Brazil Ipanema Tree-Dried Process

Why do I keep buying Brazilian coffees? They all taste like one-dimensional, ashy coffees to me, with the exception of my beloved, Poco Fundo. Mmm, Poco Fundo (insert Homer Simpson voice)....

Anyway, I have been doing a lot of roasting for espresso lately, and I am always on the lookout for interesting coffees to add in. This one caught my eye because of the "tree dried" moniker, and the allusion to Oreo cookies in the review at Sweet Marias. Recall that I had tried a tree-dried coffee before, and it was interesting, so I bit for a pound.

I roasted this twice. The first time was in my standard treatment:

For some reason, this coffee raced from 1st to 2nd crack and got away from me. It ended up as a Vienna roast. In a second session, I blended it (pre-roast) with some Uganda Bugisu, and that was a more normal behavior during the roast.

As espresso, this was indeed redolent of an Oreo cookie. You got that chocolate cookie thing going on, with a very unusual creaminess to the body and taste that reminds you of that cookie center, which is of course nothing more than vegetable shortening and sugar.... It is certainly an interesting effect, but I found the whole thing a bit one-dimensional. It lacked that dynamism (is that a word?) that you get from a great dry-pricessed coffee, that core of spices and leather that keeps things interesting. Even blended with the Uganda, I just didn't find it interesting. Oh, well, another Brazil bites the dust. I am done with this origin, with the one exception.

Brazil Pocos de Caldas - Fazenda Barreiro

Have you ever gotten really excited about something based on its description and then ended up being totally disappointed after you got it? That pretty much sums up my experience with this coffee. I have been doing a lot of thinking about espresso lately, and trying to come up with a blend of my own. Before even getting to that, however, I have been exploring individual coffees to get a taste picture in my mind, hoping that will make things easier.

Quoting Tom from SweetMarias:

"... This is a very unusual and complex coffee, and has won quite a few accolades: BSCA and COE in 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, and Illy award in 2007. The dry fragrance is has strong nut tones, sunflower seed, and savory qualities. There are hints of fresh leather, which perhaps doesn't seem like something you want to smell in your coffee, but it is very attractive in this cup! The aromatics have hints of ripe muscat grape and a bit of banana sweetness, as well as hazelnut roast tonality. Cup flavors are so unique, with toasted almond, savory spice, honey and bee pollen sweetness. The cup is very dense, oily, thick. I get a raw sunflower seed flavor, and hints of olive oil. The overall flavor profile is concentrated in the middle ranges, without high acidic effect or (at my City+ cupping roast) dark, pungent deep tones. As it cools, it seems thicker and thicker. I start to get a single-malt scotch flavor from the coffee, with a tiny suggestion of roasted red pepper. For me, this is a unique flavor experience overall, that might have aspects of Indonesian coffee (low acidity, rustic sweetness), even Aged Sumatra (leathery hints), but is also unique when I line it up against other natural and pulp-natural Brazils on the cupping table. I can easily pick it out of the line-up every time in blind cupping."

Wow - sounds awesome, doesn't it? I picked up a pound and roasted it a few snaps into second crack:

This had some seriously dry, leathery aromas during roasting.

Bottom line - I wasn't impressed. In fact, I felt a bit let down. As espresso, I found it quite one-dimensional. Low acid, dry and leathery, but without any interesting character to it. I played around with temperature, time, and grind, and couldn't find a good operating point. As drip coffee it was a bit better - waxy bittersweet chocolate was the theme. I am just not a fan of Brazil coffees with the exception of Poco Fundo, I suppose.

Brazil Jacu Bird Coffee

I'd really like to know who first thought of the idea of using the coffee beans that animals ingested and then pooped out. The guy (I am pretty sure it must have been a guy) is either an idiot or a genius. Actually, likely the latter given what these coffees go for. You may be familiar with kopi luwak (easily googleable, if that is a word), the product of an Indonesian rodent with a taste for coffee cherries. This stuff goes for >$100 per pound in places. The theory is that the animal only eats the ripest coffee cherry, thereby "sorting" the best from the worst. In reality, however, the rodent eats low-grade robusta beans similar to what you get in a can of Folgers, so hang onto your wallet.

Last year a different product began to emerge, this time from Brazil. The coffee consumer is the Jacu bird, a cute creature that lives on coffee farms in Brazil:

In principle, this avian aficionado eats high quality arabica beans from the same farms that already produce great coffee. It is still pricey, ~$17 per pound, but it is being offered by some purveyors who I trust for quality, so I decided to try a pound out.

This being a Brazilian coffee, I decided to take it into second crack a bit:

It looks and roasts like any other dry processed coffee. And the cup? Let me tell you - this coffee got more rave reviews than any other coffee I bring into work, and this is without telling them what it was. My wife, also slipped a cup without telling her, also waxed philosophic about it. Of course, then I did the "you drank poopy coffee" dance around the kitchen in true infantile fashion....

It is a sweet, sweet cup with intense maple syrup tastes. Smooth and delicious, and no trace of the, er, unusual processing. I am looking forward to some espresso extractions with it as well.

Brazil FTO Poco Fundo x2

The coffees from the Poco Fundo cooperative in Brazil have a unique distinction: they are the only Brazilian coffees I like. I have tried many, and they always disappoint me in terms of overall flavor, intensity, and interest. They serve as a nice backdrop in an espresso blend occasionally, but on their own I just don't like them.

Then there is Poco Fundo. This is a dry processed coffee with some great character. In the darker roasts I do with this bean, it is one of the best single origin espressos out there. Nutty, fruity (plums, raisins, etc.), chocolately - Poco Fundo has it all. As drip, it is also a very nice cup, but it really shines as espresso.

Anyway, I had a pound lying around and I thought it would be interesting to roast this coffee to a very light level, something I hadn't done before. Maybe I have been missing something all this time while roasting it past second crack?

Here we go with the light roast:


Brazilian beans are typically not that dense, so I tried to take it easy with this roast. I eagerly anticipated the first pot of coffee. And the result?.... Lousy. This was thin and boring. There was some nuttiness, but the characteristic fruitiness that I love so much in this bean wasn't there. It wasn't a terrible cup, but it wasn't very good either.

Just to prove that I wasn't going crazy, I took the other half pound of coffee and roasted it darker:



Here you'll see that the final temperature was up a but to make sure the coffee entered second crack, and the total roast time was longer. This time the coffee was phenomenal. Low acidity, intense nuttiness, chocolate, and plums. The mouthfeel is unique - creamy and crunchy if that makes any sense. The espressos were just perfect. With this coffee, I will be avoiding the light roasts like the plague.