We roast specialty coffee. We are not particularly snobby about it but nevertheless we like good quality products that align with our values and the way we like to conduct business.
In its essence specialty coffee are beans that have good enough quality to be scored above 83 points on the SCA scale of quality. And while specialty grade coffee makes up roughly 20% of the world coffee production it is worth about a half of the total value of all coffee traded globally. Basically, we pay premium for quality. Our coffee is neither organic or fair-trade as most of the time the green coffee we purchase is too expensive to fall into that category and comes from producers who despite sustainable farming practices often struggle to acquire these specific certifications. For that reason we work with carefully considered groups of importers and producers who share our view on traceability and transparency and who in the end make our business possible. From a customer perspective at least, the fact that we roast specialty coffee should tell you two things:
- You can expect a product that’s consistently of good quality.
- We don’t treat coffee as a commodity but rather a collaborative product that we’re always excited to share with you.
We like to share coffees in all their diversity and from all over the world - from fruity and vibrant, through elegant and delicate to heavy and bold. We find these flavours all along the coffee belt and then roast them in Amsterdam where we highlight and communicate our favourite aspects.
Our roasting style falls somewhere in the “medium” category and is divided into filter and espresso. What medium means is that It’s neither a very light roast or a dark roast. Its somewhere in-between and that’s the sweet spot we are aiming for. And it quite literally is a sweet spot as sweetness is something we often like to highlight. This roasting style helps us make our coffees more approachable and easy to brew while still maintaining the unique character of the bean. Which is also why we have two separate roasting profiles for each coffee depending on its destined brewer. We design those profiles in a way that whether its brewed as a Chemex, French Press, Mokka Pot or on an espresso machine our favourite flavours and characteristics remain in the cup and aren’t hard to find.
We depend on the quality of our raw material a lot but the journey doesn’t end there. On a daily basis we perform quality control in the roastery and our cafes. By tasting every batch of coffee we roast and keeping track of how it performs on various brewers throughout the day we are able to consistently provide a delicious experience. In addition to that we also work with digital roasting software that lets us track and manipulate many aspects of this process. This allows us to be consistent in our day to day operations.
Now that you know the general foundation of our roasting philosophy it’s important to add just how obsessed we are with the little things about the coffees we feature. Whether one of us has a special connection to the person producing it, a keen interest in a certain flavour profile or the desire to deep dive into exploring a lesser known coffee species - we are all in. This element is what makes Chunky Cherry. We don’t roast coffee for the sake of caffeine but rather to share our interests, our quirks and that just like a morning cappuccino our coffee beans are grown, processed, handled and roasted by unique individuals.
