Holiday Blend Coffee

In 2003, when Zingerman’s Coffee Company first started roasting coffee, small, specialty coffee roasters were few and far between. A decade ago, specialty coffee was beginning to find a foothold, but it was still a nerdy, niche product with a limited audience. Today, the story has changed. Even a small town is likely to have at least a couple of offbeat coffee shops serving locally roasted brews. (In the rural town of 30,000 I call home, we have four.) A big city may have dozens of independent coffee roasters.

Across the nation, specialty coffee follows certain trends.

As specialty coffee has become more ubiquitous, in many cases it’s also become more generic. Many roasters make similar boasts: they source directly from small growers, sharing details like the name of the farms or farmers, the type of coffee beans grown, and the processing methods. That transparency is great, and it’s wonderful to see the hard work of coffee growers celebrated. But for all the specificity, it’s often hard for someone who isn’t a professional coffee cupper to tell the difference between one brew and another. These days, specialty coffee tends to be synonymous with lightly roasted beans that produce highly acidic, fruity brewed coffee. If jammy coffee isn’t your jam, you may be stuck with the one token dark roast that a shop offers.

Zingerman’s Coffee Company has never been about the trends.

While the specialty coffee landscape around Zingerman’s Coffee Company has changed significantly in its 21 years in business, the operation here in Ann Arbor has largely remained the same. That consistency plays out in many ways. For one, from the beginning, the Zingerman’s roasting crew have selected a wide range of beans, with a few offerings hitting lighter, medium, and darker roast profiles. As flavor fads have come and gone, the Zingerman’s crew have continued serving a range of tastes.

Behind that range of flavors, we have long standing relationships with many of the folks who grow our coffees. While other shops may not have much to share about a grower beyond their name and a photo or two, we focus on building long-term relationships with our growers. We’ve sold coffee from Hacienda Miramonte in Costa Rica every year for a decade. It’s been even longer since we started working with the DaTerra Estate in Brazil. Over those years of partnership, we’ve traveled down to visit the estates—and they’ve come up to visit us in Ann Arbor, too. Together, we’ve worked on experimental microlots to discover the impacts of very specific terroirs. We’ve tried out different processing methods to tease new flavors out of coffees. These aren’t the kinds of partnerships that spring up overnight. Our long, strong relationships have given us deeper understanding of the coffees, and better access to exceptional beans.

A decade from now, I can’t predict how the specialty coffee market will have shifted. But I can bet that the coffees from Zingerman’s Coffee Company will continue to produce excellent, easy to love brews.

Pretty much everyone professes a desire to drink better coffee. Of course what constitutes “better” isn’t the same thing for everyone. For me a great coffee is complex. It’s well balanced. It’s got a nice nose and nice finish. Bad coffee? Again, it’s a personal thing, but to me bad coffee is usually thin textured, watery, flat-tasting, and frequently overwhelmed by off flavors like excessive sourness, a burned flavor, paperiness, etc.

Aside from educating my palate with tasting after tasting, probably the biggest single thing I’ve learned from it all is just how much the same exact beans can taste totally different depending on how they’re handled. Basically, brewed coffee quality can be very, very variable. It’s become ever clearer to me that even the most carefully sourced and roasted coffee beans can only get you a small way to where you want to go on your quest for quality. The grind, the water, the method, the age of the beans, the volume of ground coffee used…it’s not a simple thing.

That said, here are the things I’ve learned that any of us can do to radically increase the odds of consuming a better cup of coffee at home.

Buy Better Beans

I will tell you truthfully and with great confidence that there is a really big difference between great coffee beans and so-so stuff. I am very confident that even the biggest skeptic really can tell the difference pretty darned quickly if they just decide that they want to. This is where all of our head roastmaster Steve’s homework has paid off with connections to the most quality-conscious brokers in the US, enabling us to get hold of some really special green beans.

