JulieCraves

Coffee reviews / Latin America / Starbucks

Starbucks Black Apron Costa Rica

Plainspoken Coffee. A Coffee Review for Ordinary People by Ordinary People, #29.

Starbucks Black Apron Exclusive: Organic Lomas Al Rio (Costa Rica).

This review is a tad out of the ordinary for two reasons. First, I don’t buy coffee from Costa Rica. For the most part, they have gone in for sun coffee and chemicals and the Costa Rican marketing model makes it very difficult to identify where and how a particular bean was grown. You can read all the details in my post on coffee growing in Costa Rica. Second, I don’t buy coffee from Starbucks. Not because I dislike the company, but I just find most of their coffee overroasted, not very fresh, and in the case of the Black Apron line, outrageously overpriced ($14/half pound). Nonetheless, the back stories of the Black Apron coffees have been so interesting (e.g., Gemadro, Terranova) that I always see what’s new and what I can find out about it.

The latest Black Apron Exclusive is Organic Lomas Al Rio. Lomas Al Rio is not an estate, farm, or co-op, but a coffee mill in the Central Valley. This area is known for its sun coffee. To its credit, Starbucks makes no claim that this is shade coffee, and clearly states Lomas Al Rio is a mill. This source is not new to Starbucks, which has been purchasing Lomas Al Rio coffee since 1998; it is an intregal part of its Cafe Estima blend.

The Lomas Al Rio mill receives coffee from well over a hundred small and medium farms. It doesn’t process exclusively organic coffee, in no small part because so little organic coffee is produced in Costa Rica (less than 1% of the crop). Many farms in Costa Rica that were once organic have given up on it and gone back to using chemicals (non-organic nitrogen fertilizers in particular). The reason often given is that quality can’t be sustained organically. This is inaccurate in general, but in the case of large areas of sun coffee, it may be true. Sun coffee monocultures strip the soil of nutrients, and pests are more prevalent without the predators (birds, lizards, other insects) found in more forested coffee farms. The long route to high quality organic coffee in Costa Rica would probably involve re-planting a lot of native shade trees. Obviously, it’s easier to just start using non-organic means instead.

Around 2002, Lomas Al Rio was Costa Rica’s first Smithsonian Bird-Friendly certified coffee. Alas, it is no more, having let certification lapse.

No doubt this coffee is Catuai and/or Caturra, as these sun-tolerant varieties are very dominant in Costa Rica. If the “use by” date on the packaging is 6 months out from roasting, we sampled this coffee at two months old, rather long in the tooth. It produced a weak bloom, so I’d guess the we’re pretty close on the age. As I mentioned, most Starbucks coffees are roasted too dark for my taste. This wasn’t too bad, a medium-brown with a sheen, but no spots of oil. But I was dismayed at the pieces and shards in the bag, and the tell-tale missing divots on many beans, a sign that the coffee was roasted too fast. This is a sign of carelessness, but may only affect a given batch. At $14 a box, I was not about to buy another to see how common this error might be. So my expectations were not high. I was very happily surprised.

This coffee had great balance, with a medium body, a pleasant, soft mouthfeel, and a nice finish. It was wonderfully sweet when hot, and it had a distinct flavor than none of us (amateurs) could identify. Marzipan popped into my head — some sort of carmelized sugary almond flavor. Another taster also felt strongly about an almond note. This intriguing mystery flavor meant we tried it repeatedly with different people. Just about everybody liked it, and nobody came any closer to really nailing the sweet taste. Once the coffee really got cool, it took on a sort of odd flavor. But, what do you know, it got a solid 3.25 motmots.

Coffee Review tasted Lomas Al Rio from two different roasters in 1998 and 2002.

Coffee and the environment

5 top actions coffee drinkers can take to help the environment

Today is Blog Action Day: thousands of bloggers are uniting to put a single important issue on everyone’s mind. This year, it’s the environment.

Coffee & Conservation is all about the impact of coffee growing on the environment. Because coffee consumption is so ubiquitous, coffee drinkers have tremendous influence on habitat preservation and the conservation of biodiversity. The small actions of many people have enormous power — your actions can make a difference!

Here are the top 5 actions you can do as a coffee drinker to help the environment.

