India's Golden ── Myth country, Coffee in the Land of Monsoon

Our mysterious impression of India is not only its coffee, but also tea, monasteries, yoga, sitar, or even the more negative abnormal cities, and so on.

No, when I joined the 2002 Indian International Coffee Festival in Bangalore, I didn't feel the above phenomenon at all. I have visited a local temple, and it is very impressive. The interior of that temple is white, and the ceiling is covered with a huge black bull, overlooking the tourists who travel to and from the ceremony, but this is not the only one in the local temple in Bangalore. Bangalore is the distribution center of Indian coffee and the address of the Indian coffee shop. It is the city that hosts the Indian Coffee Festival and co-hosts the Indian FineCupAwardCompetition. The legendary abnormal weather in the big city can not be seen here, perhaps because there are more aggressive automatic rickshaws and smaller big-class taxis here, but there is no sign that the local public is very poor or there is a traffic jam.

Here, of course, there are more coffee-related products than tea, and small and cheap coffee cups can be seen everywhere, and sometimes some people can be seen in a very dramatic way to squeeze out coffee from an Italian coffee machine. or coffee brewed in other ways, assimilated with condensed milk In addition, there are many small Western-style cafes, where the Menu is similar to Starbucks, and most of them sell cappuccino and latte.

Despite its importance in premium espresso recipes, Wind-stained Malaba is not very popular in the American coffee market.

As a result, three common stereotypes about India do not exist in India's coffee capital: full of temple weather, poverty, and tea.

Back to the subject of coffee.

The stunning of wind-soaked beans

How many typical types of coffee are there? In the American boutique market, it is rare to see too many kinds of Indian beans. It seems that Indian beans are neglected in this boutique world. I have done in-depth research and comments on Indian beans supplied by two retailers on my website http://www.coffeereview.com/, both of which were almost difficult to give birth because I couldn't get enough Indian beans to fight. The reason why there are so many kinds of Indian beans on the American market today must be attributed to Dr. JosephJohns, the desperate Indian coffee expert and importer, who is in charge of JosumaCoffeeCompany. Over the past 10 years, with shrewd press releases, collecting reports, and all the espresso recipes he developed for Indian beans, he has found a healthy way for Indian coffee in the boutique market in the United States.

About 30 years ago, I first tasted Indian beans. At that time, I had only one impression of Indian beans. I once mentioned in my first book, Coffee:AGuidetoBuying,Brewing,&Enjoying: it tastes like Indonesian beans without a deep change in strength, with exotic flavor, but it tastes less dusty than Sumatra, and sometimes tastes like spice or chocolate) Compared with Sulawesi, it also lacks a refreshing flavor of forest soil and no complex and changeable fermented flavor. for those who are used to fine coffee, there is nothing to talk about about this bean. It is "a sweet, smooth and pleasant coffee". This is exactly the comment I wrote about Indian coffee beans at that time, but now I really regret complaining about it.

However, the pity of this wind-stained Malaba is that it has such obvious flavor defects that even most North American boutique coffee tasters find it difficult to take over the taste of pure drinking this bean. Wind-stained Malaba has extremely low acidity, thick viscosity and syrup-like taste, but because of their unique strong dusty smell, most North American coffee drinkers do not like it. To say the truth, it has gradually come to the fore in the world competition of espresso beans, playing the magical ingredients in the formula, which increases the taste and texture of pure drinking espresso, which is a fascinating benefit in espresso, as well as the implied length in drinks with milk.

There are also delicious manor-grade Indian beans.

Several of us cooperated with the judges of FlavorofIndiaFineCupCompetition, and sometimes the city was shocked by the implication of some beans, which to me was like a dramatic change in the type of Indian beans.

The cup test style held in India is carried out in accordance with the Indian coffee bean grading system, and the bean samples are selected according to each grade: MysoreNuggetsExtraBold of SpecialtyArabica grade, PlantationA, B of commercial grade Arabica bean, RobustaParchment and KaapiRoyale of Robusta grade of water washing, in addition to the treatment of beans of grade long and short. All the beans sent into the competition seem to have been selected by thousands of people, and the preparation levels are very beautiful, but they are all delivered by large Plantation. I noticed that the quantity of beans they sent in is usually very large, which is not quite the same as that of CupofExcellence in America, which is almost all sent by boutique-grade small farms to participate in the competition, and the quantity of a batch of beans is usually not much.

