[Closed] Do I Just Have To Suck It Up (Coffee Content)

Just nip to aldi - it's about £3 in there and not bad stuff!
Is 3x the price really worth it?

On line coffee will always be the pricey option. small batches, high overheads. If you want nicer coffee, you have to suck up the cost I think.

Probs get told off by the coffee snobs, but the regular Tesco beans are a pretty nice average roast, I tend to get a posh bag every now and again, and use the Tesco for weekdays.

£12 with delivery for a kilo bag of LavAzza Super Crema off fleabay. Good enough for my uneducated palette.

Find local roasters/stockists?

I know I'm probably lucky but there's several local co's doing roasting their own beans near me plus others stocking stuff doen elsewhere.

Items like coffee are better bought locally than off the web - the shops get the volumes that make delivery a significantly smaller fraction of the price you pay.

I would consider myself a coffee snob and I agree that the Tesco home brand beans are disconcertingly good.

What's available locally? Any local roasters? Or a cafe that sells beans (either packets on the counter, or might be willing to sell you a bag from their own supply if you ask nicely)?

Just buy coffee, rather than an artisanal lifestyle-choice with a curated backstory, marketed towards A2 consumers seeking external validity.

Coffee can be bought in shops.

https://www.ouseburncoffee.co.uk/

Great Coffe and free postage.

I ordered some expensive beans to grind myself as a result of a recent coffee thread on here. Did a blind tasting comparison with some pre-ground Lavazza coffee that I usually use and couldn't notice any difference.

Anyone who thinks they can notice an improvement can probably justify the cost difference.

[url= https://www.monsoonestatescoffee.co.uk/coffee-shop/ ]My Pusher [/url]

Half the price at Happy Donkey.

Has Bean used to be reasonable but they're mostly over £6 now

Anyone who’s business is based on imports will be getting hammered just now and I doubt the price increases your seeing reflect the whole picture of the costs they’re having to absorb.

I think a lot of these companies are going to be lucky if they survive. Nice stuff is going to is going to cost more money. There’ll always be cheap stuff. It’s up to you to decide whether it’s money well spent but if the preople who sell the nice stuff go to the wall then the decision will get made for you.

Find local roasters/stockists?

This..

I'm so lucky there's a roasters (and trade supplier) in my village..

I love cycling past in the morning and the smell of 'burnt toast' wafting through the air brings me back to my childhood, visiting my grandparent here (they also live in the village)...

Hmm... Coffee...

DrP

Just buy coffee, rather than an artisanal lifestyle-choice with a curated backstory, marketed towards A2 consumers seeking external validity.

Coffee can be bought in shops.

This. Lidl's Guatemalan (in a purple topped bag) is [i]really[/i] nice. It's Fairtrade, orangutan-free and llama friendly.

I go about every 6-8 weeks to an independent coffee seller in Richmond and buy mostly beans but usually a small amount of ground. Always single variety and varied taste so that we don't get bored. Also different for different brew methods - stove top or Kinto.
If you want decent things and choice, and to keep money in the neighbourhood then you should be prepared to pay for it.

Just buy coffee, rather than an artisanal lifestyle-choice with a curated backstory, marketed towards A2 consumers seeking external validity.

I wholeheartedly agree with this, but it doesn't necessarily mean buying the cheapest coffee from the supermarket.

Lots of the online suppliers seem to fall into this category. I had Pact for a while as a present, but didn't continue it.

Ouseburn Coffee Co that Drac linked to above roast really good coffee, but do spend too much on marketing

I was in Ljubljana recently and went to a cafe run by a guy who was incredibly passionate about coffee. It was basically his life. He goes once a year to visit plantations in central America and deals directly with them to import beans which he roasts himself. He now supplies them to a select few cafes in Slovenia. His knowledge of roasting, preparing and tasting, including the science behind it is incredible.

But here's the thing. He refuses to brand it because he says it's not his product to brand and he doesn't buy into the whole brand image thing. His cafe is unexceptional. He sells beans but doesn't brand his packaging - in fact, he doesn't have any packaging, you just bring a bag and get it filled.

