Back to the warmth of T-town
Say whatever you want about Tulsa, but the weather is nice. And it's good to be back.
It's nice to type out a blog on a keyboard instead of the tiny buttons of my iPod Touch. It's nice to drink DoubleShot Coffee. It's nice to see our customers, who appreciate what we do day in and day out. It'll be nice to get back into a bit of a routine.
If you are curious about the results of the USBC, some dude from Intelligentsia won. Some other dude from Intelligentsia got second. Scott Lucey from Alterra Coffee in Wisconsin got third.
Four of the top six were from Intelligentsia.
Five of the top 25 were from Intelligentsia.
I think it's interesting to note that, of the tens of thousands of cafes and hundreds of thousands of baristas in the United States, so many of the top spots were from one. What are the chances?
Anyway, one question that occurred to me during our time in Portland was: What is espresso?
This is a serious question. Obviously espresso is a brewing method generally using 7g of finely ground coffee, compacted, and brewed with water between 195 and 205 degrees F at around 9 bars of atmospheric pressure. That's the mechanism. What are the parameters for the beverage produced as espresso? So much of the time when we are at industry events or talking to industry people, they tell us for whatever chemical reason or another, that one should not use coffee to make espresso until it has aged a certain number of days. This number varies, but generally we hear 7 days, 10 days, 12 days... and that's when they say it "PEAKS!"
The problem for us is that we love FRESH coffee. The word "fresh" is sort of a dirty word in the coffee industry. It has a negative connotation. In fact, when someone in the industry is trying to say that they like coffee that isn't stale, they try to avoid the word fresh. Because in the specialty coffee industry, the word "fresh" is usually preceded by the word "TOO."
So let's say they're right. Let's say coffee has to go stale before you can properly brew it using an espresso machine. What then? I'll tell you what. That means we stop making espresso.
Clearly I don't agree with this idea, but it seems to be the generally accepted principle of espresso in the industry. And one conundrum we keep bumping up against.
Please comment. I'd like to know your thoughts and opinions on this subject.
ps. Don't forget the DoubleShot 5th Birthday party is this Saturday at 7p.
posted by Brian at 7:02 AM
25 Comments:
Sounds like you're bumping into a subjective evaluation. I'm not a fan of collective subjective evaluations. Its kind of similar to one sports team being "better" than another, everyone wants to be associated with the winning team. If there were a way of evaluating this objectively I'd be interested. Collective subjective evaluations are dangerous and subject to politics and can serve to lead an industry in a direction that does not best represent a product.
All I can comment on is my own experience. I can say that when we were pulling shots of your Ambergris, it always tasted best right out of the USPS box on Wednesday. By Tuesday night, I was itching for Wednesday to get there. Tuesday's just didn't taste as good, 'cause it was already eight days old.
I would be interested to know if I were somehow biased from knowing exactly how old the beans were. Maybe some blind taste-tasting is in order?
I've read a bit about this and it seems there is more cargo cult mentality about when coffee “peaks” then actual fact. Numerous people online seem to think, "Gas emerging from the coffee will prevent water from thoroughly percolating through the grinds, resulting in under extraction”*. This just doesn’t make sense to me, an espresso machine extracts at 9 bars of pressure (130 psi) and there is not enough co2 pressure from the beans to provide any significant resistance to 130psi.
I ran across a blog post that said co2 from a same day roast causes the coffee to be more acidic, this actually has some science fact to it. Co2 dissolved in water does form carbonic acid. The next step in this would be to test the acidity of shots (using a digital pH tester) coming from roasts a few hours old, 24 hours old, 48 hours old, etc. If there is significant difference between 1 hour old and 48 hours old, maybe there is something to it.
I’ve never had beans same day out of the roaster so I don’t know if there is a taste difference or not. I’ve gotten some 2 days out from the roaster that were great and stayed that way though days 5-7 then days 7-10 seem good but slightly dulled flavor and after that they are significantly degraded. I’ve never had beans get better with age and I think these guys saying their beans peak at 27 days are full of it.
Brian, I really enjoy the podcast and your Ambergris blend is the best espresso blend I’ve had yet! Thanks for your hard work.
* Quote from: http://www.sweetmarias.com/espresso-freshness.html
If you really think "too fresh" is bullshit, then brew all your coffee and pull your shots ONLY on coffee roasted that same day. That's FRESH!
"Too fresh" is real. Deal with it.
Still good to see you jokers in Portland.
I told you in Portland, Nick: We never use our coffee for espresso sooner than 30 seconds out of the cooling bin. We ALWAYS let it age at least that long. I'm not kidding.
