Archive for the ‘ Coffee News ’ Category

Some of you might have already heard the rumours, but we wanted to wait with making it official until we knew it would really happen. We’re opening a new roastery and coffee shop in Frederiksberg, Copenhagen.

A few months ago we signed the lease for an absolute dream space. An old factory building on Godthåbsvej 34B in Frederiksberg. Just 10 minutes from Jægersborggade and in an area we know really well. The building is just three levels and we’ve taken the entire floor plan of around 400 square meters. This will host our new roastery, a good sized office space, storage and shipping, and a new coffee shop.

Since the beginning of the new year we’ve worked on renovating the interior. The walls and the beautiful old concrete floor have been kept, but made ready for use for food production. We especially love the floor, which have been sanded down and treated with something called liquid glass. We wanted to keep the history of this 100-year-old factory building. There’s lots of big bright windows in the old style with iron mullions and even though the building is off the main road, there’s great light. The renovation has taken quite a lot of time and we’ve needed to draw in new water, plumbing, radiators, electricity, build inner walls and so on. But we’re getting very close now and things are taking shape nicely. Our good friend Søren Ulrich and his company Plain Crafts have been instrumental in this process and he’s currently finishing the beautiful bar constructed in two kinds of Oak and raw iron.

For the roastery we’ve invested in a 35 kg Loring SmartRoast. That machine deserves a blog post on it’s own, and we will try to write that up soon. It will be visible through a large glass wall so the noise from the roasting won’t bother our guests, but everything will remain transparent. This will also be a much needed expansion of our roasting and packing space, which all our guests at Jægersborggade know we’ve been needing for a while.

To be honest, we didn’t really think we’d be building a third coffee shop so soon after the huge project of opening and optimizing Torvehallerne. We did consider just opening a roastery and wait with a coffee shop. But it just didn’t feel right. It’s been a central vision for us straight from the beginning of The Coffee Collective, that you should be able to see how we roast and be able to enjoy that coffee on the same premises. So since we have no wish to become a chain, we decided to try out something new with the coffee shop. Just as our two current shops are very different, this third place will hopefully present a completely new experience. And exactly the coffee experience is what we want to focus on.

The goal in our new shop will be to get our guests to experience and talk much more about the flavour of the different coffees. We wish to create an environment that is relaxing and de-stressing. Table service is one of the things that will help us to do this. Another is a long bar, with ample leg space and pleasant seats. From our experiences on Jægersborggade we want to bring in more closeness between the guests and the barista. Presence, service and openness will help us eliminate the stress we often see in people when they are waiting in line at a register. And we hope to create an atmosphere that encourages trying out new things and being open minded to new experiences.

There’s a lot of ideas and things we want to try out and we look forward to get the journey going. Everything is shaping up nicely. A La Marzocco Strada EP is installed and already producing some amazing shots of espresso. The Uber Boiler has arrived too and grinders, water filters and so on is in place. We’re still waiting for a few things to be in place before we dare to share an opening date, but it’s getting close. We’ll be back soon with an invitation to you all.

The space before putting up inner walls:

Some of you might have already heard the rumours, but we wanted to wait with making it official until we knew it would really happen. We’re opening a new roastery and coffee shop in Frederiksberg, Copenhagen.

A few months ago we signed the lease for an absolute dream space. An old factory building on Godthåbsvej 34B in Frederiksberg. Just 10 minutes from Jægersborggade and in an area we know really well. The building is just three levels and we’ve taken the entire floor plan of around 400 square meters. This will host our new roastery, a good sized office space, storage and shipping, and a new coffee shop.

Since the beginning of the new year we’ve worked on renovating the interior. The walls and the beautiful old concrete floor have been kept, but made ready for use for food production. We especially love the floor, which have been sanded down and treated with something called liquid glass. We wanted to keep the history of this 100-year-old factory building. There’s lots of big bright windows in the old style with iron mullions and even though the building is off the main road, there’s great light. The renovation has taken quite a lot of time and we’ve needed to draw in new water, plumbing, radiators, electricity, build inner walls and so on. But we’re getting very close now and things are taking shape nicely. Our good friend Søren Ulrich and his company Plain Crafts have been instrumental in this process and he’s currently finishing the beautiful bar constructed in two kinds of Oak and raw iron.

For the roastery we’ve invested in a 35 kg Loring SmartRoast. That machine deserves a blog post on it’s own, and we will try to write that up soon. It will be visible through a large glass wall so the noise from the roasting won’t bother our guests, but everything will remain transparent. This will also be a much needed expansion of our roasting and packing space, which all our guests at Jægersborggade know we’ve been needing for a while.

