Much of the coffee that is sold through roasters and cafes is sold in the form of blends, in which the roaster has selected several coffees to mix together and create a particular flavour profile.
But when it comes to selecting and roasting coffee, how do we know the perfect ratio or mixture of different coffees to create the best blend possible?
We spoke to coffee roaster, Sam Corra about his method for creating his award-winning blends.
Sam is the Head Roaster for ONA Coffee, as well as a world-class competitor. In addition to placing second in the World Brewers Cup in 2017, Sam has also led the ONA Coffee team to several prestigious coffee awards, including Best Espresso and Best Roaster at the TISCA WRBC championships, two overall franchise championships in the Golden Bean roasting championship and Overall Champion of Golden Bean.
“When constructing a blend, you need to consider how you will create a balance between sweetness, acidity, body and overall flavour,” said Sam.
“The idea is you pretty much ignore the cup score and flavour profile, for the most part. You’re looking for the coffee’s strength, whether it be quality of acidity, body and so on.”
It may sound easy in principle, but there is most certainly an artform to creating the perfect blend. Many roasters have an idea of the flavour or character they’d like before they start cupping or selecting coffee for their blends.
“It really depends what you’re trying to achieve,” said Sam.
“If you set out with an idea in mind of what you want to construct in terms of a flavour profile, then it’s easier to break down the different elements into brackets and to find coffees that can achieve all these elements.”
Most roasters will already know that the journey to creating a blend is about achieving balance, rather than an expression of one element – so, is there a perfect recipe to create the best blend possible?
“In my experience, body-focused coffees are always your base and then you can select coffees to bring in the level of sweetness and acid you want to achieve, ” said Sam.
“On top of all of this, you want a coffee that is very flavour-forward and is complimented by all the other coffees in the blend.”
This isn’t to say that you need one coffee for body, another for sweetness, another for acidity and so on. Sam says that looking at different coffees on the cupping table can help identify which coffees can be used for multiple elements of a blend.
“A single coffee can be more than one thing – by this I mean, you can use one coffee to act as both your catalyst for sweetness and flavour”, he said.
“In one blend, you might just have two coffees in that one coffee has strength in body, sweetness and flavour, but it lacks the acid you need to balance the blend and created a rounded expression. You can’t only use coffees that have bright and light characters, it just won’t work.”
One of the biggest components of creating a blend is thinking about the purpose, application and reception of your blend: what style is your coffee being roasted for, who will be using it and the reception of the blend by customers in cafes.
“It really does depends on your purpose – are you going for an espresso or milk-based blend, who will be drinking it and so on,” said Sam.
Want to start finding coffees to create your perfect blend? Get in touch to see a list of our current green beans and learn about new and exciting coffees coming the next few months:
Stay up to date with our Project Origin projects and latest specialty green bean coffee imports
We acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the land on which we work, the Ngunnawal people. We pay our respects to elders past, present and emerging.
