Skip to content
TrackPodcasts
artsMar 8, 202233:15pending

The Dark Side of Coffee Roasting

About this episode

Close your eyes, and imagine taking a sip of thick espresso. What flavours would you hope are dancing on your tongue? Dark chocolate? Caramel?

How about lemon? What if the coffee is so acidic, you may as well be sucking on lemon juice? This acidity is often the result of roasting a coffee quite lightly, and specialty coffee loves this acidity.

But the weird thing is specialty coffee isn't obsessed with acidity because they necessarily enjoy acidic flavours. It goes waaaaaay deeper. So deep in fact it's caused massive Twitter brawls where a celebrity food columnist even sparred with a gang of self-proclaimed coffee punks.

Scott takes Jools on a coffee roasting journey, starting at the darker times in coffee, and how it evolved into the light roasts of today by speaking with Sonja Bjork Grant (Icelandic roaster and World Barista Judge) and Nick Mabey (co-owner of Assembly Coffee Roasters).

At the end, we ask the question: were the coffee punks right to be so focused on lightly roasted coffee?



Join our Patreon to support the show: https://bit.ly/3vrispx

Follow Nick Mabey (https://bit.ly/3Mwpu4m), Assembly Coffee (https://bit.ly/3sM618c), Sonja Bjork Grant (https://bit.ly/3tFMqpz), Jakub Klucznik (https://bit.ly/3Knl3Hh) and Saint Espresso (https://bit.ly/3IPaxsc) on Instagram.

Learn more about the Siemens EQ700 fully automatic espresso machine: https://bit.ly/3Ia8yy5

Find your perfect roast with the Ikawa Home: https://bit.ly/3IdYVPc

Join us at the London Coffee Festival! Send us an email - [email protected]

Tell your local barista about Adventures in Coffee!

Our Instagram handles:
James Harper / Filter Stories: https://bit.ly/2Mlkk0O
Jools Walker / Lady Velo: http://bit.ly/39VRGew
Scott Bentley / Caffeine Magazine: https://bit.ly/3oijQ91


Lightning and rain sound effects courtesy of Free Sound Library - https://bit.ly/3vKcfHv

Get every episode summarized

Each time Adventures In Coffee publishes, we email you a written briefing from the transcript — the topics, who appeared, and any specific claims, with the ad reads skipped.

Email me new episodes

Free for 3 shows. No card needed.

Hosts & guests

No transcript yet

This episode has not been transcribed. Request it and it moves to the front of the queue.

The Dark Side of Coffee Roasting

Adventures In Coffee

0:00
33:15

More episodes

More from Adventures In Coffee

View all episodes →