The first thing that scares us is this year's award-winning Bean Badnekhan Manor (the best Arabica) and Jumboor Manor (the best Specialty coffee). Like other cup tests, all the judges used their own strange ways to describe the winning beans in what ways they were impressed, but in the end, all cities had a more consistent general review. For me, I think the beans of Badnekhan Manor are floral and citrus-flavored, which is somewhat similar to the characteristics of good spring breeze plateau beans, while the beans of Jumboor Manor are sour and crisp with an unpleasant flavor of water. These two beans are outliers that have not been shown in several other world competitions, and each of them has its own unique features, so that they can win the honor of a selected manor in India.

"who brought this bean?" This kind of surprising problem often arises one after another in each cup test. In fact, the "flavor characteristics of the producing areas" do not come entirely from the local weather and soil conditions, or from the local extraordinary treatment methods. The flavor characteristics of the producing areas also cover the local people's preference for all kinds of flavors, and find out how to produce such flavors. In other words, a large part of the flavor characteristics of the producing area comes from the happiness of importers, exporters and buyers.

The next surprise level is not very strong. I once mysteriously mixed Robusta with water into one of my old recipes. I didn't mean to stir up a controversial topic, but what I drank in this cup was a very good bottle of water to wash Robusta ── 's best Robusta without any smell, except for its "sense of existence". Slightly docile sweetness, like the smell of wheat, thick texture. Most cup testers focus on the touch and functional features of the mouth (that is, the taste and the functional value of playing roles in espresso), rather than on the judgment of fragrance.

Once the grading system is established, the next step is to find the best beans implied under the grading system, which must best represent the flavor characteristics of the entire producing area. However, these two Indian beans violate this principle and are different from the producing areas, so I suspect that there are more good tools waiting to be excavated on the hills where coffee is grown in India.

Put Indian beans on the single coffee supply list

If there are too many kinds of weird coffee in a large producing area, then perhaps large roasters, as well as general importers and exporters, do not know whether they should give this big producing area a special noun, so that when customers buy it, they will know whether the taste of the bean is what they like. India makes it impossible for the great master to set an exclusive dictionary. Unless the beans here have constant flavor implications and more and more interesting flavor changes year after year, only on the premise that they can form a complete flavor characteristics of the producing area, can sellers and customers also have more fun with the beans produced in this producing area.

I saw a glimmer of light. In this FlavorofIndiaCompetition, although in the commercial grade PlantationA, B can not find very extraordinary characteristics, but the length of the beans are often right and interesting, all have a slight flower fragrance, the preparation level is obviously quite good level.

Indian Plantation beans lack a dramatic flavor implication, which means that when you get a Yirgacheffe, you have to drink floral and citrus flavor; when you get a Sumatra, you have to taste a little dusty. But on the other hand, Plantation grade beans have good balance and cleanliness, and their acidity is properly sweet and not too sharp. In other words, this grade of beans can be taken over by many customers who do not like strong acidity, and they do not have to bake too deep or even burn out their qualities and acidity.

Marketing document

If you want to make marketers have a lot of fun to push a bean, you have to give them some fictional coffee stories or real coffee stories. The most famous story today is the story of BabaBudan bringing the seven native coffee breeds out of Mecca. This story is more authentic and historical than the story of another shepherd, Kaldi, but both stories are a bit too overblown. If the OldChick coffee brought to India at that time in BabaBudan can survive diseases and insect pests, this story may also have some influence on the marketing of Indian beans, but this kind of coffee is rare today.

The true story of Indian coffee is actually quite complicated. Coming back to the question of tree species, OldChick and Kent are very rare today. Kent beans have long been highly respected for their pleasant flavor, but they are also rare now. However, in this Indian cup test event, I happened to drink very similar to the flavor characteristics of Kent species. On the other hand, SLN9 is planted in recent years. It comes from the tree species of Ethiopia, and it has the characteristic of blooming and smelling fragrance. I often drink this flavor in this event.