To be honest, we didn’t really think we’d be building a third coffee shop so soon after the huge project of opening and optimizing Torvehallerne. We did consider just opening a roastery and wait with a coffee shop. But it just didn’t feel right. It’s been a central vision for us straight from the beginning of The Coffee Collective, that you should be able to see how we roast and be able to enjoy that coffee on the same premises. So since we have no wish to become a chain, we decided to try out something new with the coffee shop. Just as our two current shops are very different, this third place will hopefully present a completely new experience. And exactly the coffee experience is what we want to focus on.

The goal in our new shop will be to get our guests to experience and talk much more about the flavour of the different coffees. We wish to create an environment that is relaxing and de-stressing. Table service is one of the things that will help us to do this. Another is a long bar, with ample leg space and pleasant seats. From our experiences on Jægersborggade we want to bring in more closeness between the guests and the barista. Presence, service and openness will help us eliminate the stress we often see in people when they are waiting in line at a register. And we hope to create an atmosphere that encourages trying out new things and being open minded to new experiences.

There’s a lot of ideas and things we want to try out and we look forward to get the journey going. Everything is shaping up nicely. A La Marzocco Strada EP is installed and already producing some amazing shots of espresso. The Uber Boiler has arrived too and grinders, water filters and so on is in place. We’re still waiting for a few things to be in place before we dare to share an opening date, but it’s getting close. We’ll be back soon with an invitation to you all.

The space before putting up inner walls:

Big congratulations to Torfi Þór Torfason – the 2012 Danish Barista Champion !

Also congratulations to Omar Hossain for the 2nd place and Allan Juhl for 3rd place.

Danish Barista Championship

This weekend the Danish Barista Championship as well as Latte Art and Cupping competitions is being held at Frederiksberg Hallerne, Jens Jessens vej 20, 2000 Frb. C.

Three of our baristas will be competing: Torfi, Peter E and Omar. So come by and cheer for them this weekend.

Saturday at 10.00 the Latte Art Competition will start and at 14.00 the Barista Championship takes off with 6 participants in total.

Sunday at 10.00 is the Cupping competition and Samuli, our new bar manager at Jægersborggade and previous Danish cupping champion will compete. The at 14.00 it’s the Finals of the Danish Barista Championship.

From what we know it’s going to be a small event, but it’s open to anyone.

Torvehallerne Closed Friday

Due to the strange Danish public holiday Store Bededag – literally means Big Praying Day – our shop in Torvehallerne will be closed tomorrow. Jægersborggade will still be open. We hope to see some of our inner city customers make it out to beautiful Nørrebro.

Today we have a new coffee on the shelves.

Upper watertank

We have never bought coffee from this part of Brazil, so it was with a lot of curiosity I was driving into Santa Alina late at night some weeks ago together with the owner Tuca and her general manager Rodrigo. It was pitch black, but I could already feel the difference in topography as the car rolled over one hill higher then the other.


Vale da Grama


Wetmill, patios


At any farm the harvest method is essential and you have to choose what is best for your location. At Santa Alina most picking is done by hand due to the steepness of the hills. They are looking into having machines helping out in the flatter parts to a greater extent, but even the flatter parts are not flat, which makes it quite a challenge.

Dense vegetation
Anther difference from the Cerrado is that the vegetation is more dense. There are more pockets of small forests squeezed in between the farms and the fields at Vale da Grama which is the common name for this region (Vale da Grama would be Grass Valley in english). So the general impression of this region is hilly, lushy green with a lot of tall trees and bushes.
The wildlife leaves little else to ask for, we saw hawks and lots of spiders. Jaguars have also been seen at the farm (but not by me).

Spiders



The coffee we have bought is a pulped natural where the aroma and taste is very much in line with how the landscape looks. It has a distinct fruity aroma with notes of dried abricots and a lot of body and sweetness.

Hidden stream

Santa Alina has been in the same family for over a hundred years and very recently Lucia Maria da Silva Dias (nicknamed “Tuca”) took over the farm from her father. During the last 2 years Santa Alina has undergone a huge transformation which is actually clearly visible by just strolling around the farm. What is striking is how the houses where the employees and their families live, have been transformed into modern homes. Many fences and barriers have been taken down which gives a very open and friendly impression. Santa Alina is now not just a coffee farm with some people and attached houses, it ressembles more a small prosperous village next to a coffee farm.
Workers houses

There are 120 people employed all year round who lives on the farm and during harvest comes another 180 workers.
Many of the inhabitants have also worked on the farm for generations, so there is a big sense of community which in turn seams to give a lot of valuable experience to build on when it comes to growing coffee.
Rodrigo, Nilton, Julio

Lucia Maria has also some rather young but very experienced managers and friends to help her run this everchanging farm. I spent a lot of time talking to Rodrigo Fernandes, but there were many others sharing their knowledge very generously- Nilton, Vanderlay and Julio just to mention a few.
Vanderlay at wetmill


Apart from the transformation of houses and a very extensive Human Resources programe, there is a long list of improvements taking place. The whole wet mill has been upgraded and they are working on many levels to get the coffee from the trees at the right time and thereby increasing the quality of the coffee.

