Coffee Review: El Salvador La Roxanita by Verve Coffee Roasters

By now, I've had what I would like to consider to be a reasonable amount of coffee from various roasting companies. I'm not claiming to be some ultimate coffee guru or anything even close to that. I'd like to consider myself as a home coffee enthusiast, if you had to call it anything at all. It's just my thing. While other men are glued to the TV arguing over why that coach didn't put that one guy in at that one time, I'm adjusting my grind size and measuring coffee extraction levels. All that so say, out of all the coffee roasters that I've tried I have not yet found one to be better than Verve Coffee Roasters. It may be a premature thing for me to say, but it's my blog and my opinion, so take that! Anyway, without getting deeper into my tangent on how much I like Verve, I'm just going to talk about today's cup. Today we're talking about Verve's La Roxanita. 

El Salvador La Roxanita
Roaster: Verve Coffee Roasters
Region: El Tunel, Chalatenango
Processing: Honey-Process
Varietal: Pacamara

Why calculate TDS and extraction yield when a computer
can do it for ya?

Method: Chemex, paper filter
Grind: Course-Medium (26)
Grind/Water: 19g/300g
Pour Method: 60 (agitate/bloom)-150-200-250 (agitate)-300
Initial Water Temp: 198 F
End Water Temp: 130 F 
Extraction Yield: 21.05%
TDS: ?? (Again! I messed up on my measurements)
Aroma: Chocolate, berries, roses
Taste: Milk chocolate, tinge of orange, subtle berry
Mouth feel: Balanced, smooth


The Verdict:
While being excited for Verve's newest shipment that's come to my door via their free online shipping, I still want to maintain as much of an unbiased opinion of this coffee for the readers sake (you're welcome). That being said, this coffee's fantastic. One thing I can always appreciate about Verve is that whatever the package says it's going to taste and smell like is not an exaggeration of what you're going to get. Initial aroma's reminded me of a chocolate dipped strawberry and roses (not even joking). Basically smelled like Valentines Day in a cup. Once brewed, my first sip had those rich milk chocolate undertones. A couple sips later (as it started cooling) the hint of orange kicked in with some very subtle berry tastes as well. 

Overall, it was a very pleasant experience. It was really good. Very balanced; meaning as it sat in my mouth it wasn't more acidic or more spicy. It was smooth, tasty and stinkin' awesome. Like I mentioned in previous posts, much of the character of the coffee develops even more as it cools. That being said, this definitely maintained it's balanced taste as it cooled down which makes me want to try this things iced. Hmmm. Might have to...

Now I'm all about supporting local, however I'm also about supporting talented and well done. Verve Coffee Roasters really do roast quality coffee and, in my opinion, is one of the best out there. Support local coffee roasters, but please do yourself a favor and try something from Verve. You will not be disappointed with their single origin coffee offerings. And they have free shipping! Come on! You're running out of excuses! Go get some. Oh you don't have a link to their online store? Boom. Here it is.

Any questions? Have you had better coffee that I need to try? Shoot 'em in the comments area and let's talk. 

Coffee Review: Organic Bolivia Anjilanaka by Intelligentsia

It doesn't take much to get me to brew up some coffee at Casa Hernandez. My cousin, and fellow coffee connoisseur, Fabian just got a new bag of Intelligentsia Coffee that he wanted to bring over and brew up. Obviously, this is a no brainer for me; bring it on over!

So, thinking about it, this post could go two different ways:
1) I explain to you, in deep unnecessary detail, the visit from my cousin Fabian. This would include our family history, embarrassing stories from our childhood, and us ending our visit with a nutritious family dinner consisting of sloppy joes and curly fries.
or
2) I give you, in brief detail, our findings from our awesome coffee brew party.

Let's go with option 2.