It was really refreshing in this day and age where everything is branded and we've come to see that as an indicator of worth.

Coffee subscription from Dusty Ape? Take the hit once (or get it as a gift) and then chill for the rest of the year 🙂

Aldi espresso beans are also good, and around £2 a bag.

We also have a local coffee and tea shop that will sell you a large variety of beans and even grind it to your specifications. It's been there years, long before the coffee hipsters were around. Just checked prices and it's about £22 per kg. That's a lot more than when I used to go in there!

I was in Ljubljana recently and went to a cafe run by a guy who was incredibly passionate about coffee. It was basically his life. He goes once a year to visit plantations in central America and deals directly with them to import beans which he roasts himself. He now supplies them to a select few cafes in Slovenia. His knowledge of roasting, preparing and tasting, including the science behind it is incredible.

But here's the thing. He refuses to brand it because he says it's not his product to brand and he doesn't buy into the whole brand image thing. His cafe is unexceptional. He sells beans but doesn't brand his packaging - in fact, he doesn't have any packaging, you just bring a bag and get it filled.

It was really refreshing in this day and age where everything is branded and we've come to see that as an indicator of worth.

does he look like this ?
[img] [/img]

Heard of Waitrose?

I second looking for a local importer and roaster....

I pop into a warehouse on an industrial estate every couple of months, have a chat to the guy who seems happy to have someone to talk to.....

then he makes me up a blend based on my opinion of his last one, and charges me £10 per kg...

then I go across the other side of the car park to the blue money brewery and pick up some beers 😉
win win!

Coffee is cool at the moment. Therefore unless you're right out in the sticks there will almost certainly be some kind of roaster/wholesaler/artisanal coffee shop that sells its own beans within a few miles of you.

No reason at all to pay for postage - just go for a ride!

If you have a good local roaster, then you are fortunate.

Do I just have to suck up the £5+* a bag plus £4 postage for online coffee these days? Has Bean used to be reasonable but they're mostly over £6 now.

The annual Has Bean InMyMug subscription is £250, which works out at £4.81 per 250g bag including postage. If the regular delivery of different beans each week suits you, then it is very good value.

The main downside is that the beans do vary each week: this is probably more of an issue for espresso, since with most grinders it can sometimes take a good few shots to dial in the correct espresso grind for a change of beans, and some beans can be especially difficult to make espresso with. For brewed coffee I think it's a positive advantage, since I get to try something different each week rather than get stuck in the rut of ordering the same beans every time. I have an InMyMug subscription, and generally make a point of using the South American beans to make espresso (especially if they are bourbon) and the African beans to make brewed coffee.

does he look like this ?

Not really.

(I may have missed something)

My local roaster does mail order. Very good coffee and £4-5 per 250g, v. freshly ground how you like it.

[url= http://www.e-coffee.co.uk ]Coffee[/url]

Not sure how much postage is, as we pop down weekly.

James Gourmet is just down the road in Ross, but aren't open on a Saturday.

I do buy in Waitrose and Aldi, not tried Lidl. Tesco I've not been to for a while, but I tend to find supermarket beans are over roasted for my taste especially "espresso" blends which seems to be code for black-and-oily-as-****.

I'll have a look at Ouseborn and Dusty Ape, nip in to Lidl and also see who's local to me (Method, Hunters and not much else near Hereford it seems).

I have the fortune of having a load of coffee shops near me, all selling bags of beans and some do their own roasting. Even from this choice it's hard to find beans that are to my taste and produce consistent espresso.
I'm pretty anti-Waitrose, but their Monsooned Malabar beans make a solid tasty espresso for drinking black or for making cappuccino / flat white.

Just buy coffee, rather than an artisanal lifestyle-choice with a curated backstory, marketed towards A2 consumers seeking external validity.

