When small is beautiful
A new generation of micro- roasters is raising the bar on coffee with small-batch lots of beans focusing on terroir in the cup. It's about geography, rainfall, humidity and soil type, just like chocolate, tea and wine.
O'Connor-based Micrology has picked up four medals, including gold for its Ethiopian Yirgacheffe from Aricha at the Nativa Golden Bean Awards this year.
"This coffee has a unique sweet blueberry fruit flavour with a rich creamy texture and a slight citrus acidity, best enjoyed as a black or an espresso," Micrology owner Dan Ash said.
A 10kg lot of Geisha - the varietal is so rare and sought after that it has a cult following - from Don Pepe Estate in Panama was roasted for demonstrations and tastings. The notes? "It has an intense floral fragrance with concentrated fruit flavours of orange and strawberries," he said. "If it were to be sold, you'd be looking at about $50 for 250g."
Altitude and microclimate on farms are givens; so are growing methods, harvesting and processing to develop stronger relationships between growers, wholesalers and roasters because 10 years ago farmers would not even get to drink the coffee they produced.
"They would simply pick over-ripe, under-ripe and insect-damaged beans, sell them to a broker and get paid peanuts," Mr Ash said. "The push now is to encourage farmers to pick better beans and pay them a bonus so they are rewarded for their production and become more educated along the way."
Gordon St Garage, in West Perth, roasts under the Mano a Mano label for its stable of restaurants, which includes Il Lido in Cottesloe and Bread in Common in Fremantle, and only buys coffee picked in the past six months. Its Blue Seal house blend changes every fortnight as new beans arrive and there are two single estates for espressos and filter brews.
Typika's Stephen Kenyon has invested heavily in WA's biggest artisan-roasting training facility under one roof on the former Claremont Fresh site, with an $800,000 roasting operation that includes two machines. Micro-lots are sourced from around the world and used in filter and espresso coffees.
"We're talking about beans from a small area of what might otherwise be a big farm that are processed differently," he said.
"They have a cleaner, more interesting flavour, with more sweetness and complexity; sometimes you end up with 10 different notes in a cup."
Darkstar's Tim Fraser and Duncan Mathews focus on specialty-grade beans in their O'Connor facility, such as the 30kg lot they just unpacked from Paso Ancho Estate in Panama with floral, stone fruit and chocolate flavours that will be sold as a single-origin espresso, filter roast and bottled as a total-immersion cold-brew iced coffee .
"The priority is coffee that's equitably sourced and traceable with sustainable relationships between purchaser and seller," Mr Fraser said. "I'm going to Africa next month to meet our producers so we can work together and discuss how they can improve their practices."
Down the road, Pound Roastery's Justin Gardner roasts in 8-12kg batches, matching beans to brews.
"Sometimes a coffee that works in a great espresso won't work in a flat white," he said. "This year, a Colombian Bruselas has been a highlight with an apple sweetness, vanilla and cocoa; another has been a Nicaraguan from Mierch Estate with wild cherry, cocoa and sherbert. Some of these are grown in very small areas and you even get the farmer's name."