Organic Bolivia Anjilanaka
Roaster: Intelligentsia Coffee
Region/Farm: Caranavi, Las Yungas

Processing: Wet Processed
Varietal: Typica, caturra, catuaí

We decided to prepare this coffee two different ways so we could determine which method we thought would be most tasty for our home brewing. Here were our findings:

Method: V-60 Pour Over
Grind: Course-Medium
Grind/Water: 26g/410g
Pour Method: 60 (agitate/bloom)-140-220-300-380 (agitate)-410
Initial Water Temp: 200 F
End Water Temp: 152 F
Extraction Yield: 19.23%
TDS: ???? (because I messed up in my measurements...bahh)
Aroma: Berry, spices
Taste: Fruity, cloves, dark chocolate (especially as it cools)
Mouth feel: Slight acidity, mild.

The Verdict: This is the part where most of my friends would say, 'yeah, I have no idea what those numbers have to do with coffee, just tell me how it tasted.' Alright alright! So at first slurp, it honestly did not taste as good as I had imagined it to be. Usually that first sip, if you brewed it right, is where you get those crisp, clean, slightly acidic notes on the tip of your tongue (obviously depending on what kind of coffee you have). This had a bit of a bite to it. I wish that I would have been able to measure the TDS (total dissolved solids) because that would have given me a pretty good indication if I brewed the coffee too strong. However, one thing you always want to remember with coffee is that it is complex. There are many variables that contribute to the overall taste of the coffee. The first variable I thought of was the water temperature at the time of consumption. The serving temp I had for this coffee was 152 F, which for me is usually a bit too hot for my liking (I usually like mine in the 140-145 range). So I waited about a minute for it to cool and once I had it at about 145 F, it was pretty good. Coffee continues to develop character as it cools off, so keep that in mind when drinking your coffee. The fruitier notes definitely kicked in once it had time to cool.

So was it amazing? No, however it was still good. One thing I'm trying to stay away from is knocking specialty coffee roasters for not having shockingly amazing coffee. To me, as long as their products taste good I'll consider that a win for them.  Typically your South American coffees end up being a bit heavy ended, such as your Brazil's, your Columbia's, etc... Given that, and the fact that I'm a bigger fan of the wilder berry tasting coffees, I'd say that this coffee was good. Have I had better? Yes, but this stuff still knocks the pants off that Yuban you had at work this morning.

After less than stellar results from our pour over, we were interested to see what this coffee offered run as an espresso...

Method: Mypressi Twist Espresso
Grind: Fine
Grind/Water: 18g/2 oz (approx)
Pre-infusion: Yes
Shot Pulled: 20 sec
Initial Water Temp: 207 F
Aroma: Berry, dark chocolate
Taste: Bright apricot, brown sugar, slight limy acidity
Mouth Feel: Light yet full body, mellow

Coffee drinker by day, amazing musician by...well,  by day too. And night.
FabianChavez.com

The Verdict: Smiles were all around with this coffee done as an espresso.
Fabian's first words after finishing his shot was "Dude, lets make another one!"  Crema was nice and rich in color. The sweetness given off from this coffee as an espresso was smooth and mellow, yet sugary with a hint of acidity as you finish it. We sipped that shot and gave each other imaginary high fives and 'atta boys, thinking that this coffee had redeemed itself in our graces. There was no debating between the two of us that this coffee is best served as an espresso rather than pour over. Again, it's not a bad pour over, it's just better as an espresso.

Overall, it was a nice side by side comparison between the two coffees. One coffee done two ways. Both tasted good but the espresso just tasted better. We felt that the espresso brought out the more subtle fruity notes and made them more vibrant and noticeable. It's neat how brewing coffee as an espresso does that. A friend of mine once described espresso brewing as a caricature, or exaggeration  of that particular coffee; meaning if the coffee tastes of berries, it's likely to taste really bright and vibrant as an espresso. Or if it had subtle chocolate undertones, an espresso would really bring out that chocolate to the forefront of your tasting, making it rich and dark.

If you ever get your hands on Intelligentsia's Organic Bolivia, try it different ways. I believe that the beauty in coffee is in it's complexity. There are so many factors that contribute to the coffee's overall taste, so play around with your brew methods. Don't be afraid to mess up. Record what you do, adjust your variables when somethings off, and repeat your method once you get it just right. In the words of the late Aaliyah:
"If at first you don't succeed, you can dust it off and try again, you can dust yourself off and try again, try again."
Literally. Dust off that portafilter and try again (wow, that quote worked perfectly for this coffee entry).