How Starbucks Chooses, Roasts And Blends Their Coffee
By Gary Gresham, Fri Dec 9th
Starbucks® Coffee knows the perfect cup of coffee starts withonly the best beans. Finding and purchasing the best green beansin the world is the first step that differentiates them from therest of the coffee industry.
They are well-known for exceptionally high quality coffees,care in selection, and expertise in roast. Each coffee isselected for the defining qualities that distinguish its origin.This careful selection process illustrates Starbucks passion forbuying and roasting the world's best coffee.
Starbucks combs the world for the perfect combination ofclimate, soil, elevation, and agricultural practices that cometogether to produce a great coffee. When searching for coffees,they ask these questions. Which coffees from a given locationbest represent the perfect intersection of climate and skilledhorticulture? It is a search for unmistakable regional flavors,what a French wine-maker would call goût de terroir, the tasteof the place.
At Starbucks, coffee is a fresh produce, not a commodity. Whenthe inevitable happens and a given coffee estate or region hasan "off" year, they simply don't offer that coffee. They makethis tough decision rather than offering a lower qualityselection. They buy coffee solely on its performance in the cup.
The coffee Starbucks buys is truly special, spectacular coffee.Their coffee buying team evaluates over one thousand "offersamples" each year. The evaluation process includes roastingsmall batches of coffee and tasting these batches in a processcalled "cupping." Only a very few of these sampled coffees makethe cut.
Starbucks coffee buyers spend approximately 18 weeks per yeartraveling to countries of origin. The purpose of these travelsis not necessarily to buy coffee. The goal is to continue tolearn about coffee and to strengthen relationships with growersand suppliers. These relationships are critical to their futuresuccess.
They solidify the company's role as champions of quality andprogress at every level of the coffee business. It is because ofthese relationships that Starbucks gets the first pick of thebest crops worldwide. And thus Starbucks is able to procure theworld's best coffee beans every year.
Harvesting Starbucks Coffee
At harvest time, coffee trees are laden with bright red coffeecherries. Ripe coffee cherries are cranberry. An unroastedcoffee bean is simply the pit of the coffee cherry.
The skin of the coffee cherry is very thick, with a slightlybitter flavor. The fruit beneath the skin, however, is intenselysweet. The texture of this layer of fruit is similar to a grape.Beneath the fruit is the parchment, covered with a thin,slippery, honey-like layer called "mucilage."
The parchment of the coffee cherry serves as a protective pocketfor the seed, much like the small pockets that protect the seedsof an apple. Removing the parchment, two translucent bluishgreen coffee beans are revealed, coated with a very thin layercalled the "silverskin."While most coffee cherries contain twobeans, 5 to 10 percent of the time, only one bean is produced inthe cherry. This is called a "peaberry."
The Starbucks Roast®
Starbucks is passionate about the way they roast their coffee.It's called the Starbucks Roast®. It's more than a color: it isthe cumulative, positive, and dramatic result of roasting eachcoffee in a unique way, helping each one reach its maximumflavor. The color can be duplicated, but the taste cannot.
All roasters, including Starbucks, roast green coffee beans byheating them in a large rotating drum. After about 5 to 7minutes of intense heat, much of their moisture evaporates. Thebeans turn a yellow color and smell a little like popcorn.
After about 8 minutes in the roaster, the "first pop" occurs.The beans double in size, crackling as they expand. They are nowlight