I'll agree with you that it generally tastes better a few hours after we roast it than it does a few minutes after we roast it.
But try this: as soon as the coffee comes out of the roaster into the cooling bin and it's still 4-hundred-odd degrees, grab a half-cup and make a presspot. Watch the smoke pour out of the grinder. Taste really fresh coffee. It's a fantastic feeling.
(Oh, that's right, you don't roast coffee, do you NIck? Have you ever had fresh coffee?)
Anyway... I really want to have a discussion about this. I want Paul Songer to tell me about it.
For now, NICK: define too fresh.
Tell us when it's just right.
And go make me a 20 ounce latte. Soy. Hold the dick punch.
ps. You're sweet, Nick.
First let me preface this statement by saying that I did not judge Isaiah, and have no more insight into what the sensory judges tasted/thought/wrote than anyone else.
I think that you have a valid arguement about the symantics. Perhaps judges should stay away from telling competitors what they assume went wrong, and stick to merely reflecting the experience of the espresso/performance ect. As a tech judge it would be like giving a note that the competitor shouldn't use a certain brand of doserless grinder because it always clumps and causes .5g of waste eveytime. Rather, merely observing the waste would be sufficient and the competitor would be left to find solutions or live with the .5g waste.
I don't believe in a blanket time period for resting coffee. I do believe in using a coffee in a time frame that it tastes best. It's subjective and could change based on numerous theoretical factors.
If Isaiah got generic feedback, I'm sorry to hear that. The scoresheet review session is there for a reason, and I hope you took the chance to ask someone for a more constructive explanation.
I have to echo Josh and Mike's comments above: I go through a pound of coffee in a little over two weeks, and I always try to make sure I buy Doubleshot on Tuesdays, so the beans are fresh. The flavor does a gradual slide from Day One, and after two weeks I'm ready to toss whatever's left.
Brian, you've completely spoiled me. Thanks, man.
I would be incredibly interested to know how "too fresh" is being defined and ascertained here.
Are we saying that you can taste the lack of certain notes that would be present had the coffee aged more? How would you know that without being intimately familiar with the coffee?
That you can taste more carbonic acid? What does carbonic acid even taste like? That's not a rhetorical question...I don't know what it tastes like.
Is it something else? I'm not asking for the sake of argument, I really do want to know what too fresh means, because it's not something I've even thought about when drinking coffee.
What happens to make the coffee "peak" at Day 12? And why is "fresh" so often prefaced by "too"? My coffee-drinking experience would tell me, like Josh and Mike, that coffee tastes much better Days 1-7 and noticeably, undesirably stale after that. I don't know if that's because I'm used to DoubleShot coffee or if that would also be true with a wide variety of coffees.
Brain, here's the long awaited post; the website and I came to an understanding.
With regards to 'freshness' of espresso, I have an observation. Most consumers (note, I did not say Patrons or “Gourmet Coffee” aficionados; I meant persons whom consume Espresso regardless of distinction) have never tasted freshly roasted AND freshly ground Espresso with any means of consistency. Moreover, I have never really seen any organization, company, or local ‘Coffee house’ owner really adhere to any measurable standard of Freshness.
My suspicion is, and it is whole hypothetical, it is liked to the “Mac v. PC” debate. If you are a Mac user, you know the platform and hardware are exceptional and far superior to PC. However, if you remember back in the dark ages, 1988-95, it was VERY difficult to obtain all Mac components and no upgrades. Whereas PC’s were plentiful with plethoras of peripherals, software options, hardware options, and configurations. It did not mean PC’s were better, just accessible. Now, in 2009, things are quite different for Mac users and Espresso drinkers. If you came across any Espresso, it would be sitting in the grinder for an undetermined time, from an undetermined lot of beans, roasted from a time that could not be determined.
It’s only claim to quality was for years it was solely and readily available without distinction to, or educated, to freshness. But, as I said, it’s just a suspicion.
I've been doing a bit more research about this.
If you want to read a discussion about this very thing on coffeegeek, it's here: http://coffeegeek.com/forums/coffee/questions/334502
A couple interesting things in this discussion (to me) are these:
"... if your roasting technique and / or roasting machine is not close to "ideal" and not making all "good" flavors uniformally in each bean during the roast then some of the "off " flavors or odors ect. will have time to leave each bean as it ages a bit. So aging may help the roaster at times." from DarkMajestic
In other words, if you suck at roasting or your roaster sucks or you buy low quality coffee, letting it go stale will help cover up the off-tastes. That made me laugh.