Not ready yet

I should also mention that “Tuca ” asked me to make a small presentation of our company and how coffee is brewed in Denmark to her collegues. Just as interested as I am in how the beans are handled at the farm – equally interested I found the people at Santa Alina being interested in Denmark and how we drink coffee here.

We are very happy to introduce Santa Alina to you.

Upper patios


Ethiopia 2012


So I recently returned from a trip to Ethiopia.
The trip started out like many other coffee trips with heaps of cupping. I was very glad to be able to meet up with Carl Cervona from Technoserve in Addis Ababa and try out some samples from the coffee area surrounding the city of Jimma in the west of Ethiopia.
Cupping in Addis Ababa
Based on the cupping results and through conversation with Carl the planning of the trip towards west began and the route through this high altitude area was set. I was to travel out to Jimma and from here up north to the town of Bedele and visit around 10 cooperatives throughout the area.
Around Jimma area
I arrived in Jimma in the afternoon so there was time to go visit some cooperatives located quite near Jimma.
There are a lot of interesting things happening around Jimma.
And I was introduced to some of these things at the cooperative of Doyo.
Technoserve has been helping out for the last couple of years setting up loans for the cooperatives so that they can invest in better equipment and hereby get better quality, which hopefully will result in higher prices for the coffee.
Among these things are the demucilators the cooperatives use to remove the pulp. By using these machines you can separate fully ripe and under- and over–ripe and remove pulp and the layer of sugar from the beans without using the normal amount of water that a normal washing technic would use.
Demucilator
After pulp and sugar is removed from the coffee bean the coffee is washed during night ant then laid out on the raised drying beds in the morning. The water from the washing phase is cleaned and collected in lagoons using ”Magic grass”(I know.. lovely name right). This grass is said to remove up to 80% of the toxic material from the wastewater. The rest is collected and when the moisture is gone you can use the rest as fertiliser for the farmers.
''Magic'' grass
It is crucial to clean the water properly as the small villages surrounding the cooperatives are depending on the water from the small rivers that run from the mountains for drinking, washing and cleaning.
Arriving this late in the harvest period means there is not a lot to see coffee wise. But this means that the people running all these processes who normally are very busy, has time to meet and talk. I had the privilege to meet some of the people who produce some of the best coffees from Ethiopia and it was great to sit down and talk about what they do and what it is we are doing back in Denmark. Great conversations.
Drying tables getting packed down
All the cooperatives I visited had already packed all their drying tables away or were in the process of doing so. This is because termites will ruin the wood that the tables are made of if they are left outside. This wood is very expensive for the producers, so they store it safe in piles often at the receiving station.
Drying tables stored at recieving station
I also got to see some of the farms and plantations. The plants are planted directly out in the surrounding forests. The biodiversity is extraordinary and the coffee plants grow wild into the sky. I have not before seen coffee plants this high and I seems there would be a lot of more producing capacity if they started to prune and stomp some of the plants. Also this would make harvesting the cherry’s much easier. As they said they use the natural pruning technique where you let the plant grow until it falls over from its own weight.
Natural pruning
This is Kebge Wubeshet a farmer from the Hawa Yember Cooperative whom I was very glad to meet. In the two years he has been in a cooperative working with Technoserve the prices has risen so much that he has been able to build a new house of wood for his family.
Kebge Wubeshet Coffeefarmer from Hana Boske Cooperative
Before that all their coffee was processed as natural coffee dried on the dirt and sold to private buyers who drove up to the farm and bought the coffee as grade 4 or 5 for cheaps. Now most of the coffee is sold as grade 2 coffees for very good prices to buyers throughout the world seeking extraordinary coffees. Kebge is happier to produce high quality coffee and can now see that it is in fact possible to make a living of producing coffee of great quality and not just produce it out of need.
A really cool thing about Ethiopia is that they consume around 40% of the coffee they produce themselves. They drink it throughout the entire day and quite often it’s 2-3 cups at a time. Throughout Ethiopia you see small coffeehouses where coffee is brewed in the old traditional way by boiling it in a pot. Because most of Ethiopia is very high altitude this process does not ruin the flavour of the coffee and a lot of the places the coffee brewed this simple way really tastes good.
Coffeebar in Gera near Yukro cooperative
The trip ended up with me test roasting and cupping back in Jimma to make the last selecting round. I now knew what to bring home to sample with the guys back in Copenhagen.
Cupping samples
If you have plans to travel out west in Ethiopia do remember to visit some of the many honey farms as well. You will taste honey unlike anything you have tasted before.
Honey from local honey farm on the way to Nano Challa cooperative

EasterOpen

We count on drinking a lot of coffee this easter, hope you do too.
Both our stores are open between Thursday 5th april and Monday 9th April,  from 8.00 until 18.00
Happy Easter !

