This May, our sensory team evaluated 43 coffees and two unique chicories (more on those later). This is a fairly average number of cups for us to taste in a month. Between class cuppings, QC/Production cuppings, paid roasted and green coffee evaluations, and ongoing projects developing unique profiles for clients' coffees, we have many opportunities to gather at the cupping table every week.
Regular readers of this cupping series may be surprised to learn that our roasting program is a very small part of what we do here at Mill City Roasters. We are an equipment manufacturer, and almost everything we do is designed to support sales and training on our roasters. Wholesale and private label roasting services help our customers launch their coffee brand and build the capital they need to eventually purchase their own roasting equipment. Our work in consulting, profile design, and coffee education is all toward a common goal: to demystify the craft of specialty coffee roasting and show more people that they, too, can be successful roasters.
I mention this to remind our readers of a point we make time and time again in our classes and trainings: every roastery, no matter how small, should have a dedicated QC schedule. For us, weekly cuppings are not optional. There is a recurring appointment on our shared calendar every week, reminding us to come to the cupping table and taste what we're working on. The only way to know if your profiles are working, if your greens are still fresh, and if your machine is operating the way it should be, is to evaluate your coffee in a standardized and professional practice. ABC! Always be cupping! Here are some highlights from our table last month.
Tega & Tula Farm, photo courtesy of Cafe Imports
New offerings from Ethiopia
At the beginning of May, we sampled a few profiles of what would be our newest greens offerings for the month. A natural processed Ethiopia Limu from the well-known farm Tegu and Tula, and a washed coffee from the Ayla Bombe washing station. The natural offering from Limu is our favorite type of natural Ethiopia. It's fruity without being boozy, juicy and clean, with notes of melon, fruit punch, and rose petals.
The washed coffee is, likewise, a terrific example of the region. In the past, we've carried a natural processed coffee from Ayla Bombe, which we loved for its blueberry cobbler and grape jelly notes. This washed offering is more floral, clean, and tart. Flavors of apricot, strawberry wafer cookies, and bergamot are met with a crisp, lightweight body. It reminds us of a delicate white tea. It's a refreshing and lovely cup that we're excited to drink throughout this summer.
Mexico Chiapas CESMACH Cooperative
We've covered this coffee on the blog before, once when we first brought it into the roastery and a second time when we profiled it for a dark roast. What we love about this coffee is its versatility, which is why we used it as our class coffee for Day One of last month's Roasting 101 course. On Day One, students roast one coffee three different ways, taking it dark, then medium, then light, while following roast profiles provided by us. The exercise helps students understand basic inputs like fuel and air flow, and get familiar with the control panel during a roast without stressing about messing up a batch of coffee.
After we break for lunch, we cup all of the morning's coffees, and student share their notes with the whole group. For many students, it's their first ever cupping, and it's an opportunity to hear notes on the same green coffee roasted 12-15 different ways. As the notes get read aloud, we're reminded of how complex coffee is. Dozens and dozens of cupping notes from one single green.
In this session, our favorite (what instructors would call "the most successful") roast was from a group of students roasting on the MCR-3D. Their light profile tasted like oranges, red popsicle, rhubarb, and grapefruit. We also enjoyed a dark roast from the group on the MCR-2D, who were able to create a rich profile that reminded us of Tootsie Roll candies, rocky road ice cream, and cherry cordial. The profile we share on the greens page for this coffee is a medium roast, which offers a great balance of sweetness and acidity for this green, and where we find classic "Mexico" notes of dark chocolate, lemon, and cinnamon.
Students cupping their coffees in Roasting 101
India Monsoon Malabar and Chicory
Our ongoing work in private label profile design and white label roasting allows us to constantly taste new coffees and coffee adjacent products that we wouldn't normally source for our wholesale program. Right now, we're working with two different companies that are showcasing unique coffees from India. As their menus grow, they continue to send us new offerings to evaluate, profile, and add to their list of retail coffees.
One new coffee we tried in May was a Monsoon Malabar AA. The unique processing method, created to mimic the effect of long sea voyages that coffee took between India and the UK, is celebrated for creating an earthy flavor profile with low acidity. This AA Malabar certainly meets that expectation, with earthy notes as well as flavors of malt, spice, and black tea. We enjoyed the round body and the deeper, sweeter flavors of roasted almonds and brown butter. Of the three new coffees that our client brought us in this batch, we like this Malabar the best, and we look forward to profiling it for retail.
Chicory is a common additive to South Indian filter coffees. In the past, we'd only tasted chicory in New Orleans-style coffees like Café Du Monde. Like coffee, spices, and everything else in the culinary world, origin matters. Chicories from different regions and farms have different flavors. We tasted two different chicories for a new South Indian blend. One was spicy and sharp, we noted black pepper, tree bark, and quinine. The second was surprisingly floral and sweet. It reminded us of a natural sweetener like monk fruit or stevia leaf, and it had notes of red candy, raspberry leaf tea, and sweetgrass. For our client's desired flavor profile, we selected the spicier first option to pair in a blend with a nutty India Arabica.
Heading West
Next week, we're on our way to Portland, OR for Coffee Fest. We're looking forward to seeing lots of old friends, teaching a bunch of new coffees, and sharing samples of some of our unique offerings like the Colombia Mango Co-Ferment I wrote about in our February Cupping Recap. We share the profile for that coffee in a class titled Roasting Rare, Unusual, and Challenging Coffees. In that class, we break down our approach to roasting decafs, naturals, Geshas, co-ferments, and other coffees that don't play by the typical roasting rules.
If you're in Portland for the show, make sure to come say "hello" to our team at the Big Red Roast Rig!
