Pound Coffee Roastery

A good friend whom I know back from the Fiori days has now embarked on starting his own coffee roasting business.

It’s called Pound Coffee Roastery.

If you happen to frequent Western Farmers Markets you would know the only coffee vendor is the gregarious Justin, and the studiously calm Irene.

They are now bringing to life single origin roasting on a boutique level.

Heavy old machinery in small hand batches of coffee, changing every few weeks to keep us on our toes. They could almost be caffeinated cousins to Bahen & Co. chocolate which have a similar old world approach.

In addition to tacking down seriously good batches of coffee, Justin and Irene will also be holding coffee grading classes (cupping) for curious coffee imbibers.

We attended one of the Saturday morning cuppings and were sternly warned not to consume any coffee beforehand. And rightly so.

Cupping involves the blind critical appraisal of coffee in cups. Echoing wine tasting, cuppers assess upon aroma/flavour of preinfused ground and steeped coffee in a table top extraction in small…erm…cups.

Mouthfeel, sweetness, acidity, and astringency are all wine-synonyms found in cupping.

It was it was interesting to see the effect of single origins, washed, unwashed (beans), at different grades etc… all of which my comprehension is only budding. And it reconfirmed how much I love Ethiopian coffee.