Coffee Appreciation

https://jamesgourmetcoffee.com/product/rwanda-musasa-dukunde-kawa-nkara/

Pretty sure James Gourmet has been mentioned here before but this is delicious and a bargain at £19/kg

Looks like they have a filter roasted decaff too

https://jamesgourmetcoffee.com/product/colombian-decaffeinated-el-carmen/

Could be relevant to @BCarley hunters.

I’ll have a look, although I’ve bought a decaf from Monmouth coffee and it’s been disappointing delicious. It is very expensive though. Will give it a whirl @Belagerent!

Thanks for the Girls who Grind recommendation. About to finish my first order and just placed my second order. All very tasty and all for a good cause.

Speaking of which, some people were talking about decaf and this sounds super interesting
https://girlswhogrindcoffee.com/collections/filter/products/decaf-amaca-association-colombia-washed-sugarcane-ea

The Sugarcane process uses ethyl acetate that has been naturally
derived from locally grown sugarcane, which grows in abundance in
Colombia. Unlike most other processes, The Sugarcane method has the
ability to retain the exceptional flavour of the coffee bean. First,
the coffee is sorted and steamed for 30 minutes under low pressure in
order to open the coffee seeds’ pores and prepare them for
decaffeination. The coffee is placed in a solution of both water and
ethyl acetate, where the E.A. will begin to bond with the salts of
chlorogenic acids inside the seeds. The tank will be drained and
re-filled over the course of eight hours until the caffeine is no
longer detected. The seeds are steamed once more to remove the ethyl
acetate traces. The coffee is then dried and polished for export.

We love this method because it’s a lot more gentle to the beans than
other methods, resulting in a smooth, sweet and delicious cup that
works particularly well with milk

I've been buying that James Gourmet decaf and it's perfectly fine, but I feel like Colombian sugar cane decafs seem to be the default for a lot of roasters right now and they all taste quite similar to me. Had them from Hasbean and Dark Arts too and I definitely wouldn't be able to tell them apart in a blind test (not that they taste bad). Monmouth gets the piss taken out of it a lot on here but I do think they seem to change their decaf fairly frequently so if I want a change in decaf I'll get a bag there sometimes, although it's not as consistent and sometimes I wish I'd just gotten the Colombian beans from whoever.
The James Gourmet non-decaf has all been absolutely excellent I should say, I'm so pleased I read about them here and gave them a try. I've been giving coffees I'd normally avoid (because I don't generally expect to like them, e.g. Brazilian with tasting notes of dark chocolate) a go and have found them delicious.

New office is right next to one of the Ancoats Coffee Co. shops. Yay.

Is the Wilfa Svart still the go to "budget" home grinder for non-espresso duties?

Yeah, pretty much.

Timemore hand grinders getting popular too if you want to push even harder on value for money.

Anyone got one of these they don't need?

Made the pilgrimage to the forum's favourite roaster this morning. Been meaning to for ages as it's 20 miles from the in-laws. Nice undulating ride over from Rugby.

I think Steve has checked out from the forum, hopefully not permanently as it's people like him that make this place what it is. Hope you come back sometime @Nah. The coffee was ace and I picked up a kg to save on postage. Tailwind home should lighten the load!

Yeah I went to tag him recently and couldn’t find his username.
He’ll deffo be missed!

That's a damn shame indeed. Hoping it's not a permanent leave!

Googling suggests that solvent washing with ethyl acetate seems to be an extremely common method for decaffeination, and is usually done by industrial chemical facilities rather than by the coffee producers. Also, the swiss water method seems to be advertised as the "gentle" method rather than ethyl acetate which is obviously a much stronger solvent than water.

But I've only googled it for 5 minutes so I'm talking out of my arse of course.

I think Steve has checked out from the forum

No! Why?

Hope he's doing OK.

from his facebook and instagram it looks like he has his hands full with getting a new roastery premises sorted and helping his kids with their cover drive /square cut technique.

.

Its all new to me, not seen a roasters go in to so much detail before

as a total third wave medium roast 4 lyfe milquetoast I was quite surprised to see myself willing to check out the girlswhogrind version of a dark espresso roast ("Oh my Goth!") but in combination with a full spring clean of my machine and grinder it's actually quite subtle and tasty, it's definitely darker roasted than my usual fare but I'm not bombarded with notes of coal dust, burnt toast and frozen pizza you fell asleep while cooking in the oven like most dark roasts i try.

I don't think it will supplant my usual stuff but will enjoy the bag (managed to get first shot about 2 seconds outside of ideal shot range so shouldn't have any wastage either).

Anyone know anything about Cool Beans coffee company? (And/or the happy donkey takeover?)

I’ve been happy with happy for a while now and while they say the current product line will be maintained, call me cynical if I don’t believe it since they have they’ve started adding their own beans into the mix.

I have a 1Zpresso JX-Pro unopened and brand new for £5 cheaper than amazon at £150 if anyone’s keen? Absolutely class grinder for both pour over and espresso.

.

Fallen out of love with espresso for now. I've used my Robot maybe three times this year and I don't like stuff gathering dust. Bought it for $350 with the pro tamper two years ago and just sold it for $380. Hehehehe.

Judas!

Before I stick this on eBay does anyone on here want it?

Vario Baratza with a brand new motor, drive and pulley and burr replacement tool. The issue is that I cannot manage to get it to grind consistently as the gear slips. Coffeehit will repair it for for £70 (https://coffeehit.co.uk/products/fix-my-baratza-vario) - this had been my intention and never got round to it. So if someone wants it for £80 then it’s yours otherwise I’ll stick it on eBay.

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