THE BLUE BOTTLE CRAFT OF COFFEE The Blue Bottle Craft of Coffee TEN SPEED PRESS Berkeley James Freeman, Caitlin Freeman, and Tara Duggan Photography by Clay McLachlan Illustrations by Michelle Ott Growing, Roasting, and Drinking, with Recipes C ontents Introduction / 1 Grow 13 Coffee Growing / 14 Processing / 16 Getting to Know Coffee from Three Favorite Regions / 22 Farmer Profile: Lorie Obra, Hawaii / 27 Farmer Profile: Aida Batlle, El Salvador / 35 Roast 41 Roasting Day / 46 How to Roast Coffee at Home / 56 Cupping and Describing Coffee Flavors / 60 Cupping at Home / 63 Drink 69 Brewed Coffee Techniques / 70 Pour-Over Coffee / 79 French-Press Coffee / 83 Nel Drip Coffee / 88 Siphon Coffee / 95 Turkish Coffee / 99 Espresso / 101 Making Espresso / 115 Eat 131 With Your Morning Coffee / 136 Perfect for Dunking / 156 In the Afternoon / 186 From Our Friends / 206 Acknowledgments / 222 Index / 225 13 For those of us raised with the idea that coffee is a dark powder that comes in a can, it’s easy to forget that coffee actually comes from a fruit that grows on trees and is subject to seasonality and harvest cycles. Though green coffee—the term for unroasted coffee beans, which come in various shades of jade green—can be held much longer than roasted beans, coffee should preferably be consumed within a year of harvest, though that can vary depending upon how it’s packed, shipped, and stored. Once we run out of a coffee from a particular harvest, that variety is gone until the next harvest. There are cafés in Japan that feature coffees aged twenty years or more, and Italian roasters sometimes age certain beans for their espresso, but these are the rare exceptions. Fortunately, coffee is harvested almost year-round in the world’s various coffee-producing regions, which extend from well-known areas in Latin America and Africa to lesser-known regions in Taiwan and India. Hawaii is the only U.S. state with the right climate for commercial coffee production, so for most of us, coffee growing is a fairly distant and mysterious thing. This chapter will cover the basics of how and where coffee is grown, looking at how farmers and millers transform the juicy red berries from the coffee tree into green coffee beans. Then I’ll offer a more in-depth look at a few of my favorite coffee-growing regions, as well as two Grow 14 / THE BLUE BOTTLE CRAFT OF COFFEE growers Blue Bottle works closely with: Lorie Obra in Hawaii and Aida Batlle in El Salvador. I’ll also discuss issues such as organic certification and how we get access to some of the world’s best coffee, such as the online auction called Cup of Excellence. Coffee Growing The two main types of coffee that are harvested for consumption are arabica, from the species Coffea arabica, and robusta, from the species Coffea canephora (formerly known as Coffea robusta). Arabica, which is of much higher quality than robusta, accounts for around 70 percent of the coffee grown worldwide, and those of us in specialty coffee work almost exclusively with it. At Blue Bottle, the only exception are a few robustas—principally certified organic robustas from India and Madagascar—that we use to add depth and an oily body to one espresso blend. So I’ll focus on arabica here. Coffea arabica is native to Ethiopia and was the first coffee to be grown commercially. Within this species, there are thousands of varieties—called varietals in the coffee trade. Typica and Bourbon are two of the most widely grown varietals. Planting and Farming Coffee beans are the seeds inside the fruit of the coffee tree, which is actually more of a shrub. While it can grow quite tall, it is usually trimmed down to around 6 to 10 feet (1.8 to 3 m). The tree has oblong leaves, and its fruit, called the cherry, is about the size of a cranberry and has an outer skin that is dark red when ripe. Underneath the skin is the pulp, or mucilage, a sticky substance surrounding the coffee bean that is so high in sugar that it tastes sweet if you bite into it (and it’s caffeinated!). Each coffee cherry usually contains two coffee beans, each with a flat side; peaberries are a naturally occurring mutation in coffee cherries that contain only one round coffee bean in each cherry. In any case, the beans are wrapped in parchment, a thin papery layer that must be removed during processing, and under that is the silverskin, an even thinner layer that comes off, for the most part, during roasting. The ideal growing conditions for arabica coffee are a constant moderate temperature, a latitude between approximately 10 degrees north and south of the equator, and an altitude approximately 3,000 feet to 6,000 feet (915 m to 1,830 m), though coffee is grown successfully at