New Espresso Blend

We’re ready with a new blend!

About half a year ago Linus spent a month in Brazil and visited lots of farms, mills and other coffee people. He found quite a lot of interesting coffees, with good help also from our friend Isabela Raposeiras. One really caught our eye with it’s immense sweetness and clean cup. We’ve cupped it several times since then and just love it. It’s called Santa Isabel and actually Linus is down there right now again to visit them. He’ll report from his trip once he’s back.

Santa Isabel is the pillar of the new espresso blend which consists of:

60% Santa Alina, Brazil
30% Daterra Sweet Collection, Brazil
10% Finca Vista Hermosa, Guatemala

The two Brazils are both pulped natural, of pure red and yellow bourbon varieties. So you can expect a lot of sweetness and quite low acidity. The washed Finca Vista Hermosa is a mixture of varieties contributing with a little acidity to highlight that sweetness.

As always all coffees are bought Direct Trade and the quality of the green coffee allow us to roast it very light. And we’re going lighter with this new blend than before, allowing for even less bitterness.

Our taste descriptors are: Syrupy sweetness and cream-like mouthfeel. Caramel. French Nougat. Hazelnut. Long and round aftertaste. With milk you can expect deep coffee aromas and milk chocolate notes.

Available in our coffee shops and webshop from this week.

We hope you like it!

Finca Vista Hermosa
After having enjoyed the extremely clean and balanced coffee from Finca Vista Hermosa since we started our company in 2007, finally I got the chance to visit the Finca in Huehuetenango, Guatemala. I had the pleasure of travelling with Thomas Sigfred who has two coffee shops in Aarhus. called Sigfreds Kaffebar. In my view they have for many years been one of very few coffee shops in Denmark that has developed a solid barista culture. And Thomas work there has inspired lots of peolple both costumers, employees and other people in the business.


I was very curious to see the place where the Finca Vista Hermosa coffee is produced and meet the people who produces it. After 3 days of travelling (including an unforeseen night in Miami because of very slow immigration process there) finally we reached Finca Vista Hermosa monday 5th of March in the afternoon. What stroke me as the first thing was how impressing the mountains looks in Huehue. I have seen coffee at similar altitudes in other countries but the heigth difference between the valleys here and the top of the mountain I have never seen similar. That really makes the mountains of the Huehue region look amazing!

When we arrived at the finca we started out with a good hike around the lots that we have been buying through the years as Cipresal, Sabinal, Edlyna and the Vista Hermosa lot. It is always a good reminder of how much effort is put into producing the coffee when walking around and see how steep the slopes that the trees are growing on can be. It is definitely not an easy task keeping these trees healthy and picking their cherrys.
Tuesday we got the chance to cup samples from what had been picked on the different lots of Finca Vista Hermosa so far. We cupped together with Edwin and it was his first time cupping the samples of this harvest as well. I was really impressed and exited about the cupping, since there where quite a few very clean, sweet and balanced lots but also some special ones with very delicate Fruity and Floral aromas which I haven’t found to that degree in any other Guatemalan coffee before. Very distinct citric tones in one lot and bergamot notes in another. I found this very interesting since normally I have only tried that elegant and well defined fruity (elegant fruity notes not fruity as on the edge to fermented) or floral notes from coffees of the Kenyan SL varieties, Ethiopian undefined varieties or the Gesha variety. At Finca Vista Hermosa they grow none of these. On the lots with these special aromas was Caturra, Catuaí, Bourbon and Arabigo.
It seems to me that in general from what I tried this year the crop is the best that I can remember from Guatemala! Now I just hope that these fantastic aromas arenot to fragile to make it through the milling and exportation system Guatemala.
What made this origin visit extra exiting for me was the hospitality of Edwin Martinez and his family. It is rare to get the oppotunity to stay in private homes all through an origin visit. The Martinez familiy where so kind as to host us in Edwins Grand Parents house in Guatemala City, in his parents house in Huehue and at the Finca. 
Thank You, Edwin for all Your hospitality, the friendly and inspiring talks as well as all Your work during the year to make coffee from Finca Vista Hermosa as well as from other producers in Huehuetenango recoqnized in the industry of specialty coffee for their extremely high quality!