Use Enough Coffee

As simple as it seems, this really could be the single biggest offending action at issue in the world of home brewing. The generally recommended ratio is two tablespoons of ground beans per six-ounce cup. Even if you like weaker coffee you’re better off to brew at that ratio and then add hot water to thin your cup. Paul puts three coffee scoops of whole beans into his grinder for each 8-ounce cup of water he’s using. If you’re calculating pounds in decimals, as I like to do, it’s about .45 ounces for an 8-ounce cup. I’m sorry for all the confusion but it’s become clear to me that part of the problem is that everyone is using different measurements and, consequently, ending up with really variable coffee quality even if they start with the same exact beans.

Store the Coffee Well

That would mean in an airtight glass jar. Probably at room temperature, and stored in a dry cabinet where it’s away from the light, for no more than a week after you get it home. Although there are those who like to keep the coffee in the freezer, most folks I’ve talked to of late have given up on the idea; there is little to be gained and you run the risk of causing condensation inside the jar which will ruin your brew.

Grind Right

Your best bet is to buy a good grinder and grind at home right before you brew. My personal choice right now is to use one of the old-fashioned hand held German coffee mills that we’ve gotten hold of—they’re quieter, they look good, they’ve got a really great set of perfectly tooled gears inside. They don’t heat the beans in the least. They’re incredibly easy to use. And they’ve got a ten-year warranty on ‘em. For more on these old fashioned—yet marvelously modern when it comes to the actual grinding mechanism—check them out online.

If you want to stick with electronically powered machines, the best I think are the burr grinders. Like the old-fashioned hand driven mills above, these actually grind the coffee (as opposed to the chopping action you get from the ones with those little whirring blades). Whatever grinding method you might use, keep in mind the amount of time it takes to grind. A fifteen count is about right. Once you’re happy with the timing, the burr grinders give you the option of presetting the timing so that you get a higher level of consistency. If you’re using the blade style, stop a couple times to shake the beans so you get even grinding. Too fine will lead to bitterness. Too course and you lose flavor.

Use Better Water

Since nearly all of what we actually end up with in our cup is water, not coffee, it’s kind of clear that the better the water we use, the better tasting the brew will be. Filtered water will help a great deal—you may not recognize your current coffee purchases if you switch from tap water to filtered (I will say though that if you’ve become accustomed to tap water you may not like the “cleaner” taste of coffee brewed with filtered water when you first try it). Regardless it should be clean and cold. And be careful not to ever overboil.

Why are dark coffees confused with strong coffees? This is one of the most common misperceptions in the coffee world and the starting point for frequent conversations with customers. When someone is browsing Zingerman’s coffees for the first time they often ask, “Which is your darkest coffee? I like strong coffees.”

This question really hits on two very different, often confused, aspects of brewed coffee: roast color and brew strength. Roast color does not necessarily affect how strong a coffee tastes. Brew strength will always affect how strong it tastes.

Roast color affects what flavors you taste but not necessarily how much of them you taste. In very dark roasted coffees, the pleasant characteristics of the bean – sweet, floral notes and other aromas – are burned away. They are replaced by bitter components, often a charred flavor. We’re sensitive to those bitter flavors and sometimes mistake them for strength. Dark coffees aren’t necessarily stronger, though. They’re just darker.

It’s brew strength that really makes a coffee intense. Chances are, when you say you like strong coffee, this is what you mean. Technically brew strength is a measure of dissolved coffee solids in your cup. A strong coffee is one with more solids.

A lot of formal research has gone into the measurement of “optimal strength” coffees. Coffee experts will often tell us how much ground coffee we should have for how much water. To some extent, these guidelines are helpful. Too much coffee will start to taste bitter. Too little may taste pleasant but thin or watery, lacking body. I have my own personal opinions and preferences for brew strength. My professional opinion is that nearly everyone errs on the side of too little coffee. But in the end it’s your taste that counts, so find a brew strength that works for you.