lower altitudes. The higher the coffee is grown, the more slowly it develops and the denser the beans become, which can create more interesting flavors. Much like wine grapes grown under “stressful” conditions in great growing regions, the challenge of altitude forces coffee plants to focus their energy on developing seeds, rather than more extensive vegetative growth, which would be the plant’s inclination under less stressful circumstances. Grow / 15 Depending on climate and elevation, coffee might be grown under shade trees, which can protect both the coffee plants and the native bird species, explaining the origin of the term shade-grown. However, coffee is also traditionally grown without shade in Brazil and in places with a lot of natural rainfall, such as Hawaii. Trees start producing fruit at around three to four years of age. At this point, they’re given fertilizer and pruned regularly for easier harvest and higher yields. Irrigation is uncommon in coffee farming, which is why rainfall, storms, and drought can have a huge influence on the worldwide coffee market. Harvest Coffee is different from other fruit trees in that the plant continues to produce flowers and newly ripe cherries throughout the fruiting season, even on the same branch, which results in repeated crops—and requires a lot of hand labor for harvest. In some regions the fruiting season lasts only a few months, while in others, such as Brazil—one of the few places where mechanical harvesting is common—it lasts for about six months. Harvest timing and duration also vary depending on altitude. 16 / THE BLUE BOTTLE CRAFT OF COFFEE Because the fruiting season can last so long, some trees or branches will be full of red cherries, while others will have a mixture of blossoms, green or pink (underripe) cherries, dark red (ripe) cherries, and brown (overripe) cherries. Harvesting only ripe coffee cherries well is a skill and directly relates to higher coffee prices. So if roasters choose to buy excellent, well-harvested coffee, the farmers have an incentive to offer a premium to the best pickers. Therefore, careful harvesting can directly lead to increased standards of living for both farmers and their pickers. Yields average around 2 to 3 pounds (0.9 to 1.4 kg) of green coffee per tree per year. Each 100 pounds (45 kg) of coffee cherries results in about 20 pounds (9.1 kg) of green coffee. Processing Most small farmers send their coffee cherries to a mill, where they enter the next stage of their journey: processing. In this important step, the green coffee beans are removed from the fruit and dried to prepare them for transport. In most cases, the harvest from small farms is processed with the cherries of other nearby farms, whereas larger growers often do their own processing. However, the increased demand for single-origin microlot coffees means that some small farms do their own processing or strictly supervise the processing of their beans, keeping them separate from those of other farms (for more on this, see the profiles of Lorie Obra on page 26 and Aida Batlle on page 35). The two main processing styles used in the coffee industry are washed, also called wet, and natural, also called dry. Washed beans are washed or soaked in water to remove the outer pulp before drying, whereas natural processing means the beans remain in the cherry for drying. Within those two basic categories, there are many variations. The style of processing that’s chosen varies according to local tradition and has a lot to do with access to water. For example, natural processing is traditional in the Harar region of Ethiopia, where water is scarce. On the flip side, natural processing doesn’t work well in rainy climates because it requires a long drying period. Farmers who pay a lot of attention to processing also vary their methods depending on what works best with specific varieties and what their customers want. Washed Coff ee Washing, or wet processing, results in coffees with higher acidity and more consistency, and these are among the reasons why this is the most common processing method. The basic process goes like this: the cherries are sent through a pulping machine, which removes the outer skin, leaving the sticky mucilage, or pulp, still clinging to the beans. The beans are then soaked 18 / THE BLUE BOTTLE CRAFT OF COFFEE in water, and often gently agitated during this stage. They are then allowed to ferment for a period of time that ranges from hours to a day or two, during which time the pulp falls off. (Note that all fermentation and drying times vary greatly depending on the type of equipment used and the weather, so these are all approximations.) After fermentation, the beans