COFFEE “For many customers, the story of how a store’s chosen brand of coffee is produced is as important to them as the taste of the product, particularly within independent cafés and delicatessens where customers expect to be served the best of the best. It is for this reason that our artisan coffee brand, Café Nueva®, proves such as popular choice within luxury coffee shops and independent cafés,” says George Thomas, coffee brand manager at Aimia Foods (www.aimiafoods.com). “Lovingly produced in the heart of the Lake District, Café Nueva products
are crafted with more than 100 years of expertise, making for an endearing story of production which matches the desirable flavour qualities of the coffee itself.
“Having specifically been developed to help independent cafés stand-out amongst the crowded coffee scene, Café Nueva’s three-wide range of artisan, roast and ground coffee blends boast unique flavour profiles which Café Nueva recommend to be paired with specific coffee styles if an operator wishes to maximise the full potential of each coffee blend. Café Nueva’s balanced and Fairtrade certified Passioné, for example, has a traditional coffee shop taste profile, whilst we feel that Forte is ideally suited for great tasting milk-based drinks such as cappuccino and latte. Single origin Colombían provides a
Q&A (Mike Steele, head roaster at 200 Degrees) Where are all 200 Degrees coffee beans sourced from? We source coffee from all over the world. The bulk of what we source comes from Vietnam, Brazil and Colombia, as these origins make up our popular Brazilian Love Affair espresso blend. There are not many coffee producing countries that we haven’t bought from over the years. How did you choose the locations to source coffee beans? When choosing coffee, we take into account a number of different factors, with seasonality playing a big part in where we buy from and when. Different countries have different harvests and therefore this means that the coffee is available at different times throughout the year. Flavour profile also contributes to where we buy from. If we are looking for something with a chocolatey or nutty profile, we’ll lean towards South American countries, or if we are looking for fruit notes then we will source from Africa. Are you planning on expanding your coffee bean selection to incorporate beans from any other far-flung locations? We are always on the lookout for new origins or varieties of coffee that become available. This year, we have purchased our first coffee from Ecuador which will be exciting to launch in our stores. Did Alex and Mike’s recent trip to Guatemala include sourcing any new coffee beans, and will any limited-edition blends be available following this trip? The main focus on the trip was to check on, and help with, the harvest of the Yellow Bourbon and Sarchimor micro-lots which we have previously bought. We did, however, cup some interesting coffees at the Dry Mill, and made some connections that maybe in the future will bring some different Guatemalan coffee to the UK.
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When choosing beans, what do you look for in terms of flavour notes, roasting quality etc? When selecting beans to buy, we take everything into account, but most importantly we ask ourselves - is this coffee delicious? People drink coffee because it tastes nice. It’s all well and good having a coffee that reads well, but if the taste leaves the customer disappointed then we’ve failed as coffee buyers and roasters. How does 200 degrees differentiate from other small batch roasters, and how does their roasting process produce better quality coffee for 200 Degrees’ unique flavour? We believe and think (like a lot of other roasters), that it’s the people who make a roastery different. The principle of roasting is the same for anyone, but it’s the roaster who changes the variables and creates a profile that makes coffee taste great. Describe what your vision for 200 Degrees was from the start in terms of its coffee offering, and how it has evolved since the company’s inception in 2012. Our coffee offering has evolved quite a bit since 2012 when we were first only offering an espresso blend, a decaf and a filter blend. In 2014, I joined the company and we opened our first coffee shop. This allowed us to increase our offering by bringing in a guest espresso and guest filter coffee this is pretty much always a single origin speciality grade coffee. Over the years, we’ve grown our expertise of different coffees and have increased our knowledge and quality of coffee blends that we buy. This year we landed our first 90+ coffee - a grower and producer of single origin and single variety coffee in both Panama and Ethiopia. This blend is due to be released later in the year, stay tuned!
How do you train staff to ensure that they roast each batch perfectly? How many years of coffee/roasting experience do your current roasters have, for example? I have six years of roasting under my belt and our new roaster, Micah, is just completing his first year as a roaster. As head roaster, part of my role is to guide and train others to ensure that our high standards are met consistently. Alongside my guidance, we use Cropster which is an industry standard piece of roastery management software. This visually logs what is happening during the roast via temperature probes, by using this we can ensure that a profile is followed closely and when adjustments are needed midroast, we can log them and refer back to them. This is great for looking back at roasts and discussing profiles. How much coffee is roasted across the company for normal and wholesale customers (total figure would be great)? As of March 2020, we are roasting 2.5 tonnes a week, with planned growth to increase this.