With global warming (and other factors) affecting coffee production and prices, I’ve noticed a couple of interesting patterns in marketing strategies for household and white label brands.
Everything is extra intense, high intensity, intensity 11 (probably comes with a free Spinal Tap record)… Robusta roasted past 5th crack, no doubt.
I also spotted a bag of highly exclusive “100% Robusta.” At this point I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop and for them to market “0% cyanide” coffee.
How’s everybody else’s grocery shopping experience these days? Is this a big trend in your area?
Yes. I noticed a decently reputable (but mega corp) bag of whole espresso beans… 50% robusta. I was surprised.
Everyone is right into burnt coffee for some reason too. I hear a lot of people talking about dark roasts and how they like “strong coffee”.
The burnt bean people like their beef well done.
This is me. I also like slightly burnt microwave popcorn. I dunno, maybe something’s wrong with my taste buds.
I was recently one of those people. 🤦
Made the mistake of thinking French roast would be a nice and bold cuppa, so I bought a couple bags of beans at Costco… absolutely terrible coffee.
I have discovered cold infusion coffee just last week. It’s a surprising way to salvage ruined coffee roast. Cool water until there’s some ice in it, or just dump ice in water, then dump your badly roasted coffee powder, shake, and leave in the fridge overnight (not the freezer). Strain the grounds, reheat in the microwave and drink (or just drink it cold and with grounds, whatever works for you). Ideally you should use coarse grind size, but it’s mainly because it’s easier to filter it.
I’d love to do this properly. I tried it a while ago and it tasted like dirt. What is the best ratio of water to grounds?
Dirt
I expect it’s unfamiliarity with roasting and some “more must be better” reasoning that makes this marketing work.
Dark roast drinker here. I am completely unfamiliar with the roasting process. I prefer the flavor. Regular dark roast. For me it’s a flavor preference.
Upvote for dark roast being stronger flavor. If I just wanted more caffeine, there are brands that do that
I like my beer IPA or ESB, I like my coffee, black, strongly flavored, I like my chocolate dark with little to no milk solids, I like my grapefruit by itself with no sugar. Intense flavor is life
You know what all those have in common? They all go good with dark chocolate.
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For sure!
I don’t know fuck about coffee and 99% of the time drink basic bitch Maxwell house from the warehouse club, but I love dark roast. Not these new megacaff brews being discussed though. I used to occasionally get Starbucks Sumatra, I just tossed my single serve thing and got a French press, and a bag of Peets Major Dickasons Blend.
I guess I don’t really have a point, but I’m open to suggestions as I try to drink less crappy coffee lol.
If I’m not mistaken, burning the shit out of coffee neutralizes some of the caffeine in it- ironically
That is a widespread assumption, since roasting breaks down the caffeine somewhat, but Hoffman did a test and found higher caffeine in darker roast brews, and speculated that while there was less in the bean, it may be more extractable. There’s also the issue that the more you roast the bean, the less each bean weighs so you get more beans per unit weight.
It’s not as bad as people make it out to be but a lighter roast will pack more caffeine in it. If you get a chance to a tour in Costa Rica. I did a few and it was awesome
There’s room for preference, I can enjoy a dark roast blend, but they seem to be really leaning into it these days.
Dark roast used to be my go-to before I realized I had some sort of reflux issue and started taking antacids. But sometimes I still stray back it had strong bitter flavor is kind of comforting
That’s not the case around me, where the fancier the coffee shop the lighter the roast typically. And many smaller roasters are selling very pale cinnamon roasts under the heading “medium”.
The trouble is, many people really dislike an acidic light-bodied cup full of floral notes. Plus often they’re not especially skillfully made and I’m pretty sure some people are reacting to very thin acidic, sometimes woody and vegetal, cups and assuming that if they don’t like this, they must want dark roasts.
As usual, it’s shouldn’t be a binary, and they might enjoy a traditional medium roast, or perhaps a better prepared lighter roast. Personally I hate acrid, shiny-bean dark roast, but I’m not sure I hate it more than some of the cups of woody acid I’ve been offered from some enthusiast “high end” coffee shops around here.
Another possibility is just that light roasts can just be too fiddly for most people to want to bother with. Between the money for equipment and time spent brewing it, it’s probably just too great an investment for most people to take something from at least acceptable to them to being great, after a while when you get things dialed in and the stars align.
Sure, though to many of us it’s a lot of money and investment to take something from very unpleasant to kind of palatable.
Sure, I was just trying to say that while some people will dislike the flavor of the currently vaunted light roasts, even when properly brewed, I think there is a pretty sizeable number of people who would like them well enough, but just find it too much hassle. Especially outside of the specialty coffee scene, where you see more and darker roasts, in my experience
When Costco or someone puts out a dark roast on the shelves, they generally aren’t competing for customers that drink single lot beans from your favorite café, they’re looking to get the people who find McDonald’s coffee or Dunkin Donut’s good enough, but want to save a bit of money by brewing at home.
Once I saw a bag of over roasted beans from a small roaster. They screwed up the process and ended up with a batch that tasted like smoke, ash and charcoal. Instead of throwing it away, they decided to sell it instead.