When it comes to social and economic issues, most of the Indian coffee I drink this time is delivered by larger estates, some are family-run businesses, and some are run by larger Corporation, such as one of the TataFarm is a good bean for Corporation. Seeing this, I deeply feel that the beans on small farms in India will be buried by these wonderful farm beans, but there is still a glimmer of improvement, such as the fact that small farms can grow beans with a more interesting flavor. then it is possible to repeat the drama of the Brazilian and Nicaraguan Cup trials (Note 1.)

For marketers, the best marketing focus of Indian coffee may still be on India's own scenery and natural scenery, and the Indian estates participating in the competition may look quite large. But in fact, they all maintain their own natural beauty: most of them are shaded under native trees and planted with other spices and crops at the same time, although these farms are very large in scale. However, there is no atmosphere of "mass production" at all.

Note 1. In the 2002-03 Brazil-Nicaragua Cup Test Competition, many previously unknown small farms sprang up. Take Brazil as an example, in this year's Cup Test Competition, there are many small farm participating beans with similar flavor characteristics of Guatemala and Costa Rica, the author should be referring to this possibility.

The implication of Robusta is not very amazing.

Most Robusta are peeled directly by hand and stacked next to a pile of failed meat, so the Robusta tastes bad, and if it is Arabica, it is just as bad. The dry Robusta handled in this way can be seen that the flavor is not good, and the defect rate is high enough to change the taste; however, it is very creditable to measure the IndiaParchmentA and BRobusta in this cup, and their defect rate is about 4d/300gr, which is higher than the defect scale of some high-grade Arabica beans.

I deeply feel that these carefully prepared Robusta is another treasure of Indian coffee, if you know how to use it in espresso formula, ingenious play the role of depth and moderate sweetness, sometimes better than using bright Arabica to bring out too bright sweetness.

What other beans are amazing in this cup? For me, I think the taste of several good wind-stained Malabas is almost all syrup-like flavor and super-thick texture, while the more disgusting dusty rough edges are much lower, making the overall texture thicker and fuller. The sense of organization is also very rich, with a very good sweetness in the thick taste. It can be said that the wind-stained Malaba drunk this time is completely above the level, and what is left in the mouth after drinking is the warm and moist wind. S "flesh dyed, wrinkled, defective, τ and ping-pong"? Nose? Tabanmou Keqi is rebellious and rebellious. Did Shun Wei's tomb bow to Tuo in the shape of a bow? Fat dinner? Lucky Mother? Load? Yi send sulfonate? The ┒ coffin carbuncle is afraid that the hospital will revolve around Hu Chun to remove the azine. Huang Jiuxiang Mou Jiao Chen Terpene scratching Xinzhao sent a whoring ton? Γ? Liquid taro group? Quietly glycoside leaf courtyard to offer dice osmium? Constricted gong cuo barren chicory, drum mushroom? In addition, the quality of the existing Indian coffee species also contains unlimited possibilities. Today I drank such excellent and extraordinary Indian beans, suggesting that there must be other excellent and extraordinary Indian beans that are not yet alive, such as other drying treatments or "tree top fermented" beans. Most of the Indian beans in the market last year are mildly fermented or over-fermented products, if these improperly handled beans to a good processing factory will not become a more beautiful picture? Or may we get another version of Harrar or Yimen beans? Or will the beans treated by wind stains be replaced with other methods? If coffee growers and buyers can find a balance, then these possibilities will one day be realized.

But the biggest problem is still transportation. It takes a whole day for North America to fly to India, unlike seven to eight hours to fly to Guatemala City or San Jose City. But from another point of view, the Indian coffee shop and coffee farmers are friendly and enthusiastic, and the coffee-related scenery is also diversified and interesting, and the families who drive rickshaws wear a wide variety of elegant and stylish clothes. If one day you have the opportunity to travel outside Bangalore (this is the only thing I have not done this time), I am sure you will still see a lot of monasteries and tea!

KennethDavids is the author of three coffee-related books, one of which is "Coffee:AGuidetoCoffeeBuying,Brewing,&Enjoying", which has been republished for the fifth time.

But it's not my fault. At that time, I drank a few Indian beans that can be found in the United States. Although there are still not many Indian beans you can find today, many American bakers have continued to put wind-soaked Malaba into their espresso formula. The name of this bean is really good. This is an Arabica dry bean. After a year and months of wet rainy season in India, until the beans swell up and turn yellow, it is simply coffee version of popcorn!