Commodity coffee or specialty coffee. Luckily as a consumer you are free to make a choice.
Though for me it's flavour/quality not marketing that informs my choice, something that is skewed the wrong way with a lot of commodity bulk processed coffee like Nespresso etc. Where is the money going? Those Clooney adverts and prime retail spaces cost a fortune unlike their raw ingredients yet the cost per gram is the same as specialty direct trade coffee. Only the growers/producers don't benefit as much.

(As an aside fairtrade is just a fancy label that means very little compared to direct trade)

If you want cheap but half decent coffee that is easy to source then Momnetum from Sainsbury's and the Taylor's beans with the copper/black packaging and line illustrations not the brighter coloured 'rich Italia' 'hot java lava' etc.

My pensioner folks get their beans from Extract coffee and the price per kg suits their budget and the coffee is very good VFM.

Our local bike shop sells beans over the counter from our local roaster, which is just how it should be.

https://tugboatbrews.co.uk/ is my local coffee supplier, I get to walk in and watch them grind for aeropress, but the prices are the same online (£5.50 a bag) and free delivery if you spend over 35 quid or something. Sure that's several bags but they're ground the day they're posted so even if they sit in your kitchen for two months that is still fresher than anything in a supermarket...

aldi

is surprisingly good

which is nice, as I'm brassic at the moment

normally we get the taylors unfancy stuff

Not shopped at Has Been for a while but the prices do seem to have crept up a bit.

Depends if you want fancy beans I guess or just good fresh beans. I get mine from Rave, their Italian Job blend for 4.50 for 250g or 11.50 for a kilo (I think postage is a few quid.) Though some beans are twice that price.

as I'm [i]brassic [/i]at the moment

it's 'boracic' as in [url= http://www.cockneyrhymingslang.co.uk/slang/boracic_lint ]boracic lint[/url].

Aldi does a nice, varied line as mentioned above.

Aldi is fine for easy to get hold of even more so as not everywhere has a local coffee bean shops. But if you fancy something nicer then ordering online opens up meny opportunities.

Not shopped at Has Been for a while but the prices do seem to have crept up a bit.

[url= http://www.hasblog.co.uk/brexit-hangover ]This post[/url] on Has Bean's blog last year spelt out the impact of the Sterling fall after the referendum in cold hard numbers.

Surprisingly, they still have not (yet) increased the price of the annual subscription, and I can only guess that the fact that they get to decide which beans to send out each week has given them enough flexibility to avoid putting the price up so far. I have not noticed a deterioration in what they are sending out, i.e. more of the less expensive beans and less of the higher price beans, although I'm not attentive to the price of the different beans they send out for the subscription.

Regardless of who the roaster is, I imagine that price rises are inevitable if you like to buy the same single estate beans each time, and for blends the only alternative to price rises is to substitute some or all of the beans used in the blend with a cheaper alternative, which may or may not suit you depending upon the impact on the taste of the blend.

Just buy coffee, rather than an artisanal lifestyle-choice with a curated backstory, marketed towards A2 consumers seeking external validity.

Coffee can be bought in shops.

I was in Ljubljana recently and went to a cafe run by a guy who was incredibly passionate about coffee. It was basically his life. He goes once a year to visit plantations in central America and deals directly with them to import beans which he roasts himself. He now supplies them to a select few cafes in Slovenia. His knowledge of roasting, preparing and tasting, including the science behind it is incredible.
But here's the thing. He refuses to brand it because he says it's not his product to brand and he doesn't buy into the whole brand image thing. His cafe is unexceptional. He sells beans but doesn't brand his packaging - in fact, he doesn't have any packaging, you just bring a bag and get it filled.

It was really refreshing in this day and age where everything is branded and we've come to see that as an indicator of worth.

It's almost like you assume Taylors don't do exactly that, and have an army of chemical engineers and tasters making sure that each bag of tea/coffee tastes exactly the same and as good as the last?

