George Howell Coffee / Kenya / Kirinyiga Mamuto AB / Washed

After drinking that magnificent Ethiopian a few weeks ago, I was advised to try the Mamuto AB from George Howell. That Ethiopian, this Mamuto AB, and the matching Mamuto AA are the three coffees that George Howell stocks full time. Every other coffee is rotating. I loved the Ethiopian, which was super sweet and silky. I was informed I would enjoy this one.

This coffee is very sweet and bright and deposits sweetness on your mouth that remains for hours. It is not as thick and syrupy as the Ethiopian. The chocolate note is crisp - probably because it is a medium roast. I did not like that aspect. And I struggled to get a brew that I found truly delicious. I struggled to dial in on my Kalita, and was not shocked by the French press (I do not like French press in general, though). I got good results from Aeropress. 

My favorite brew was the Tim Wendelboe, stronger recipe. I think this coffee would be excellent as a moka pot and as espresso, as George Howell themselves call out. Regardless, I spent my final 20g of beans on this final moka-pot-style brew, which was the right amount of bitter and exploding with juice and fruit. Wow. It was an impressive. It felt like there was actual fruits popping on my teeth. This is comparative to other "medium roast" coffees, bear in mind, but I thought it was an excellent brew. 

My biggest learning this time around is that I prefer light roasts. I was weirdly finding it hard to dial in medium roasts - not because they are hard to dial in, but rather because I wasn't getting the results I wanted. The results I wanted were just light roast coffee! The other learning is that Aeropress is the best brew method. Just brew it on Aeropress!

Hyperion / Colombia / Huila Luis Enrique & Robinson Cuellar / Washed Pink Bourbon

One of my methods for grading my enjoyment of coffee is how much I crave it after or how much I remember it. I think that the mechanism for this is actually how much sweetness the coffee leaves on my tongue – I have no idea how the physics of that work. In any case, I really enjoyed this coffee after it cooled down to "warm at best," and it had a wonderful sweetness. The top end of the temperature was a bit too acidic for me, but as it cooled down, I found it had this pleasantness that this terroir and varietal combination often makes. 

I do think coffee is always a perception thing. The same coffee can be labeled with different notes and your brain will try to match them up. The point of coffee is not tasting notes, though. The point is whether you like it or not. I remember this coffee fondly. 

Wesley Andrews Coffee & Tea / China / Yunnan / Red Honey Double Ferment

I am usually wary of cafes that roast their own beans but have an air of non-commercialty to those beans that they roast. You need to start somewhere, I guess, but I feel like those smaller roasters usually do not make coffee that lives up to snuff. I thought Wesley Andrews was a multi-roaster, which they are, but multi in addition to their own coffee. 

I ended up at Wesley Andrews after going to FRGMNT, one of the original specialty cafes in the Twin Cities. FRGMNT is a multi-roaster, but I was in search of a pourover. FRGMNT will only do batch brew and espresso. A good principle, and it certainly helps them make money and have consistent quality. High throughput cafes should not do hand brew coffee because hand brew coffee is impossible to do consistently at pace. I should not be so beholden to the "pourover," because I think good coffee is not about the brew method. 

Wesley Andrews had two roasters on rotation today, themselves, and Heart. Both Heart roasts were Colombian so I immediately overlooked them. Yunnan caught my eye — never had coffee from there before! I usually associate Yunnan with pu-erh. Actually, I only started this association a few days ago after reading the Wikipedia page on pu-erh. I knew Yunnan produced coffee but I was never presented with the option. 

The pourover took a long time to arrive — in the meantime, we had also ordered one of their permanent specials, a matcha Thai tea. It was not good. The matcha was all in one big glass milk bottle and was premade and looked watery. The Thai tea itself was not too brightly colored but was weirdly spicy. Overall, the whole drink was a little bit too watery and spicy, which was peculiar. 

The coffee finally came and on first sniff I knew I was in for a little bit of sadness. The fermentation of the bean did not bring out anything interesting except for vague fermentation. Maybe this is a product of the lack of subversion they did to me — no notes on the bag, no helpful information on what thoughts to form — but it just kind of tasted earthy and fruity with low acidity. Perhaps this was not the best representation of the terroir. 

Haan Coffee / Colombia / Edwin Norena / Honey & Watermelon Mossto Co-Ferment Castillo

I was about to say that everyone in Colombia feels outdone by Sebastian Ramirez and Diego Bermudez, but then I learned that Edwin Norena actually is the father of co-fermentation and was famous maybe over a decade before Ramirez and Bermudez. That being said, co-fermentation is cool and all, and this coffee tasted just like jolly ranchers, but that is exactly the problem with the coffee! It tasted just like jolly ranchers! It is like a cool trick. Back flips are really cool, and require a lot of skill, but can I use a backflip every day? 

I should break down the name of the coffee. ChatGPT told me castillo is a varietal common to Colombia, and the honey and watermelon are added in a vat with the coffee cherries to ferment. "Mossto" is the juice of the coffee cherries that helps macerate the cherries and control fermentation. Macerate means to soften, often by soaking in liquid.

Complaining is probably out of order. This was a tasty coffee. All the notes were crystal clear. There was no winey-ness. You could show it to someone who would be totally surprised at the coffee. And if you were not given the list of notes, you probably would not say jolly rancher since that is not a flavor you (hopefully) associate with coffee. I would have loved to see what it would taste like as a cold brew or in a milk drink, though. That would be very interesting. 

Haan Coffee / Cold Brew

Sometimes, I like to wax poetic about coffee and how tasty it is and whatnot. This time, I wanted to widen my horizons, go out of my comfort zone, and order coffee with milk. It was also hot outside, and hot coffee didn't seem too appealing to me at that moment. Since I was also out for a work conference, I thought why not spoil myself and upgrade my cold brew to a cold brew with a "creme top." Not only did it sound delicious, but it also looked very pretty in people's cups. 

Unfortunately, they put mine in a rather ugly to-go cup. Even worse, I ended up with coffee with milk, instead of just coffee, even though I wanted coffee. There goes expanding my horizons. 

I will say that I respect those who order a cold brew with creme top. It is tasty. Unfortunately, the creme top covers the coffee flavor which I crave so badly. I love coffee. Give me coffee. Ideally a sweet, buttery, clean coffee. 

Lineage / Colombia / Sebastian Ramirez / Washed Pink Bourbon

I usually try to avoid vague labels like the grower, because you can't usually Google them. In this case, you can totally Google Sebastian Ramirez. Lineage is probably one of the more notable specialty cafes in the Orlando coffee scene, which is relatively small but nothing to scoff at. One thing I was grateful for is that they did not serve any alcohol – many of the cafes in Orlando also served wine or beer in the evening. 

They had a very interesting baklava syrup, which we ordered in a matcha latte along with a salted honey cruffin. The baklava syrup tasted correct and the cruffin and croissant were both good. 

The coffee was great. This is not the first washed pink bourbon I have had from Sebastian — I had one from SK Coffee last year. One notable thing to highlight is that this was definitely reminiscent of the other coffee, but not the same. In that post, I question what "pink bourbon" means. A trip to the Hyperion Ypsi bathroom (unfortunately unblogged) opened my mind — coffee varietals are descendants of each other (see Cafe Imports tree). People differ on whether pink bourbon is a child of bourbon, but no one disagrees that is a fantastic varietal. 

The notes on the bag were accurate. This was an unoffensive coffee that you wouldn't get tired of, but not something I'd have as my daily driver. I did like it, though. Perhaps it was a bit too inoffensive. I guess that is what I get for ordering what I saw as the most recognizable name on the list.