Beans & Origin
Buying coffee: how much, how often
The practical logistics of keeping good coffee in the house without wasting money or drinking stale beans.
Beans & Origin
Varietal, processing, terroir and what the bag is telling you.
Beans & Origin
Coffee in cooking
Coffee is a bitter, aromatic, acidic ingredient, and it behaves like one, which is not always how recipes treat it.
Beans & Origin
Coffee and climate
The structural pressure on the crop over the coming decades, and what is being done about it.
Beans & Origin
Robusta, reconsidered
A species dismissed by specialty coffee for decades, with a case for reconsideration that is partly about quality and partly about climate.
Beans & Origin
What producers actually get paid
The C price, the specialty premium, and the gap between what a bag costs and what reaches a farm.
Beans & Origin
Indonesia, Vietnam and the Asia-Pacific
A region with distinctive processing traditions, enormous production volume, and profiles that divide opinion sharply.
Beans & Origin
Kenya, Rwanda and East Africa
Some of the most distinctive coffee in the world, produced under structures that differ considerably from origin to origin.
Beans & Origin
Colombia, Brazil and the Americas
The largest producing region, spanning everything from commodity volume to some of the most sought-after lots in the world.
Beans & Origin
Ethiopia: the origin of the species
Where arabica comes from, where the genetic diversity still lives, and why the coffees taste unlike anywhere else.
Beans & Origin
Single origin and blends: a false argument
One is not better than the other. They are different products with different purposes, and the marketing has confused this thoroughly.
Beans & Origin
Reading a coffee bag
What the label tells you, what it should tell you, and which terms are meaningful.
Beans & Origin
Processing: washed, natural, honey and the rest
What happens to the fruit after picking changes the cup more than almost anything except the roast.
Beans & Origin
Where coffee actually comes from
A fruit seed grown at altitude in a narrow band around the equator, passed through several hands before it reaches a roaster.