Hot Coffee Club, a subscription roaster based out of Georgia, sent me some samples recently and I was excited to try this Colombian coffee out because they recommend brewing it as espresso, and I love me some ‘spro! You can buy this coffee as part of Hot Coffee Club’s subscription. If you get to their website before May is over, too, you can get a bag of this, or one of their other coffees, for free, too! Check it out here.
Hot Coffee Club has limited information about this coffee on their site. They do mention it is a Colombian coffee that comes from a co-op and that the beans are Caturra and Catuai varietals that are washed. Growing altitude is listed at 800-1900masl (although I wonder if that isn’t supposed to be 1800-1900masl). Tasting notes are “sweet, chocolaty and well-balanced” and this is said to be a “medium” roast that is perfect for espresso.
My sample bags only contained 50g each, which is good for at least two espressos, so I decided to try it the recommended way. I pulled two shots using 20g of beans and I got around 30g of espresso in 35 seconds, which is a decent starting point for espresso.
My shots came out really thick and syrupy, so there is a lot of body on this coffee. I picked up lots of almond flavors, dark chocolate and some pretty decent acidity that reminded me of some sort of orange juice/lime hybrid. It had good balance and nice sweetness. In both shots I picked up a little cardboard flavor on my first sip, but only on my first sip and it didn’t bother me when I drank the rest of the espresso, so it was no big deal.
I really enjoyed this as a single origin espresso. It was nice and balanced, bright but not too acidic and hit all the nuts and chocolate notes I like, too. Very nice! I only with I had more to try it as pourover or AeroPress.