First, let me express much love to Sean at Houndstooth here in Austin. Sean talks about trying with his shop to "weave the pattern of coffee and people," and is starting, in my estimation, to do a great job of that. His first major outreach is a weekly free public cupping. Every Monday at 130, Houndstooth opens its doors, its grinders, and its coffee bags to all comers. I've run into no less than 2 independent roasters, as well as a dozen random new coffee fans. Its a great way for people to become acquainted with specialty coffee, but also to begin to build a lay-community of coffee lovers.
But I was actually onto something here that associates back my last message on the Yirgacheffe from Intelligentsia. Last week, we cupped 3 different Yirgacheffes, one of which was the Adado from Intelli. There was also a Yirgacheffe from Verve and one from Dallis Coffee (being repped by all-around coffee geek and good guy Dan Streetman). No doubt these were all great coffees, very fun to drink. But this quick comparo really reinforced my previous notes about the Adado. For whatever reason, be it Terroir, roast, processing, the Adado really distinguished itself from the others. The Yirgacheffe from Dallis and Verve lacked the amazing lime forwardness that the Adado showcases.
This prompted a discussion about what exactly effects flavor more, the bean, the processing, or the roasting. Dan made the point that Intelligentsia's faster roasting methods may cause the internal bean temperature, and there for roast level, to be inherently lower for a given degree of roast than Verve's low heat ultra-slow roasting method. This lower degree of roast would have the effect of increasing acidic tastes, and therefor lead to a brighter cup in general. I'm not sure I'm one hundred percent convinced, but I'm certainly interested in cupping another same region group from the same roasters against one another.
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