  1. Stop buying coffee from “the big four”: Nestlé, Kraft, Procter and Gamble, and Sara Lee/Doewe Egberts. Here is a list of their brands. These multinational companies, aside from having other dubious business practices outside of coffee, are motivated entirely by profit and market share. The only way they can offer cheap coffee at their huge volumes is to increase production and decrease production costs. Coffee is grown as a monoculture in the sun on large plantations with high chemical inputs and farmers are not paid a living wage. Read more about how sun coffee destroys biodiversity and the issues surrounding corporate coffee. I can’t emphasize enough: if you do one thing, this is it, quit buying commodity coffee.
  2. Buy organic coffee. Certified organic is great. Quite a lot of coffee is grown organically but not certified (“passive organic”) or nearly organically (even occasional use of spot-applied herbicide or non-organic fertilizer is a disqualifier). If you are willing to do a little research to learn which ones, these are great, too. You can read more in the organic coffee category; of special interest is this post summarizing organic certification.
  3. Use your own mug! Disposable coffee cups have to be the most wasteful product in the Western world. Here’s something you own for less than a half-hour, and throw away. And you get another the next day, or perhaps sooner. Good for the companies that are developing cups made from recycled or biodegradable materials. They still get thrown away, and in the anaerobic conditions of a landfill, even grass takes a very long time to break down. In the U.S. between 15 and 39 billion cups are tossed every year (Starbucks uses nearly 2 billion a year). How many do you throw away? Stop!! Bring some mugs to work, keep a couple of travel mugs in the car. How hard is that?
  4. Buy from a local roaster. Unless you live in the tropics, it will not be possible for you to drink locally-grown coffee. But you can cut down on the fuel used to ship roasted coffee by purchasing from a local roaster. You can check out my interactive roaster map for some great roasters around North America — feel free to make suggestions for additions. If you don’t have a local roaster, look for Allegro coffee at your nearest Whole Foods Market. There’s an added bonus for supporting your local roaster. You develop a relationship with them and can let them know what’s important to you. You increase their business, providing them with resources which enable them to develop direct relationships with farmers, which nearly always means improving sustainability efforts. Win-win-win.
  5. Quit using paper coffee filters. Don’t kill trees and send a filter a day to the landfill. There is a reusable gold filter for virtually every pot. This action also saves money in the long run, and makes your coffee taste better. Most paper filters tend to change the taste of the coffee, either by adding their own paper/chemical taste, and/or by absorbing some of the oils in the coffee that help give each bean its unique flavor.

Coffee-related products / K-Cups/Keurig brewers: alternatives

Keurig reusable coffee filter for single cup brewers

Some time ago, I wrote a post on refilling K-Cups, the single-serve coffee “pods” used with the Keurig single-cup coffee brewers.  I hate the idea of sending the plastic, foil-topped cups to the landfill.  An internal memo provided to me by a representative of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, which owns a large share of Keurig Corp. and manufactures K-Cups, stated “the environmental impact of the K-Cup waste stream is one of the most significant environmental challenges we face.”

The company does offer a product which completely avoids the throw-away K-Cups: the Keurig My K-Cup Reusable Coffee Filter. Let’s take a look at this product.  (Update: this review refers to the older version, but the concept is the same. I’ve since written a table of K-Cup alternative products, with links to all my reviews, updated in December 2018).

What it is
The My K-Cup is a simple three-part contraption: a mini gold filter basket that fits into a filter holder with a lid. The filter holder corresponds with the removable assembly in the Keurig brewers that hold the disposable K-Cups. I thought perhaps it would be difficult or annoying to swap out this assembly for the My K-Cup, but either pops right out and the other pops right in. Simple.

How it works
Very straightforward. 1) Fill the filter basket with ground coffee. 2) Set it in the bottom holder, twist on the lid. 3) Pop out the assembly in your Keurig brewer, and pop in this holder assembly. 4) Push the brew button.

The math
There is, of course, a bit of finesse involved in step 1 above.

First, a standard measure for coffee is 2 tablespoons per 6-ounce cup of coffee. Since “tablespoons” (and coffee scoops) vary, we’ll go with the equivalent recommended by the Specialty Coffee Association of America, 10 grams per 6 oz cup. I realize I’m mixing metric with English measurements. Most people have kitchen scales, which are able to measure weight in grams. And most average-sized coffee mugs are between 6 and 8 ounces. Once you know what 10 grams looks like, and how much water you typically use, you’ll know how to make your coffee.

So, the package insert says that the My K-Cup holds 2.7 tablespoons of coffee. I won’t use a conversion formula to tell you what the equivalent is in grams, since I’ve not found one with the proper translation of volume to weight for coffee. I simply used my scale, and the My K-Cup holds right around 14.5 to 16 grams of coffee.

Usage tips
The instructions say not to pack the My K-Cup filter. The water would not flow through the coffee, grounds would overflow into the holder, and they would clog the hole at the bottom of the holder. Likewise, very fresh coffee (which I hope you are using) “blooms” as the hot water causes a release of carbon dioxide. That can also cause overflow and cloggage.

So use care to only fill the filter to just under the plastic rim. Actually, probably the worst aspect of the whole My K-Cup experience is filling this little filter with coffee grounds. It’s easiest with a spoon, but still sort of a pain.

