S1: Episode 12: Miracle In A Cup
It's the season finale! In the last episode for this season we find out why that great coffee you just had was in fact a miracle in a cup. Discover just what had to go right all along the way from coffee bush to cup so that you could have a moment with your coffee. This week’s FACQ answers the frustrating question of why it is that when you find a good coffee it’s never there when you go back for it again.
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Email: thecoffeedrinkersguide@gmail.com
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Hello and welcome to The Coffee Drinker’s Guide, a podcast for the coffee curious where I explore and explain the world of specialty coffee to make your daily coffee better and more satisfying.
I’m Angela Holder a coffee roaster and writer on a mission to fight back against bad coffee by giving you the knowledge you need to help you get good coffee and a happier (coffee) life in coffee-break sized episodes. So grab your coffee, pull up a chair and take a break…
Welcome to the season finale of the podcast! I’ll be taking a short break after this while I prepare the next season’s episodes and will be back on 29th May. But first, in this episode we are taking a look at what I call the miracle in a cup. If you have ever had a cup of coffee that made you think it was the best coffee you’d had in your life then you have experienced a miracle in a cup. The truth is that so many things had to go right to make that coffee taste so amazing, it really is mind boggling…
… and in the last frequently asked coffee question for this season I tackle the related issue of why great coffee is so elusive….
If you are the kind of person who reads podcast descriptions which tell you a bit about the show, you will have read that my coffee journey began with a terrible cup of coffee. A cup of coffee that was so bad that it changed the course of my life! But what I didn’t say was that particular cup of coffee was actually the second part of my two-part coffee epiphany. As epiphany’s go it was a bit of a slow burn since Part one had happened around a year before. That was when I experienced the best cup of coffee I had ever had in my life. What may surprise you to learn is that both of these cups of coffee were made in the same cafe, albeit a year apart. The first mind blowing, delicious, cup of coffee made me into a regular at that cafe for a year. I had experienced a miracle in a cup…
Firstly the miracle and the brew
The skill of the barista, or person making your coffee, is a crucial factor in the creation of a great cup of coffee. However, people often aren’t aware that this is a factor at all and when rating a poorly made cup of coffee they tend to blame the coffee itself. The truly tragic reality is that a coffee could be made with the best beans which have been transported and stored in perfect conditions then roasted with care - and if the person brewing your coffee is careless or untrained you can find yourself drinking an appalling cup of coffee. Things under the barista's control that can spoil the flavour of the brew are: the wrong temperature water, the wrong grind, the wrong amount of coffee, badly maintained and dirty brewing equipment, leaving the espresso shot standing too long before constructing the drink…the list goes on. So when all the variables align to create a great tasting cup of coffee, please take a moment to appreciate it and the barista’s skill and give thanks to the coffee gods…
Next the miracle and the taste
Since everyone’s preferences are different there is no such thing as ‘the perfect’ coffee flavour. Kenya SL28 beans are heaven for me, but you may dislike their fruity brightness and prefer the subtle cherry and chocolate flavours of a good Brasil coffee. Each to their own. What is important is that the beans should have as few defects as possible which would make the coffee taste bad. The higher the grade of coffee, the fewer defects are allowed. So invest in buying better quality coffee and your chance of experiencing that miracle in a cup will be vastly improved.
Finally the miracle and the bean
So much of what makes a coffee taste amazing is due to how it’s treated half a world away, starting with the coffee farmer. The choice of botanical coffee variety grown, local environmental conditions and the farm’s agricultural practices all determine the intrinsic flavours of a coffee. The coffee’s flavour is further modulated by the way that the coffee cherries are processed to produce the green beans. It is then graded for quality and transported round the world. At any point on this journey the coffee’s quality and flavour can be negatively affected by something that happens to it. So frankly it can feel like a minor miracle when a coffee arrives at the roastery and proves to be exactly what the roaster believed they were buying. The next potential stumbling block on the road to great tasting coffee is roasting it to perfection. Again this takes knowledge, skill and good practices in the roastery to ensure that the full potential of the raw coffee comes through in the roasted product. Finally the coffee needs to be used within a month of being roasted for the best result. And ultimately, of course, it needs to be brewed well. With so many potential pitfalls along the way from the coffee bush to your cup, is it any wonder that a great tasting coffee truly is a miracle in a cup?
Each episode I answer a Frequently Asked Coffee Question. This episode’s question is:
Every time I find a coffee I love, it’s never there the next time I go back to buy it. Why is this?
The best tasting coffees are from carefully prepared green bean Lots. These are often small quantities which roasters tend to use up quickly. And the better the coffee, the faster it sells. Even waiting a whole year for next year's new crop of the coffee you loved can prove disappointing. Since coffee is an agricultural product which is affected by the weather there is no guarantee that the coffee will taste exactly the same as the year before even if it’s the same variety from the same farm processed the same way. Essentially when a great coffee is gone, it’s gone. As I often say, it is an ephemeral pleasure…
Thank you for listening to this episode of The Coffee Drinker’s Guide and that was all about the miracle in a cup. I hope you found this enlightening. Have you experienced a miracle in a cup, a life changing cup of coffee or a coffee epiphany? Let me know - I would love to hear about it! If this or any episode so far has connected with you please tell a coffee-loving friend and rate and review this podcast wherever you listen to your podcasts to help other coffee curious people find the show too. If you have a question about coffee or a topic that you would like me to cover please get in touch. I’m on Instagram @thecoffeedrinkersguide or email me at thecoffeedrinkersguide@gmail.com. Thanks to my executive producer Viel Richardson at Lusona Publishing and Media Limited. You can find him at lusonapub.co.uk.
And that’s it for season one of The Coffee Drinker’s Guide! The podcast will be back on 29th May with more peeks behind the scenes of the specialty coffee world, need-to-know coffee information, brewing tips and of course your Frequently Asked Coffee Questions. Make sure you follow the show so that you don’t miss the start of season 2 when it drops! Until then I’m Angela Holder thanks for sharing your coffee break with me - the best way to tackle life is one coffee at a time and here’s to better coffee!
The Coffee Drinker’s Guide is a Blue Sky Coffee Project