Coffee Blends Poll

Which coffee blend do you prefer?

  • Signature Cocoa (Chocolate) Blend, Almond, Hazelnut, or Vanilla Blend (if you choose this, please po

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Colombian Blend

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Brazilian Blend

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • French Roast

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Kenyan Blend

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Jamaican Blend

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    5
I'm lost...do you want us to pick our favorite coffee or do you want us to come up with a blend with the coffees above...it is hard to be so cut and dry...there are a lot of other factors...percentage of each coffee...roast profiles...oh well just don't understand the question I guess...sorry
 
I love my Ethiopian... so far the best that I have tried.

I don't see Nicaraguan on there, that would be my very close 2nd choice.

Never tried Guatamalan... since it's in the same group as Ethiopian is it pretty similar?
 
The Corazon Cupping panel has been working diligently on our blends as of late. Today we finalized three blends we will be offering to the public....

Our Ju-Ju blend is comprised of Ethiopian Sidamo and Yergacheffe. (I'm not specifying roast degree or ratios.)

Our Corazon Breakfast blend is comprised of an Ethiopian and Central American beans. It is our lightest, brightest offering.

Our Heart and Soul blend is made up of African and Central American offerings.

We are still working on the recipes for our espresso blends. I thought we had that nailed down, but two days after roasting, one of the initial blends tastes too burnt for my palate. The other too busy. Tomorrow I'm going back to the drawing board and roasting a few more batches at slightly lower temps, including a Brazilian offering from Faz Colina that I'm hoping will serve as a single-origin espresso.

We hope to open our shop next Monday.

lw
 
Ju-Ju is a term used to describe traditional West African religions.

From Wikipedia: .....The term juju, and the practices associated with it, travelled to the Americas from West Africa with the influx of slaves and still survives in some areas, particularly among the various groups of Maroons, who have tended to preserve their African traditions.


Contrary to common belief, voodoo (known as Vodun in West Africa) is not related to juju, despite the linguistic and spiritual similarities. Juju has acquired some karmic attributes in more recent times. Good juju can stem from almost any good deed: saving a kitten, or returning a lost book. Bad juju can be spread just as easily. These ideas revolve around the luck and fortune portions of juju. The use of juju to describe an object usually involves small items worn or carried; these generally contain medicines produced by witch doctors.....


I had pondered the idea of "light" and "dark versions of the Ju-Ju blend. However, our current recipe simply includes lighter and darker elements.

Btw, Ju-Ju is also the name of one of our cats.

lw
 
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Btw...... I've also developed something called "Hooiser Daddy - Bastard Blend" that won't be sold commercially. At the end of our cupping sessions I've been taking all of the left over combinations that don't make the final cut, bagging them and then distributing to friends. Believe it or not, this blend has been well received. Our landlord even asked if he could get more of that specific offering as his adult children liked it so much. It pained me to inform him that he would he never get more of that specific blend because I had no idea of its lineage. hehe
 
Have been working on espresso blends this last week, with nothing that really stood out until this morning. I roasted up a few potential recipes and then shut down the roaster. Just about the time it had cooled enough to power down the barrel I came up with the idea of experimenting with a single origin dark roast. So I fired up the roaster and dropped in a few pounds of a brazilian from the estate of Faz Colina. I took it to an "Italian" roast level and started the cool-down all over again. And I must say it was worth the effort. We finally have a dark roast that I'm proud to put our label on. Its full bodied, deep, round and nutty with no acidity nor burnt edge. The initial cupping with a dark coffee fiend went over tre-swell. I asked the guy what he thought of the coffee in question without telling him what it was or the roast level. He told me it reminded him of his favorite Italian roast. hehe

We'll do another cupping tomorrow to see how it tastes 24 hours post roast. I'll probable experiment with adding in a bit of high-quality mexican robusta we also have on hand for our Crema Love blend.

I had been hoping to work some of this dry processed Ethiopian Sidamo into a dark blend, but it just kind of "muddied the waters" when taken to the darker end of the spectrum.

I'll sleep easier tonight having figured out this last piece of the roasting/blending puzzle. (For now at least.)
 
How do you keep track of all of the combinations that you're coming up with?

Are you able to easily duplicate your bended creations......do they come out the same each and every time?

Just wondering.

Rose
 
Hi Eldub,
Congrats on your new blend and thanks for sharing. What roaster type/size are you using when creating/sampling your blends? How much do you roast at a time when you're experimenting; and do you post- or pre-roast blend?

Angela
 
I've been roasting two to three pounds of single origin beans or blends at a time. I'm using a 12kg unit from US Roasters Corp.

I place a sticker w/ blend information on or in each container of the pre-blended roasts the day before roasting and seal the container to allow the beans to reach the same moisture content. Then I put the recipe information in a log book w/ each example given a number. The name and numbers are then placed on the individual bags in which I place the pre-roast blends or add the components of those blended post roast. (Heart and Soul #1, Heart and Soul #2, etc.) I then grind a portion of each bag and place the grounds in cups sitting in front of the corresponding bag of whole beans. We then sample each variation of a blend and attempt to reach a consensus on the best offering. Those not making the cut are pushed to the back of the counter. Those deemed worthy of further consideration are left up front and revisited as the coffee cools. Eventually one is chosen that stands out through all temp changes. At that point, I take the "winner" and cross reference with the log book to find out the exact recipe/ratio used. If I come up with another recipe idea days later, another blind tasting is done with the first winner going up against the prospective recipes in another blind taste test.

Roasting bog batches on this roaster is pretty easy. And I really haven't had a problem getting consistent results with the small batches either. I start at a certain temp, activate a stop watch when the beans are added to the barrel. The record the temp drop in the drum and then use a chart to get on track with time/temps. With this roaster, the goal is to complete a roast in 15 minutes regardless of temp reached. (So a 420* roast takes the same amount of time as a 450* roast.) I have marks I want to hit as far as time/temps go with each roast level. If I'm behind, I add gas to speed up the process until I'm on track. if I'm ahead of the desired rate, I slow down the roast by letting up on the gas. There is a temp indicator for the beans and another for air temps in the barrel. Keeping the air temps slightly above the bean temps makes for a slower roast. Raising the air temps a considerable amount above the bean temps raises the bean temp quicker. When the air temp in the barrel is lower than the bean temp, the roasting process stalls out.

So far, I've managed to get almost all of my roasting efforts to the desired roasting temps within ten or fifteen seconds of 15 minutes. One effort did take only 13.5 minutes and another went about 16 minutes. But out of 30 or so efforts so far, the vast majority came out of the drum right at 15 minutes.

I have given away a lot of coffee this last few weeks to friends, family, neighbors and folks coming to the shop to see if we are open yet. The first bit went out in zip lock baggies. Now I get them in our kraft paper bags w/ labels.

We are looking to poen for business on Monday.

lw
 
Hello Eldub;
I am appreciative of your posts and your stories as to the progress of your adventure. I wish you all the success that you can have. Keep the posts coming.
Brian
 
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