What exactly is Specialty coffee?

What is the difference between specialty coffee and regular coffee? That is the topic of today’s blog. I know what your thinking….ouu specialty, sounds fancy, and honestly, there is some truth to that, but specialty coffee is way more.

Specialty coffee doesn’t only exist as a drink, it takes an entire eco-system to make it happen. It isn’t only the work of one person, but all the people involved in the life-cycle of the coffee bean, but before we get into the eco-system & lifecycle of a coffee bean, I want to paint a clearer picture. Now, most of you think coffee tastes. . .. . like what exactly? like coffee?

If you only chose to remember one thing from this blog (hopefully not), then remember that coffee is a fruit and the coffee bean is the seed.

So, isn’t coffee suppose to taste like a fruit? Well, yes and no. This is where roast comes in.

Here’s what you should know about roasting:

• In a light roast (the best, and most expensive, used in competitions and sought after), the flavors are really fruity and acidic. That’s because the coffee cherries that the beans come from are fruity and acidic. They reflect their region's terroir.
• In a medium roast, the coffee tastes sweeter than both dark and light roasts, but less fruity and less complex.
• In a dark roast, bitter is the predominant flavor. That’s because bitter is the flavor you get when things get burned (the coffee bean). It is what you probably drink at all the major chains (Starbucks, Tim Hortons) and purchase at the supermarkets. It is the most common for all of us, and probably all we ever tasted in North America. We tend to cover up that bitterness with lots of dairy and sugar.

If you wanted a general way to think about it, the lighter the roast, the better the quality. Okay, so why doesn’t Starbucks serve light roast? Light roast, fruity coffee sounds awesome. There is another factor though, and that is the quality of the bean.

High quality beans: they are grown in high altitudes with plenty of shade. They exist in complex ecosystems and evolve and mature slowly. High quality beans have much lower yields because of the time and ecosystem diversity necessary to grow them.

Low-quality beans: they come from low altitude farms, and are not grown in the shade. Those beans hit ‘puberty’ early and grow very fast, and as a result of that, they don’t absorb the beautiful flavors of the fruit they come from. With those beans think quantity, not quality and if you roast them lightly, they will taste like rotten sour juice.

Corporations like Starbucks and many others opt to get low quality beans because they are cheaper. They then roast the beans . . a lot (Dark Roast). And they do that to achieve uniformity and consistency. Think about it this way. If you get an amazingly high-quality Ethiopian coffee bean and a low-quality Indonesian bean and roast them both for a long time to the point of dark roast, they will taste the same.

Different elevations, farming methods, complex ecosystems, and even weather patterns can have an immense effect on how your coffee beans taste. However, in dark roasts, that’s no big deal because you’re burning all the natural flavor away.

So as a corporation, it makes financial sense to buy a lot of low-quality cheap beans and then roast it darkly. Also, if you go to a Starbucks in Dubai and one in Toronto, and order a tall Americano, they will both taste the same, and that is because the roast level (Dark). This uniformity across the world is important to a brand and its image.

Disclosure: Now I’m not bashing Starbucks, I’m just presenting the facts, and additionally, if I were Starbucks, I would do the same, almost nobody is complaining about the quality of coffee, why would I (Starbucks) change a model that is highly profitable.

Starbucks and other similar corporations aren’t classified as specialty coffee and for good reason. So back to the initial question then what is specialty coffee? We actually partially answered that light roast and high-quality beans.

Specialty coffee travels on a special journey and they meet five important people along the way:

The Coffee Farmer: Those lovely people have spent generations perfecting their craft. They only focus on high-quality coffee. There are regular coffee farmers that focus on lower quality coffee, those farmers have a lot of automation involved due to the bulk amount they produce. But our specialty Coffee Farmers nurse the coffee trees for years before they yield their coffee cherry. Only coffees free of defects are handpicked at their peak of ripeness and continue on their journey.

The Green Coffee buyer: Those people get to travel around to beautiful place’s where coffee is produced and try coffee to see if they are special. That sounds easy and fun, doesn’t it? Yes, it is fun, but definitely not easy. A lot of studying, training, and sacrifice is needed to become a green coffee buyer. You have to be certified by the SCA (speciality coffee association) and the CQI (Coffee quality institute). These insane people have palates sharper then swords and are the sommeliers of the coffee world. They taste coffee and determine pricing and often work directly with farmers.

The Roaster: High quality coffee beans are purchased by the roaster from the green coffee buyer for roasting. Being a specialty coffee roaster needs certification as well, because being a speciality coffee roaster is a very technical science that requires numerous hours of coursework and hands-on training. Thermodynamics and coffee chemistry must be applied to ensure the highest standard of quality and flavor come through in the final roasted bean.

The Barista: This special person also tends to be certified by the SCA. This person is trained in all the brewing techniques used to make coffee. The barista is almost the final touchpoint in the coffee’s journey.

You: Yes, you ! the consumer. Are you surprised to see yourself on this journey? When you take the time to find a specialty coffee shop or roaster that is dedicated to the craft you directly show an appreciation to a higher standard of quality of taste and flavor and also a commitment to a better standard of living for every individual that was on this journey. I hope that you seek out specialty coffee because once you taste it, you won’t go back.

The next blog post will talk about the types of drinks that are made with speciality coffee and where to get it in Toronto & the GTA.