are rinsed and washed and then allowed to dry, either in the sun on patios or raised beds, or in a mechanical dryer, usually for a period of four to eight days, depending on sunlight and climate. Kenya-style processing is similar to wet processing, with a longer fermentation period— often with an additional rinsing and soaking period that results in coffees with high acidity and elegance. The cherries are pulped and then fermented for eight to sixteen hours. Next, the beans are washed, then soaked in clean water, usually for six to twelve hours, but sometimes as long as forty-eight hours. Natural Coff ee Natural processing, or dry processing, is the original way of processing coffee. In this method, coffee cherries are dried whole on raised beds, mats, or patios. Some farms in Brazil let the coffee cherries dry on the tree and then harvest them when they resemble small prunes. Because the beans remain inside the fruit as it dries, this results in a very noticeable difference in aroma and flavor. For example, this is how Ethiopian natural coffees develop the fruity flavors and blueberry scents they are known for. Natural processing also results in coffee with more body and less acidity. This method does not come without risks. If the beans rest in the wet fruit for too long, the fruit will ferment and get moldy or impart a sour, yeasty taste to the coffee, so frequent raking is necessary during the drying period, which usually lasts around three weeks. The beans are then either stored in their skins for a period of months or hulled right away in a machine or by hand to remove the dried outer skin and the inner parchment. Natural coffee is a somewhat controversial topic in today’s coffee world. Some coffee professionals claim that natural processing is wrong because it allows reabsorption of some of the coffee fruit into the coffee seed, creating a characteristic fruit bomb flavor profile that can either hide subtle faults or obscure subtle virtues. Personally, I’ve had both stunningly refined dry-processed coffees and lurid, bombastic, overpowering dry-processed coffees, and I would be loath to live in a world where coffee scolds limited our access to them. Grow / 19 Pulped Natural Coff ee Popular in Brazil, pulped natural processing is a cross between wet and dry processing. It is also known as honey processing, the word honey referring to the sweet pulp. As in wet processing, the cherries are pulped, removing the outer skin but leaving the mucilage attached to the beans. But then instead of soaking, the beans are spread on large tables to dry for anywhere from five days to two weeks, with the mucilage still surrounding them. The resulting coffees are more consistent in quality than dry-processed coffees and tend to have similar characteristics, such as a lot of body and low acidity. However, they don’t develop vivid fruit notes of dry-processed coffees. Wet Hulling Wet hulling is a version of pulped natural processing used widely used in Sumatra, where it is called giling basah. It results in coffees with heavy body and low acidity. The process starts like pulped natural processing, except the coffee is only dried for about a day with the mucilage attached. Next, the beans are washed, partially dried again, and then hulled to remove the parchment before the beans finish drying. Final Steps After the first phase of processing, using one of the above methods, which is somewhat confusingly called wet milling as a whole, the coffee beans are usually stored for one to three months to help balance out their moisture levels. Then they enter a phase called dry milling, when the parchment is removed and they are sorted by size. This serves two functions: first, roasters like coffees of even size and density because this makes roasting easier. Second, larger beans often fetch a premium because the coffee is thought to have been harvested from riper cherries and might cup better. After sorting, storage time can vary, but the coffee beans should ideally arrive to customers within one year of harvest, preferably sooner. Drink / 79 Pour-Over Coffee Makes 1 serving , about 10 fluid ounces (300 ml) The two indispensable tools for making better pour-over coffee are a gram scale and a swannecked kettle. Using a swan-necked kettle will help the accuracy of your pour and, hence, improve the consistency of your extraction. Some people might rebel at paying $50 for a kettle, but how many people have paid for a pizza stone they never use or an ice cream maker that lives in the back of a kitchen cabinet? If you buy a gram scale and kettle, you’ll use them every day, and you’ll drink better coffee almost immediately. Every morning your first thoughts will coalesce