could get was an overwhelming sense of sour milk. :S

Snikom

Edit to add I can smell this straight from the bag, so it isn’t something in the brewing/grinding

Dusk

White Rose tend to be at the darker end of the scale from my experience so perhaps the beans you didn’t like were quite a bit lighter and more acidic. The best thing to do is just keep trying different beans. I enjoy constantly changing so rarely buy the same beans twice, sometimes I’m a bit disappointed but it’s all part of the overall enjoyment for me. Even if you buy a bean for a specific tasting note or variety, there’s no guarantee that you’ll love it.

Twotone2

I’ve been buying beans from white roast for about a year, their prices are unbelievable compared to most others, and find their coffee pretty decent, I never really get the ‘notes’ but I drink mainly milk based so probably most of them are hidden by the milk.

My go to is their monsoon Malabar which is excellent and the Vietnamese which is also very good and very cheap, can’t say I’ve ever smelled sour milk from any bag of beans I’ve ever bought though and I’ve been buying beans for about 15 years, we go through about half a kg a week and about a kg a week when my two adult kids were living with us.

dfk41

Twotone2 Post a link Tony. I have bought a bit of coffee from this bunch and thoroughly enjoyed the Nicaraguan Decaf

https://a1coffee.net/collections/coffee-supplies-coffee-beans

Twotone2

https://whiterosecoffeeroasters.co.uk

Warm-upTime

Natural process coffee has a fermented taste, a lot of people aren’t keen on it, myself included at the start, but i do enjoy them now.

DavecUK

Warm-upTime Natural process coffee has a fermented taste, a lot of people aren’t keen on it, myself included at the start, but i do enjoy them now.

That is does…I have one that has a cider vibe. Welcome to the forum

Warm-upTime

DavecUK

Thanks for the welcome, much appreciated mate, that sounds interesting indeed, the first natural process i really enjoyed was from James Gourmet, it was very nice, and it made me rethink what my preferences where at the time, always great to expand the flavours we enjoy.

Snikom

This may well be it. I am not sure we have had many naturals.

I clearly need to start using the bean conqueror app and keeping a better track of what I am drinking :)

Warm-upTime

Snikom

I had a couple of beans from Kiss the hippo, they where natural and i really didn’t enjoy them, but one mans dislike is anothers like, just had a natural there, and it had chocolate cocoa and red fruits, it tasted superb, Brazilian Sítio Maranhão, i pulled it to a 1 to 1.5 ratio and it was so good.

Snikom

So I am now wondering if it is anerobic fermentation.

The second bag I found distasteful was double fermented and I am wondering if the first was a Rwandan anerobic which one of the suppliers I have used see. They say anerobic fermentation causes lactic acid acid which could well account for the sour milk vibes I was getting.

I am going away for a month and wanting to take a couple of bags of coffee with me, so have ordered a Monsoon and a summer blend to keep me going :)

Warm-upTime

Snikom

Keep trying different beans mate, it’s all in the journey.

Warm-upTime

Snikom

And try some good blends, don’t discount them because they’re not single origin, i’ve had some blends that are amazing, i often combine single origin beans for a shot if i think they’ll work well, or sometimes if i have 2 bags of beans that i don’t enjoy, i’ll try them together for a shot, it would surprise you how many times that one works for me lol.

Cuprajake

I find dog and hat brilliant for trying coffees and roasters I’d not normally try

Snikom

Cuprajake

The reason I ended up drinking single origin coffee was after a similar kind of gift from a friend that had several trial packs of various coffees

Warm-upTime

Cuprajake

I’ve had a friend recommended them, i may try them out, but i just haven’t because i don’t like the idea of a subscription, as i like to time my bags for different roast levels.