And this one:
"What appears to be massive crema when pulling a shot right off of roast is mostly CO2 disassociating from the pour." from MatthewBrinski
Granted, these guys aren't coffee professionals or scientists, but their comments are from experience. This last comment brings me back to my own question (and Daniel's reiteration of my question), what is espresso? Well, a very important part of espresso is the crema. But let me go back to what coffee beans are. Coffee beans, I think, are little containers for the desirable tastes and aromas stored inside. The woody part of the coffee bean is a semi-permeable barrier that contains oils and gasses that give the coffee it's distinct taste and aroma. The gasses (mostly carbon dioxide) protect the oils from oxidation. But the barrier is only SEMI-permeable, so over time the carbon dioxide is released and replaced by ambient air. This is what people mean when they say "degassing." Degassing is the off-gassing of carbon dioxide, which protects the flavor oils of coffee, and the introduction of air that is 21% oxygen. Oxygen reacts with oil in an unpleasant way by causing it to become rancid. So, in my opinion, degassing equals staling, or rancid coffee oil. That's why stale coffee is flat, has very little desirable aroma, and tastes a bit herby or minty. That's the taste of rancid coffee oils.
So what's the deal? When someone talks about the crema in espresso, it's important. But what is crema? We're not totally sure, but in simplistic terms it's little bubbles of oil with gas inside. What kind of gas? The gas that's trapped inside the coffee bean. When coffee is fresh, as MatthewBrinski says, the crema is mostly carbon dioxide inside those flavor oils. The carbon dioxide inside a coffee bean holds the key to fresh coffee aroma. What most people are saying is espresso is better when a coffee has degassed. Coffee that has degassed has let the carbon dioxide go and replaced it with a lot of oxygen, which causes rancid coffee. So the crema, in my opinion, ends up being rancid coffee oil filled with oxygen. Yum. They may be right, that the crema will dissipate quicker when it's fresh- and maybe that's because the carbon dioxide inside those bubbles is at an imbalance to the ambient air, whereas stale coffee is filled with ambient air and is in balance to its surroundings, causing a pressure balance between the inside and outside of crema bubbles. I suggest that crema from fresh coffee that dissipates faster is far superior to crema that sustains longer which is composed of inferior aroma.
That's why I told Isaiah when he went to the USBC that he should tell the judges, "Forget everything you THINK you know about espresso." Because they're defining espresso in their little, confined box of what someone has told them is right and good. Maybe they're wrong. I hope they're wrong. I'd hate to think the only way to properly make espresso is to pump out little bubbles of rancid coffee oil filled with non-scented ambient air.
Say what you want, but we're REAL close to the roaster and our coffee is delicious.
You know how old the coffee was that I used in the espresso today? I roasted it this morning around 5a. That's fresh and delicious. I drank some today and no one can convince me that it's wrong.
One other thing. Carbonic acid doesn't cause the taste sensation of acidity.
These are my opinions. I'm still very interested in yours. I want to know where all this comes from. What's the rationale? What am I missing?
As far as skill, beans, and knowledge are concerned, I don't perceive you've missed anything.
As far as the perceptions of the Professional Coffee World, not yet and this really depends on how in-depth you wish to explore the question: How willing are you to take “your vision of coffee to the larger (SCCA) community”?
I believe Jay Careget (sp?) thoughts you recorded in Portland in AA Cafe #57 should be a basis to start. Paraphrasing, he recommended to a) carefully craft your message that will resound in the Professional and Consumer worlds b) that your actions strive toward the recognition you want to have in the future c) create integrity that other Barista’s will also strive to obtain (the last I don’t see as a problem for you).
What do you think?
You can like whatever kind of espresso that you like. I won't "knock the taste out of yo mouth." If you like it, then great.
If the crema is fizzing and quickly dissipating, it's not gonna fare well in competition.
Frankly, this isn't something that can be discussed and resolved. Come to Atlanta SCAA Expo with the "freshest" coffee you can and let's play with it. There's no substitute for standing at an espresso machine side-by-side and pulling shots and tasting together.
Hmm.
This isn't something that can be discussed and resolved? Seems to me it already has been discussed and resolved within the ranks.
I agree that the majority isn't going to change their minds (without some larger event convincing them), but I certainly think it can be discussed. I hear plenty of junk science and speculation about why espresso is better with coffee that is... 10 days old, 12 days old, 8 days old, degassed, or whatever. I'm trying to relate my experiences with some logic and basic science in order to ask you questions about the rationale of your espresso experience. I want to know what you think espresso should be. And why?
