Nature VS. Nurture: September - October 2020 Newsletter
Coffee can have variety of flavours, some due to nature and some to nurture.
There are at least 900 species of Coffea, but the commercially important ones are Coffea Canephora (Robusta) and Coffea Arabica. On a world scale the dollar value, production and consumption of Arabica exceeds that of Robusta by a third. On a flavour scale there's no competition, Arabica wins outright.
And over 90% of that huge quantity of Arabica coffee is still descended from Baba Budan's original seven seeds. The rest is "Native" coffee grown mostly in Ethiopia and Yemen, although experiments with Ethiopian varietals (e.g. Gesha) are ongoing in most Arabica producing countries. This is as much to introduce more genetic variation as it is to discover the next Gesha.
The Arabica genome is terribly limited. Most of the more disease resistant and higher yielding varietals have been interbred with Robusta, with consequent loss of flavour. The hope is that the addition of wild coffee genes will improve disease resistance, yield and taste, as well as produce new and exciting flavours.
The other way to produce new flavours is to change the way the ripe coffee cherries are processed. Traditional processing in Yemen simply spreads the cherries in a single layer on a flat surface (often a house roof) and lets them dry in the sun. The dried skin and fruit is then husked off the green beans and kept to make a sort of tea, known as qishr or cascara, and the beans are further dried then hand winnowed to remove the parchment layer. This is called Dry or Natural processing. Flavour results are generally "fruity".
All the other processing methods rely on pulping the coffee cherries first to split and remove the skins and some of the sweet gooey fruit, known as mucilage. Spreading the pulped cherries out to dry results in "Pulped Natural" or "Honey/Miel" beans which when fully dry undergo mechanical cleaning and parchment removal. Flavours tend to be intense and sweet.
Fermenting the pulped cherries in water then removing the skin, mucilage and parchment while wet and sun drying the beans is "Giling Basah" processing. This is more or less exclusive to Sumatra, and results in earthy flavours and a heavy body.
Finally there is fully fermenting the cherries so that all the skin and mucilage comes off, drying the beans either with the sun or mechanically, then storing them with the parchment on. The parchment is then removed mechanically. This is "Wet Processing" or "Washing." Flavours tend towards clean, pure coffee taste and higher acidity.
Right now people are experimenting with the fermentation stage by using various types of yeast, or eliminating oxygen (anaerobic fermentation) or fermenting whole un-pulped cherries in sealed vessels (carbonic maceration.) They can get excellent results (as with the yeast fermented Burundi last year) but consistency is a problem. So, instead, this month's special is a "Natural" process coffee.
Until November,
Alan
$60 Per Kilogram
Medium
Shimmering strawberry acidity up front with a medium body and a creamy butter and malt finish.
Fully: Nicaragua SHG* Rancho Alegre - Red Catuai - Natural Arabica
Red Catuai is (via a complex family tree and many mutations) a descendant of the "Seven Seeds".
*SHG = “Strictly High Grown”
Marc’s Notes
I hope everyone’s enjoying this series of more in-depth articles that we’re asking Dad to write. We’ve got several more in the pipeline, but if there’s a particular area of coffee knowledge that you feel needs further exploration, feel free to reach out!
Regarding AusPost shipping - Express Post remains the best way to ensure speedy delivery of your coffee right now, as Standard Post is proving slightly inconsistent when it comes to delivery times (5-21 days based on our July/August data). Read more.
Cheers,
Marc
