coffeeshone Senior Member Joined: 29 Nov 2011 Posts: 34 Location: NY, NY Expertise: I love coffee
Posted Wed Feb 6, 2013, 1:20pm Subject: Recent Espresso success
Hey Folks, Just wanted to quickly share a couple of coffees I've had recently that I really like. Tried Dodd coffee's Columbian Narino for single origin espresso. Really awesome body and crema. I'm into single origin espresso. I also love Redbird Brazil Sweet Blue for single origin, or blend sweet blue with Ehtopian, 60/40 with a bit more of the Sweet Blue.
What have you folks been into lately? I'm always into trying new stuff and new roasters. My only pet peeve- no 12oz bags. I hate it. Sell it by the pound, please. Drives me nuts. If I'm going to go to the effort, I wanna order a couple pounds, ya know?
Anyone else stumbled on something exceptional lately?
I basically only order from places that offer 1lb bags now, too damn annoying trying to track and when to order with my fiance and I dealing with 12oz bags. Plus majority of those 12oz bags cost same/more then 1lb, with shipping, it usually avgs close and sometimes higher then $20 a bag for 12oz, crazy imo.
Heard about this company Fair Mountain www.fairmountaincoffee.com , got the espresso, nicaraguan, and peru roast, really good, the nicaraguan was awesome. order 2lbs or more and ships free, good prices for a pound. Yeh you can do a little better on pricing from other places when you do 5lbs+ but I can't store that much in my freezer lol.
Speaking of places i go to keep costs down, Metroplis Coffee. Redline can had for 25 for a two pound bag and shipping is free over 50 so that comes up to 12.50 a pound.
I recently received Redline and I am having trouble 'dialing it in' to get something delicious. My best coffee purchase of the year 2012 was Datera Reserve from Greenway Coffee out of Houston. They are small batch roasters, so don't look for it now. Probably in June, again. They have that annoying practice of bagging sub-pound amounts and, even worse, they sell it in grams. Their 350 gram bag translates to 12 ounces but they are even selling 300 gram (10 ounce) bags online. Soon we will be buying 'nickle bags' on the corner from middlemen. But rather than complain about it on this forum, let others get their blood pressure up - we know better. We will just call Ecky at Greenway, or call our other favorite roasters and just ask them, quote me a pound. OK? Then send me a pound. Or two. Who will not do it? I wanted a roast from an out of state company that does not have an online store. They said online that you could call them for a commercial order, so I called them and ordered 5 pounds and acted like I was a business. Roasters like to sell coffee. Yes, its too bad that the price keeps going up. Buckley
Intrepid510 Senior Member Joined: 30 Dec 2010 Posts: 308 Location: California Expertise: I love coffee
Posted Sat Feb 9, 2013, 10:55pm Subject: Re: Recent Espresso success
I don't know about the increase in some prices, sure inflation happens. However, some of these places I see all their offerings are from Coffee Shrub, and they are still charging on the plus side of 15 for a 12 oz bag and I know your coffee was only 5 dollars a pound green. Seems a little much to be triple the price of the greens.
one way to get around that,start roasting your own. you can aford to roast some amazing beans wich would normaly be out of your price range. I always have a small supply of Geisha or Jbm floating arround that I picked up for cheap considering the price of the roasted version. it's a good way to beat back the high price of this wonderful hobby. alot of roasters sell there varitals in green now at a fraction of the price per pound. Klatch is a good example and barefoot is now ofering greens apon request. I think metropolis even has greenline wich is a green version of redline for 7.50lb
Yeah have thought about roasting my own, but I really don't mind paying for coffee when it's priced what I consider fair. Just tired of see 20 dollar twelve ounce bags of 5 dollar per pound green coffee.
My opinion is ... if you start roasting your own you will have advantages and disadvantages.
The disadvantages will suggest why roasters have to triple (quadruple?) their cost of beans. That is, even after getting the time - temperature roast profiles down pat, there will be batches that are not up to par for taste - for many reasons. (The 'usual' crop of green beans changes in bean size or moisture content or a shipper decides to substitute a 'similar' variety, etc.) We can 'bite the bean' and drink our lesser roasts if they are not too far off but if we are in business we can't possibly sell it and we are left with expensive compost. The advantages are those fresh, fresh flavor notes that only last a day or two (after the roast is rested) and that, I'm sorry to say, do not seem to endure the process of freezing. Economy is not an advantage. After a small batch roaster buys a machine and pays for gas or current and throws out the occasional bad roast, I would say it is an even break.
If I home roast, I can absolutely save ~75% of the price of roasted beans, and have more control over the process. (assuming I don't have too many bad batches)
However, that is not to say that roasters are making a 75% profit margin. As you say, they have to cover employees, insurance, facilities, machines, etc. etc. When I home roast, all I have the capital expense of the roaster, so my "profit" margin is pretty close to 75% over buying roasted beans.
I don't see how you can say it is a wash between home roasting and buying roasted. Unless I was throwing out a ton of beans, or unless the quality was really poor, I can't help buy come out ahead.
A HotTop is about $1000. If I can save $15/lb, I can recover that cost in about a year (assuming a lb a week).
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