Just like I asked before...
Someone tell me the definition of "too fresh."
Someone tell me what is just right.
And tell me why my last logical argument about fresh espresso is wrong. Anyone? Is there anyone out there? Nick. Don't brush me off. Sure, we'll bring plenty of fresh espresso to Atlanta. But answer some damn questions.
And bring a Linea for god's sake.
Brain,
WOW, you may not like this but "PREACH PREACHER!!"
You dropped a bomb- I don't think we'll find survivors. Silence is golden... :)
-Mig
Well this has been a great little tasters choice moment. I'd love to see a little basic science confirm opinions. Otherwise its all subjective.
Bway: It depends on what discipline of science you want to employ to prove (or disprove) the consensus of the sting: Fluid Dynamics, Bio-chemistry, Organic Chemistry, ect.
I'd love to employ the science. But like a lot of people I've only had the basic general education courses. I wouldn't really know where start. Though I'm sure others might.
I too do not have the credentials nor training in a scientific discipline. But what if we could find someone or someones whom might pose a hypothisis? What do you think?
I've kinda been looking at some peer-reviewed journals... I've also seen some stuff written and referenced by a Paul Songer, seemed to me like he knew what he was talking about. If the coffee industry really is into 'transparency' then I'm sure they'd be interested.
Bway said I've kinda been looking at some peer-reviewed journals... I've also seen some stuff written and referenced by a Paul Songer:
Which journals and what dates? I am interested, so could you post?
The article in question was written by Paul Songer and actually references a source from the 'Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry' along with several others. I found it one day about two weeks ago and skimmed the article briefly to find out what it had to say.
Basicly it asserts that flavor deterioration is a function of 1.)"Dissipation and non-enzymatic degradation of aromatics", 2.) "Non-enzymatic browning", and 3.) "Oxidation of aromatics and lipids". These processes are driven by thermal energy.
Although I have a basic understanding of chemistry, a much greater understanding is necessary to articulate the subject matter. Read the article for yourself at www.coffee.com.au/coffee_freshness.htm
or here
www.blackbearcoffee.com/question_of_freshness.htm
Proquest Direct offers a database of most Peer-Reviewed Journal articles within the academic community though I'm sure the odd few are left out. I've done some searches and more than a few flavor -profile biochemistry studies popped up. I'm tempted but database fees are expensive and worth more in bike components than pride.
Czerny, M., et al. Sensory Study on the Character Impact Odorants of Roasted Arabica Coffee. Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry, Vol. 47, p. 695-699, 1999.
Grosch, Werner. “Key Odorants of Roasted Coffee: Evaluation, Release, Formation.” Proceedings of the Association Scinetifique du Café International Scientific Colloquiem on Coffee, 1999, p. 17-26.
Holscher, Wilhardi and Steinhart, Hans. “Investigation of Roasted Coffee Freshness with an Improved Headspace Technique,” Institute of Biochemistry and Food chemistry, University of Hamburg, Grindelalee 117, W-2000, Hamburg, Federal Republic of Germany, 1992.
Labuza, Dr. T.P. and Cardelli-Freire, C. Kinetics of the Shelf Life of Roasted and Ground Coffee as a function of Oxygen, Water Vapor Pressure, and Temperature. Department of Food Science and Nutrition, University of Minnesota, 1354 Eckles Drive, St. Paul, MN., 1994
Rizzi, G.P. and Sanders, R.A. Mechanism of Pyridine Formation from Trigonelline Under Coffee Roasting Conditions. Procter and Gamble Company, Cincinnati, OH. 45253-8707, 1996.
Semmelroch, Peter and Grosch, Werner. Studies on Character Impact Odorants of Coffee Brews. Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry, Vol. 44, p. 537-543.
Sivetz, Michael. Coffee Technology. AVI Publishing, 1979
Tressl, R. “Formation of Flavor Components in Roasted Coffee,” Thermal Generation of Aromas, American Chemical Society, 1989, p. 285-301.
It appears I have some reading to do. When I'm finished, I'll reply.
I would respectfully submit you keep doing things your way, because living in Houston, and in so many of my travels over the last year(Southern California, Hawaii, and Washington State) I am yet to have as splendidly brewed and presented a latte as the one I had a week or so ago at DoubleShot. I would like to send the staff at my favorite coffee haunt in Southwest Houston to DoubleShot for a flavor seminar. Hands down the best coffee I've had anywhere. You've spoiled me.
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