around making something wonderful. Your friends will beg you to make them coffee and share your mastery. It’s money well spent. A coffee mug usually holds around 10 fluid ounces. We’re going to call that 300 milliliters. Conveniently, 1 milliliter of water (a measurement of volume) equals 1 gram (a measurement of weight). So, armed with this secret knowledge, you can proceed knowing that pouring on a tared (zeroed) gram scale tells you not only the weight of the water, but the volume of water you’ve poured. If you employ a timer as well, you’ll have relevant information about flow rate and extraction time. And if you add a thermometer, you can also collect data about temperature of extraction. Data points, before breakfast! What You’ll Need About 20 fluid ounces (21/2 cups / 590 ml) good-quality water Swan-necked kettle Gram scale 20 to 35 grams (0.7 to 1.2 oz) coffee beans Coffee grinder Thermocouple or other thermometer Ceramic coffee dripper Coffee cup Paper filter (kenaf or bamboo-based paper is best) You will need 10 fluid ounces (300 ml) of good-quality water for your coffee, so put double that amount in a kettle or other vessel used only for heating water. Why double? Because you’ll use some of the water to preheat the dripper and cup. Put the kettle over high heat. While the water is heating, weigh out the coffee; the amount depends on the brewing ratio you’ll use, from 20 grams for a 15-to-1 ratio to 30 grams for a 10-to-1 ratio. Grind the coffee finely enough that it forms a clump when pressed between your thumb and forefinger; it should feel soft but still a bit gritty. Grind size and evenness is one of the few immeasurable factors—at least at home. At the roastery, we measure particle size and distribution of the powdery particles called fines when evaluating grinders, but at home intuition rules. Change it up and try different settings to find one you like. 80 / THE BLUE BOTTLE CRAFT OF COFFEE When the water comes to a boil, pour it into the swan-necked kettle, then let it sit until the temperature is between 185°F and 205°F (85°C and 96°C). (Your choice of water temperature should be based on the type of coffee and roast level that you’re serving; see page 75.) Warm the ceramic dripper and cup with some of the remaining hot water. Put the filter in the dripper and pour in the ground coffee. The coffee should naturally take the shape of a gentle mound. Place your now-empty but warm cup on your gram scale, set the coffee-filled ceramic dripper on top, and tare the scale. Gently and slowly drizzle a small amount of hot water in the center of the mound of coffee, away from the sides of the filter and making a circle about the size of a quarter. The goal is to pour in just enough water that the coffee will absorb all of it without any liquid dripping into your cup. Coffee generally holds double its weight in water. This is easy to check if your cup, dripper, and coffee assemblage is set up on your gram scale. For example, if you have 35 grams (1.2 oz) of ground coffee in the filter and have tared the scale, add water until the scale reads 70 grams (2.5 oz). Voilà! Pouring in water in such a way that none comes out is a skill. The better you are at soaking the coffee mass evenly, then the more water it will absorb. Can you pour twice the weight of the ground coffee amount without any dripping? 1.75 times? 2.25 times? You can take satisfaction from doing this well, but it isn’t just a geeky fine point; it has an impact on the coffee you brew. It facilitates blooming, the process in which hot water causes the coffee to expand outward in a fascinating way. Allow it to bloom for 30 to 45 seconds, or up to 60 seconds for coffee roasted over 1 week previously. A slightly longer blooming time can add a lot of depth and vitality to older coffee. Pour in more water, once again pouring slowly in a small circular pattern in the middle of the filter. A light-brown cap should rise; at Blue Bottle we call it “the mushroom.” The pace of your pour should be approximately equivalent to the speed at which coffee is flowing out of the filter into your cup; in other words, the level of the mixture of coffee and water in the filter should neither rise or fall. Furthermore, the level of the mushroom should be maintained at just about two-thirds up the sides of the cone. Aim for somewhere between 1 and 2 milliliters (1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon) of water per second. There are 15 milliliters in 1 tablespoon, so that’s about 1 tablespoon per 7 to 15 seconds. Remember, extraction rate is determined by many variables beyond how fast you pour: amount of coffee, grind size, percentage of fines, and water temperature. So the pour contributes to the speed of the extraction but doesn’t define it. Don’t be frustrated if you can’t pour slowly and steadily right away. It’s a skill. Just keep practicing. Once you’ve poured the desired amount of water, remove the dripper. The coffee will taste better if you don’t let all the water flow through the filter into the cup. At the end of the brewing cycle, you are starting to extract some undesirable compounds from the coffee; keeping those away from the coffee you are drinking will produce a more delicious product. Drink your coffee, and marvel at your dedication and skill. Repeat as needed. 