A very fine espresso grind may clog the filter and cause the same problem. I experienced this because I thought I would get more flavor from a very fine grind, and it made a mess. It will require some care to find the correct grind that will allow enough extraction but not cause clogging or overflow.This probably varies with the coffee and roast strength, not to mention the grinder. Start with a grind somewhat finer than a drip grind. Go with as fine a grind as possible that doesn’t cause brew failure.

Results

Compared to a drip machine, the Keurig provides a slightly cooler brew temperature (the max is 192F) and a shorter length of time the grounds are in contact with the water. Therefore, the 15 grams of coffee in the My K-Cup would work best with smaller brew sizes (under the large 9 ounce choice offered on the brewers).I did some tests, using the same coffee and same grind with the My K-Cup, a drip brewer, and the Aeropress small batch coffee maker. Not surprisingly, the Aeropress offered the most rich and intense flavor. But the My K-Cup does make a cup quite comparable to a typical drip machine.

And if you are so pressed for time that you are using a Keurig brewer in the first place, my bet is that you neglected to clean your old drip machine on a regular basis. This is a huge, overlooked advantage of a Keurig brewer: it doesn’t get dirty. You will certainly want to wash the My K-Cup filter and holder (or the assembly for the disposable K-cups) with soapy water on a regular basis, but overall it’s much less work than maintaining a drip machine.

Conclusion
The My K-Cup is the sustainable choice — when used with a sustainable bean, of course — for use with a Keurig brewer. Still, it will probably not satisfy those who want a strong, really flavorful cup (especially a big one). I think Green Mountain has achieved good results with some of their K-Cup  varieties, although I’ve yet to have any K-Cup that compared to a decent bean in a French press preparation. It would probably take a lot of experimentation to get consistent, really satisfying, beyond-the-ordinary coffee using a variety of beans with My K-Cup. This sort of defeats some of the convenience of a Keurig brewer, but still preserves the speed, energy efficiency, and coffee waste minimization advantages of these machines.

Coffee reviews / Latin America

Coffee review: Paradise Roasters Panama Carmen Estate

Plainspoken Coffee. A Coffee Review for Ordinary People by Ordinary People, #28.

It’s taken too long to get around to reviewing coffee from one of the most well-known coffee farms in the world that is marketed as sustainable, Panama’s Carmen Estate. Although often available from a variety of roasters, this review will feature a top boutique roasters. Let’s look at Paradise Roaster’s Panama Carmen Estate 1750 Reserve.

Carmen Estate is located in Chiriqui province near the town of Paso Ancho (you can input these coordinates into Google Earth or Maps for the exact location: 8.823611, -82.631944). It is Rainforest Alliance certified, and 60% of the property is native forest. It is not certified organic; I know they use some non-organic soil amendments such as calcium. They grow cataui, caturra, and typica varieties, which are represented in this lot.

Carmen Estate has won the following honors:

  • 2003, Best of Panama Cupping for Quality competition: 3rd place (88.05 pts)
  • 2005, Best of Panama Cupping for Quality competition: 3rd place (92.54 pts)
  • 2005, Rainforest Alliance Cupping for Quality competition: 1st place (90.75 pts)
  • 2006, Best of Panama Cupping for Quality competition: 3rd place (89.71 pts)
  • 2006, Rainforest Alliance Cupping for Quality competition: 2nd place (88 pts)
  • 2007, Rainforest Alliance Cupping for Quality competition: 2nd place (88.96 pts)
  • 2007, Best of Panama Cupping for Quality competition: 5th place (89.35)

Paradise’s 1750 Reserve is a special micro-lot from the top elevations of the farm (one might assume at 1750 meters, but I’ve read elsewhere it’s from even higher), although the “lowest” elevation of the farm is about 1450 meters — higher than the top locations of many farms.

I have to say, the Miguel Meza, head roaster at Paradise, sure knows how to roast coffee. I may have had some coffee from them I wasn’t crazy about (although none come to mind), but it was never the fault of the roast. He can really read a bean.

This was a light roast, with a truly room-filling, delicious aroma when ground. In the French press, it had all the best characteristics of a classic Central American: very sweet, with understated candy-like caramel tones, a hint of chocolate, and a light body, although not quite as bright and acidic as some Centrals. It was nicely balanced, and consistent as it cooled. Some of its delicate subtlety was, as expected, lost in a drip preparation. This is a great warm-weather coffee, as reviewers felt it was light and refreshing, perhaps even a little on the delicate side. It’s one of those very enjoyable coffees that you can drink all day. As we’ve said many times, it’s hard to really describe a classic Central, but this is as good as they come. It just made me feel….happy.  3.75 motmots.

Review of this coffee from Coffee Cuppers here.