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| Coffee
beans are known to be the most heavily traded commodity
after oil. Science, politics, and market economics
all play major roles in the drama of coffee, from
planting of the coffee seed to consumption of the
beverage. While we can't wax on about all that on
this page, we'd like to give you some blurbs that
should assist in furthering your love of coffee. |
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| Coffee
Varieties. There are mainly two botanical
varieties of coffee widely available today. One
is generally called "robusta," and the
other, "arabica." The arabica variety,
which is grown in the highlands, has unquestionably
superior aroma and taste, as well as significantly
lower caffeine content than the robusta variety,
which is grown in the flatlands. The vast majority
of the coffee companies use the robusta variety,
because robustas are more plentiful and therefore
less expensive. On the grocery store shelves, however,
it's not very easy to distinguish arabica beans
from robusta beans, as there are currently no laws
in the U.S. requiring such a labeling. Mighty Good
Coffee Roasting Company uses only arabica beans that qualify
as "specialty-grade," which is the grade
of beans with the fewest or no defects. |
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| What's
"Fresh" Coffee? Sure, freshly
brewed coffee is better than an hour-old pot on
a hotplate. But there's much more to fresh coffee.
True freshness begins with a current crop of coffee
beans, roasted within the last 1-2 weeks, and brewed
immediately after grinding. Beans get noticeably
stale a few weeks after the roast, and within a
matter of a day (or less) after grinding. It is
extremely difficult to find beans that are less
than 2 weeks out of the roaster, because the typical
distribution and retail channels require weeks,
if not months, before beans reach the consumer.
Even beans in grocery store bulk bins, which imply
freshness, are typically roasted at best a few days
before the bins are filled; and once they go in
the plexiglass bins, constant exposure to air and
light accelerates their staling process. By the
time beans in the middle of the bin empty out, they
are generally not much fresher than pre-packaged
beans. |
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| What
about those one-way air valves? Many
"premium" coffee beans come in bags with
a one-way air valve. Those valves let air out but
not in, so they certainly can't hurt. But how fresh
are the beans that go into those bags? If they are
days old to begin with, they are not going to be
fresh when consumed. Not surprisingly, most coffee
companies don't want to tell you when their beans
were roasted. Also, how much oxygen remains in the
bag? Even a tiny bit of oxygen (e.g., 2%) has been
found to cause the beans to stale, so there is no
way to "lock-in" the freshness unless
the bags are absolutely vacuum sealed. |
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| What
Else Makes a Difference in Taste? Good
coffee beans begin with the right variety of seeds,
good soil, climate, careful processes for picking,
washing, drying, grading, hulling and sorting, and
minimizing exposure to heat and moisture in transport
and storage. At each of these stages the beans,
if mistreated, can lose their full potential. At
Mighty Good Coffee we test samples after samples to ensure
that the beans we purchase have the most desirable
characteristics of the region from which they were
harvested. And once we have the green coffee beans
we like, we roast them in a traditional drum-style
coffee roaster to coax the beans into the optimal
roast stage for those particular beans. Sumatras,
for example, are roasted darker (to a "Viena"
roast) in order to accentuate the heavy, complex
flavors, whereas Kenyas are roasted lighter to preserve
that unique brightness without sacrificing their
delicate body. |
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Mighty Good -- Your Local Roaster. At Mighty Good Coffee Roasting Company, we do not pre-package our beans. What's more, we don't even roast our beans until your order date or the next day. Once roasted, we seal the beans in our one-way valve bags within the hour, and send them off to your address within 24 hours of roasting.
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