Hi, it’s Emily, Lead Roaster at Ruby Coffee Roasters, and here in Nelsonville, we are happily welcoming the month of June. I’m so excited to share a little more about the Roaster’s Choice coffees this month!
Our June subscription features two exciting new-to-Ruby coffees: Peru El Overo and Colombia Pastor Olcunche. These first-time offerings remind me that although there is a lot of value in what’s tried-and-true, there is also value in doing something new. At Ruby, we are all about forming stable, sustainable relationships with coffee producers and maintaining consistent roasting practices. We love bringing back fantastic offerings year after year. That being said, we are also constantly learning and evolving and are excited to share coffees with you that we haven’t had the pleasure of having on the menu before. From a roasting standpoint, I’m always excited to trial roast a coffee that we haven’t had the pleasure of roasting before.
When roasting El Overo for the first time, we used a profile from a coffee that had similar moisture and density readings. This worked out well as a starting point, and although I’d bet it would taste great with the same roast duration and final temperature as that other coffee’s profile, we think this coffee has something different to offer, so we made changes accordingly. And so the “tried-and-true” meets the “something new.” By starting with a solid foundation and building off of it to highlight El Overo’s unique characteristics, I think we hit the sweet spot with this one. With notes like candied nuts, maple sugar, and raisin, this coffee is sure to satisfy your early summer sweet tooth. Roaster’s Choice and Rich and Sweet subscribers, we hope you enjoy it!
Roaster’s Choice and Bright and Lively subscribers, we hope you enjoy Pastor Olcunche. Roasting this coffee for the first time went well, but it took on heat a little quicker than we were expecting. Instead of lowering the heat early to force it in line with how we thought it should roast, we allowed it to run a little hot and compensated for it with a lower gas setting later on. This way, the roast was left to do its thing early in the roasting process but still didn’t end up getting too hot at the end. As a result, it roasted even better than it would have if we had forced it into our preconceived notions, and I think this experience served as a nice reminder to be open to doing things a little differently. If something doesn’t fit into your expectations, adapt to it rather than force it, and the results might surprise you. Oh, the great wisdom roast curves have to share…I digress! What’s important is that Pastor Olcunche is tasting excellent. It has dried cherry and dark chocolate notes with some lively acidity reminiscent of mango lemonade, perfect to start off the summer season. Enjoy!
Thanks for reading!
Emily, Lead Roaster