Enviromental Effects on Coffee…

15 July 2008 in Coffee, General

Ok, so we’re not talking about global warming here, although that may come into another discussion further on.

What i am talking about here, is with all the changable weather we are having at the moment, from the cold mornings to the warmer wet mornings, how this effects the process we as barista’s make coffee.Similar to how i talked a while back about how what the cows are eating and doing at certain times of the year and how this can effect the milk qaulity going into our lattes etc, so to does the enviromental changes effect other aspects of coffee making. Seen as i have been having this battle myself even more so in the last couple of months, i thought i would share.

You see, as soon as coffee is ground it is very vulnerable to what is happen to the air around it. so if it is a cool morning with a fair amount of dampness in the air, the coffee can absorb more moisture and slow down the speed in which the coffee comes out of the machine (flow rate of the extraction for us coffee geeks).

This changes as the air warms up, or gets cooler, and we have to change how coarse we grind the coffee accordingly. This can be an ongoing battle for us who really wanna keep the qaulity standard high, as it can alter the taste and body of your cup of coffee drastically.As such when i am not happy with the way it comes out, i would throw away the odd shot of coffee rather than using it in a coffee.

If anyone would like to talk more about this feel free to drop me comments and your thoughts on here, or send me an email.