It's almost like you assume Taylors don't do exactly that, and have an army of chemical engineers and tasters making sure that each bag of tea/coffee tastes exactly the same and as good as the last?

but their sourcing is very different and they are looking for price/bulk/and good enough. thats a huge difference compared to microlots from specific farms and producers where the cherries are still hand sorted (imported by the likes of Mercanta, Nordic Approach etc).

they are looking for a house style whereas a smaller roaster is going to profile the roast to hopefully get the best out the bean and perhaps a nod to their preferred flavour profile (fruit driven not over-roasted etc).

it’s not about being a snob, its about producing a product that benefits from an approach different to that of mass manufacture/bulk commodity buying.
its the same with bread, if you are happy with refined white bread made by the Chorley wood process then there are lots of 60p sliced white options for you out there, thankfully if wish to eat something different there are bakers out there who produce better bread

but their sourcing is very different and they are looking for price/bulk/and good enough. thats a huge difference compared to microlots from specific farms and producers where the cherries are still hand sorted (imported by the likes of Mercanta, Nordic Approach etc).

they are looking for a house style whereas a smaller roaster is going to profile the roast to hopefully get the best out the bean and perhaps a nod to their preferred flavour profile (fruit driven not over-roasted etc).

Maybe, but maybe not.

There was a TV show a few years back called round the world in 80 trades, on one leg the guy bought some coffee beans from a farm and tried to sell them. At the big coffee buyers they roasted it and made 100 cups with it to check it's taste, consistency, etc etc and had a whole lab analysing it. Before rejecting it for having a whole host of off flavours and inconsistencies despite the star being prepared to accept a low price as they would have bought his whole stock.

He then went to someone who sounds a lot like you describe (a little 1 man artisan coffee roaster/shop) who paid far more for it having done far less QC.

My experience with expensive coffee beans is 50:50, half the time it's great, but so is some supermarket stuff, the other half is just coffee roasted by an ameture (and annoyingly, sometimes it's one that was great last time!). 100% of the time though it's expensive!

MrSmith has it pretty much covered. I'm sure Halfords are very good at buying and selling a wide range of acceptable bikes that work perfectly well for lots of people and represent value for money. Do I want to ride one? No.*

*with the possible exception of some of the Voodoo bikes which seem alright, but I'm not giving up my Nukeproof Mega for, and... that's not the point! 😀

*with the possible exception of some of the Voodoo bikes which seem alright, but I'm not giving up my [b]Nukeproof Mega [/b]for, and... that's not the point!

That's like saying you won't drink coffee from Sainsbury's, but will from Tesco.

For the avoidance of doubt I've nothing against either supermarket or Nukeproof. But it is a supermarket (CRC) own brand!

small batches, high overheads

Just buy coffee, rather than an artisanal lifestyle-choice with a curated backstory, marketed towards A2 consumers seeking external validity.

This

I do see your point there. The thing is, with supermarket coffee you know pretty much what you're going to get, and it'll be OK, probably pretty good for the money, and fine for most people, most of the time, me included.

But it's not very exciting (even if you're the sort of person that gets excited about coffee). I guess it can be a bit of a gamble - for every genuine coffee enthusiast who buys stuff they like the taste of (which may or may not be what you like), roasts it their way and sells it, there's probably a few chancers who'll buy anything and stick a fancy label on it.

But you can do your own QC on coffee - in fact that's part of the fun. You can buy a small amount and try it and it you don't like it, buy something else.

That's like saying you won't drink coffee from Sainsbury's, but will from Tesco.

I knew someone would say that. I know it's not made from a single ingot of steel by a bearded man in a shed in Colorado, but my point was more about quality of components. Not very well made*, admittedly.

*Edit: my point, not the bike. The bike's very well made.

The Myth of the Artisan applies just as much to coffee as to bike frames.

I could never buy from that Taylors lot, Harrogate may be posh and nice for Yorkies but i dont like their stuff, aldi not any better but Lidls coffee beans are usually good for me big 1kg bags sometimes often with 30% off
If im feeling flush and in Edinburg i will by some arty farty roast but i like dark oily beans as i like coffee strong with nice velvety full fat milk at 65°