It's Official!

That's what he told me after he drank the last pot of liquid heaven that I roasted for him. "You have officially now become my coffee provider."

Our pastor at church is a budding coffee snob. Many months ago I gave him a gift of roasted coffee and now that's all he wants. Also, I have been asked to roast the coffee for the church so the VOX can have the freshest and best coffee for their guests. So, I've been learning about the legal side of roasting coffee as a business - you know, getting the food inspector involved and everything. But as intimidating as it was to get the Michigan Department of Agriculture involved, the most daunting task has been figuring out how to price the stuff. Without going into all the details I have landed on a position. What I provide is unique in that the coffee that I sell is #1 - Fresh and #2 - Small-batch/hand-roasted.

When I say that what I sell is fresh, what this means is that every batch that I sell just came from the roaster. Coffee stales two-weeks after roasting so this means that the coffee that you buy from the store is most likely already stale. People never really notice this because they have never had fresh before. And when I say that I hand-roast a small-batch I mean that when the large stale-coffee providers roast coffee they will dump a 50# bag of green beans into a computer-controlled-commercial roaster where I only roast 2/3 of a cup of green beans at a time. Roasting good coffee is more of an art rather than a science and coffee is finished cooking when the beans declare it - not when the timer dings. Each cup of blessed nectar is (and should be) it's own spiritual experience.

So now, it is official. Under the rules of the great State of Michigan's Cottage Food Law I have begun selling my fresh roasted coffee to my friends and family for $.875 per ounce which equates to just $14.00 a pound. I compared this to the coffee that is for sale in the local grocery store and I saw a 12oz. bag of char-bucks for almost $10.00 which equates to about $.833 per ounce. Is there cheaper coffee to buy than mine - yep. Is there better coffee than mine? Maybe, but my pastor and the people of VOX Church will be hard pressed to locate it.

BINGO! I Call It "Manna" (Blend #5)

Have you ever wondered how some flavors were developed? I suppose much of it is just like it happens in the commercial where one idiot is walking down the street eating a chocolate bar while some other fool is walking down an adjoining street eating peanut butter from the jar, both so engrossed in their snacks that "POW" they run into each other and the chocolate accidentally got into the peanut butter and the Peanut Butter Cup emerges. OR... Some chemical engineer needs to come up with a new flavor to save his hide from the unemployment line and starts mixing all sorts of wacky flavors until "BINGO" they invent a winner.

Well I, like the chemical engineer, keep putting coffee beans together in the hopes of finding a Bingo. Yesterday I found a winner and I call it "Manna"

1 oz. Zimbabwe Salimba
1 oz. Kenyan Gichi Kiambu
1 oz. Sumatran Aceh Gold

I roasted this batch to a Full-City+ removing the heat just as the second crack was starting. I brewed it in the french press which created a very full body cup but not (as my wife commonly refers to it) chewy. And the aroma was mildly sweet and fragrant with no hint of a rogue acidity.

The flavor was full, deep and rich - free of free floating background taste-nuances and bitters. This cup was so good that my wife suggested that I make this for her tea-party this Saturday. Even though my wife is developing a taste for good coffee, this is a huge compliment to the flavor of this blend.

I am going to blend this again to make sure that I get a consistent cup and when I do I think I will take on Timmy Horton's.

Pastoral Gold - BLENDED

Guatemala
Sumatra

This is my first blend - 50% Antigua-Patoral (Guatemala), 50% Aceh-Gold (Sumatra). The actual blend is unknown as I roasted 50/50 green beans but the moisture that cooked off of each bean is different and so the actual blend may be 49/51, 48,52 or some slight variation from 50/50. The roast was a standard City Roast in order to allow each bean to retain its intrinsic flavoring.

The aroma possesses the smell of nature, not like goat-cheese but more like the smell of a wood pile at the cottage up North. Mixed in with a smell of nature is a definite smell of warm chocolate pudding. I, however, kept smelling this blend hoping to discover more but to no avail.

The body is normal if something like "normal" actually exists. I am always hopeful that I will discover a mouth-feel that wows me and need search no more. Alas, the "wow" is not here.

The flavor is fun as a single cup runs a gambit of flavors while cooling. My first sip demonstrated a bitterness that was not really bitter but rather it was a lack of sweetness. I could detect no notes of chocolate even though the aroma screamed of it. I thought this cup was a bust but as I sipped and the brew cooled I realized that the flavor changed significantly. As the cup cooled it demonstrated a sweetness that was not noticeable at first. I also detected a floweriness in the nose during the lingering flavors.

Blending the two coffees together was a nice experience as it made me try to detect the individual coffees in this blend. If I had to rate this blend it would be bottom shelf for sure - a Johnnie Walker Red

Aceh Gold

Sumatra

The flavor here is full with a Full-City roast - Highly chocolate, semi-sweet, and quite deep. The flavor lingers after the cup is gone suggesting a heavy body.

My lack of enjoyment of this cup is not because of the coffee but rather because I was not mentally prepared to fully experience it. I am learning, as I go, that I need to be ready to take some time to smell and taste the coffee that I make. Also, I think I need to drink some regular coffee for a while to find my baseline again.

I will post updates in the comments section as I try this bean again/

From 1 to 10 I rate this coffee a 4.