138 / THE BLUE BOTTLE CRAFT OF COFFEE Brown Sugar and Winter Spice Granola Makes 12 to 15 servings / Hands-on time: 25 minutes From start to finish: 2 hours, 30 minutes It would be quite a stretch to call Blue Bottle’s granola health food. Salty and sweet and broken into big slabs, it is sweetened with brown sugar syrup and delicately spiced with cinnamon and nutmeg. This recipe includes a somewhat generous measure of coarse sea salt to make it utterly crave-worthy. It’s great served with milk, fantastic with yogurt (especially Homemade Yogurt, page 141), and stupendous with fruit. The long, slow baking at a low temperature gently cooks the oats and nuts and results in a texture that’s both tender and crunchy. With the heavenly smell of toasting nuts, cinnamon, and nutmeg, you’ll find it hard to leave the granola alone while it’s in the oven. But be patient and bake it, without stirring, until crunchy and dry; this is the key to creating big chunks suitable for snacking. This recipe makes a fairly large batch size. It can easily be halved, but between the two-plus hours of bake time and the long storage life, I think it’s just as well to make a big batch. 11/2 cups (11.5 oz / 325 g) packed light brown sugar 1/3 cup (80 ml / 80 g) water 4 cups (14 oz / 400 g) rolled oats 11/2 cups (6 oz / 170 g) walnuts, coarsely chopped 11/2 cups (6 oz / 170 g) pecans, coarsely chopped 1 teaspoon freshly ground cinnamon 1 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg 3/4 teaspoon Maldon sea salt (see page 165) 1/3 cup (80 ml / 71 g) canola oil 21/2 teaspoons vanilla extract Preheat the oven to 250°F (120°C). In a small heavy saucepan, combine the brown sugar and water. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring constantly, until the sugar is completely dissolved and the mixture comes to a boil. Let cool to room temperature. In a large bowl, combine the oats, walnuts, pecans, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt and mix well. Add the oil and vanilla extract to the brown sugar syrup and stir until thoroughly combined, then pour over the oat mixture. Mix well with your hands, until thoroughly combined and uniform in texture; it will be messy, but your hands are the best tool for the job. Transfer to a rimmed 13 by 18-inch (33 by 46-cm) baking sheet and pat down in an even layer; it will be thick but shouldn’t be higher than the rim of the pan. Bake for 75 minutes. Remove from oven and use a large metal spatula to flip the granola, keeping it in as large of chunks as possible. Return the granola to the oven and bake for about 60 minutes, until completely dry and no longer at all soft if you take a bite. Let cool before serving. Stored in a tightly sealed container at room temperature, the granola will keep for 2 weeks. 230 / THE BLUE BOTTLE CRAFT OF COFFEE Some of the recipes in this book include raw or poached eggs. When consumed raw, there is always the risk that bacteria, which is killed by proper cooking, may be present. For this reason, always buy certified salmonella-free eggs from a reliable grocer, storing them in the refrigerator until they are served. Because of the health risks associated with the consumption of bacteria that can be present in raw eggs, they should not be consumed by infants, small children, pregnant women, the elderly, or any persons who may be immunocompromised. The author and publisher expressly disclaim responsibility for any adverse effects that may result from the use or application of the recipes and information contained in this book. Copyright © 2012 by James Freeman Photographs copyright © 2012 by Clay McLachlan All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Ten Speed Press, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York. www.crownpublishing.com www.tenspeed.com Ten Speed Press and the Ten Speed Press colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file with the publisher ISBN 978-1-60774-118-3 eISBN 978-1-60774-119-0 Printed in China Design by Katy Brown 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 First Edition THE BLUE BOTTLE CRAFT OF COFFEE