How We Choose And Source Our Coffee

How We Choose And Source Our Coffee
 

If you’ve ever opened a bag of our coffee before, you’ll notice the phrase “we source and roast the most interesting and delicious coffee for you to brew and enjoy” right under the zipper. Those words? That, my friends, is our mission statement.

It lives in on the back of our bags because sourcing coffee is one of the most important things we do at Rogue Wave Coffee. Sourcing coffee is a large part of our core identity, and we want to walk you through how we do it.

Getting the highest quality bag of coffee begins with us sourcing the highest quality raw ingredient – the green coffee we import, and there is no substitute for it! Our process begins with samples of green coffee being sent to us from farms and producers all over the coffee growing world. We deeply value and love our relationships with these farms and producers as we have worked with many of them for multiple years. We are lucky to have built some fantastic partnerships along the way.

If you have been a long-time buyer of our coffee, then you will have noticed many of the same farms and producers are on our shelves each harvest season. We give feedback to all our partners along the supply chain in the earnest effort to continuously improve the quality of coffee these farms produce. 

We roast the green samples of coffee in our beloved and much used Ikawa sample roaster, and then blindly cup and grade the coffee. Blind cupping works much like a double-blind science experiment – we do not know what coffee is what when we taste them so we can be as bias-free as possible.

This is a process that is wonderful as cupping fresh-crop coffee is experiencing coffee in its purest form. It is also something that is monotonous as we cup and grade a LOT of coffee, but we know there are no short cuts – we have to put the time in as there is nothing more important to us than ensuring that the green beans we bring in are of the highest quality.

After cupping, our decision-making process is simple. We judge the coffees on industry standard parameters that include acidity, balance, mouthfeel, and aftertaste. With those parameters in mind, when we come together as a team to talk about the coffees we cupped, we are focused simply on choosing coffees we think you will love. We are looking for those coffees that have something special to say and will enable you to brew a memorable cup; we want coffees that tell a story from the first sip that showcases and highlights the strengths of that particular coffee growing region.

As coffee roasters, coffees that are interesting and delicious is what we will always be after, and we want to provide you with an experience that will have you excited and anticipating the next cup.

Ready to try some coffee our? Check out our latest offerings here.

 

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