Cupping and an incredible, delicious fennel.
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Cupping, and why I should care
I read a write-up on “Cupping is a game of chance” so y’all wouldn’t have to.
Cupping, for the hobbyist coffee-teers, is where you make a bunch of cups of a coffee to test if it tastes good and if it is quality. Is it oversimplified to explain it like this? no.
The article explains that a cupping sample [5 cups {cupping sessions}, 350g] compared to an entire order, which is 320 60kg bags, is 0.00003125% of the lot tested.
This is not necessarily an issue in itself, but the standard for how to get this sample is to pick from 32 bags at random—a standard not always possible to follow. It’s often that a sample is sent from the first available coffees, and the full lot is not even harvested yet. Also, samples are sent throughout the process, from harvest to right before shipping the complete lot.
For a similar product, tea, it is considered higher quality if you get a “first flush” tea, which is the first harvest of the season; but many coffees are considered uniform if the lot combines early and late harvest.
For defects
Potato defect — You should cup 5600–5700g of coffee per lot if you want a statistically likely “90% correct instance rate of defect per lot” per a study by Counter Culture. The standard cupping amount only gives a 10% accuracy in finding the defect, meaning if you find a defect and switch, you’re not more or less likely to find potato defect in the new one.
TCA/“phenolic” — it’s likely the 350g standard is enough, and if you find the defect to cup again at up to 600g. That’s 50 cuppings—a lot of cups.
Different people taste molecules more or less than others, so in a cup with a defect, 70% of your team might not taste it.
Why you should care
I don’t know, should you? Pretty much all the coffee we drink is some sort of poor sampling across a giant superset of potential coffee samples that laughs at statistical soundness like a clown at a party. If they’re all doing it, kinda evens out, right?
If you were to care, you should care because it found that despite the poor sampling % and the inability to accurately predict defects, the character of the coffee is likely to stay consistent, even if a sample sent to you and a sample sent to your friend are much different in quality.
From there, you should get to know the farmer’s reputation and the likelihood of disease in that area. These pieces will give you an idea if you should buy the coffee.
Something really cool
If you want something really cool, the International Society for Infectious Diseases has a e-mail list you can subscribe to that will tell you emerging diseases for animals, plants, and people.
That means that you can select juts plants, and just in regions you care about. You’ll know when diseases are emerging pretty much at the same time that the surveyors do.
This is what the e-mail looks like:
And so on. This is a report on dengue fever from Bangladesh a month ago. It’s just starting, but allows us to look into it.
This week’s featured café
Cafecito Social is a new café opened up in Gowanus, which is a real, non-Jersey place, somehow. It’s essentially cobble hill, because if Malai ice cream is a couple minutes away I’m calling it cobble hill.
I know how much my readers appreciate haphazardly taken photos, so here’s two of the best:
What should you get there?
The dulce de leche latte, or the tres leche latte. The owner didn’t like sweet coffees (or so he said), and I thought even their sweetest drink was not-that-sweet. If you’re into that, you’ll likely enjoy this place a lot.
If you’re like me, there’s a special Lindt chocolate shop in a mountain in Switzerland and I think you’ll like it a little more.
What’s new, Jude?
A new spot, Cafe 9, in Astoria. I tried it today; could take it or leave it. I like that they have cinnamon in their cappucinos and also iced capps, which are losing traction in the idiotic war against hot milk in cold ice.
Pop-ups (thanks Coffee Klatsch, links below)
SATURDAY, TODAY, July 6th
Three-Legged Cat is having an Aeropress Bar Takeover in East Williamsburg, 11:00am–1:00pm
Muted Entity is popping up at Tumbao World, LES, 12:00pm–7:00pm, with a candle collaboration with Mothers Milk.
Next Saturday, July 13th
Kafka Coffee Pop-up at East Coast Social Club, East Williamsburg, 10:00am–5:00pm [“til late”]
Break time!
A good break involves getting outdoors, putting on a stocky pair of oversized boots, and absolutely going to town on Spotted Lanternflies, an invasive species of insect which eats trees, puts eggs on any flat surface it can find outdoors, and is all over the place.
And now…
Orange hearts, fennel eyes
The trick to a great fennel syrup is to have a great fennel latte before trying to make it.
My utmost recommendation for this is to go to Little Flower, a staple café in Astoria which serves a drink called “Pink tea”, which is green tea in a latte as the base, rose syrup, (I think?) cardamom, and a tiny bit of fennel.
Fennel, being the taste of black licorice [and very similar to anise], can be overwhelming, but if you add floral and sweet and delicate elements, raises those to new heights and imparts a little of its own. Like adding a liter of cumin into a lamb dish.
First, you should know what the difference is.
Fennel vs. Anise vs. Star Anise
OK:
Fennel look like this:
Anise look this:
Look a star:
Fennel and Anise are part of the same family, Apiaceae [I almost passed out from stress trying to type that from memory], while star anise is not; they share a similar licorice-y flavor, though.
The fennel plant you can also chop up and put in a lot of dishes, it acts like celery if it tasted a little different. The licorice flavor is not as harsh in the plant itself, and it is softened even more with heat and adds a delicious component to a dish.
Try it with your next stir fry/lazy cook meal.
The recipe
Toast your fennel seeds on a dry, hot pan for a few minutes, until they turn brown. Unlike many spices that you have to guess by scent if it’s toasted, fennel seeds are nice and will actually change color drastically to let you know. Agitate constantly.
As the last fennel seed turns brown, take it off the heat immediately and add to a pot with water and sugar. You can make the simple syrup first and add the fennel, or just throw everything in. It’s forgiving, like you can be today.
Forgive someone, and have a latte with them.
1/3 cup fennel seeds [750g? ish?]
1 cup water
1 [dry] cup granulated sugar
Toast the seeds, add them in, and remove while hot. Add to a heat-proof jar or let cool then add to a jar, then let sit overnight.
After the wait, take the fennel out and then store the syrup in a refrigerator.
Option 2
1/3 cup fennel seeds
1 cup water
1 cup sugar
Add ingredients to a small pot and stir occasionally for 20 minutes.
Both options are good, option 2 is a bit harsher but still delicious.
Orange Fennel Latte
In a rare thing for a recipe, you can switch the espresso for tea. Earl grey, green, and oolong are great options.
Espresso
Orange juice [about 2 ounces]
Vanilla syrup [0.5–1 oz]
Fennel syrup [1–2oz]
Steamed [oat, to start] milk
The ounce measurements of each of these will be precise, and you have to test your oranges and your fennel to get to a nice balance. It will be a careful measurement, but getting it right is greatly rewarding.
Mix the espresso, orange juice, vanilla syrup, and fennel syrup in the espresso pitcher or at the bottom of the cup. You should mix them in that order.
The vanilla is added to de-acidify the orange juice, making it not curdle the milk when added. If you add additional sugar it will also help, so it can be just additional fennel syrup, but adding the vanilla is delicious.
After this is mixed, add the steamed milk to complete the latte.
If you’re going to make this a staple drink and the only thing you use the fennel syrup for, consider adding baking soda to the fennel syrup so you can experiment with orange concentrate and lemon/lime juice.
Add roses to top, or lavender if you’re crazy.
Thanks for tuning in!
Enjoy your coffee!