Our Coffee Experts: Westrock Coffee
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Instagram: @westrockcoffee | westrockcoffee.com
When choosing the coffee for you, it's important to understand what you like and dislike. We enjoy our daily cup (or two) of coffee holistically, even if we don’t realize it. The smell, the taste, the feeling you get when you take a sip, and the warmth the mug exudes. The entire experience is like a song. When you know the origin of the coffee and how it was grown, it’s like a song that was written just for you. We rarely get to see the backstory of the beans in our cup of coffee. Since the best coffees in the world are grown at high elevations (at least 3,000 feet above sea level) between the Tropics of Capricorn and Cancer. Places like East Africa, Central America and the Pacific Islands are where your coffee is grown. When it’s crafted and roasted, expertise and skill are needed to expose the natural, vibrant flavors of each origin’s coffee.
Look for four things:
Flavor. Look deeper into the coffees by pointing out the flavors that like plum or brown sugar.
Aftertaste. After you take a sip, does the coffee fell dry, smooth, lingering, good, or bad? There are many ways to describe the aftertaste of a coffee.
Acidity. There are also many ways to describe acid in coffee. The taste and feeling of citric acid is what most people recognize in coffee. Described simply, you can feel whether it is high or low acidity by examining the “zing” that the acid leaves on your tongue. Body. The viscosity of coffee contributes to the overall experience. Hold the coffee in your mouth and touch your tongue to the roof of your mouth. Does it have low body like water, or high body like whole milk? Like us, look for coffee that works at every stage of the coffee supply chain. Always paying a fair price to farmers for the coffee, agricultural and financial training, and authentic partnership are all majors factors in sustainable coffee.
Storing your coffee:
What is the best way to store your coffee to prevent it from going stale? Keep it in a container that is airtight. Oxygen causes coffee to stale at a faster rate. It is also better to keep it out of direct sunlight. Store coffee in glass so that the container does not retain oils or odors from the previous batch that is was holding. Materials like plastic will retain oils. Make sure the containers always have a proper lid. Use whole bean coffee instead of pre-ground coffee. When you use whole bean coffee, the bean is encapsulated, protecting the natural flavors in the bean.