I don’t know how many of you are familiar with the famous “Farms in Berkeley?” motto on Berkeley Farms milk in the Bay Area. Well, this story in Friday’s NY Times about some pioneers growing coffee bushes near Santa Barbara brought that old line to mine.
Pretty interesting, I thought. I particularly liked the idea that they’re planting the coffee bushes under avocado trees that are nearing the end of their productive lives. The ranchers can gradually shift to a higher value crop and, at the same time, the avocado trees provide the shade the coffee bushes need.
I’m curious – has anyone tried any of these coffees?
There were a couple of economic assertions I’d question, though:
And they see more and more American consumers willing to spend $8 or $12 for a cup of joe, which would offset their high costs of production.
Really? I thought Starbucks was expensive, but where do you go to pay $8-$12 for a cup?
A pound of dried green specialty coffee beans can sell for as much as $120 in today’s market, according to Andy Mullins, a retired technology executive who has planted coffee on his property east of Santa Barbara.
I was just in Santa Barbara and found out Good Land Organics (Cali coffee grower) does a weekly Friday coffee tasting. Unfortunately, I found out on Sunday and wasn’t able to arrange an impromptu tasting nor visit.
Kopi luwak is one of the most expensive coffees in the world, selling for between US$100 and $600 per pound in 2010. The specialty Vietnamese weasel coffee, which is made by collecting coffee beans eaten by wild civets, is sold at US$3,000 per kilogram.
I am a coffee freak (I literally review Los Angeles cafes for fun) so paying a lot for an extraordinary coffee is fine for me. I know a place that serves Kopi but not tried it yet.
I’ve never had the Kopi coffee but Sweet Marias had some of the Jacu coffee a few years ago and I tried it. It was good but nothing worth remarking over. In fact, I find the quality of most of their beans to be very high with little variance. I don’t think I’ve ever had a bad cup from the coffee they sold and I roasted. Most of it is around $6/pound green. I’ve paid more several times and always felt the premium wasn’t justified.
I’m skeptical that California has the correct climate, soil and altitude combination to grow coffee well. Even if they did, the labor would make the end result prohibitively expensive.
Yes. The article talks about producing regions that are starting to use more machinery. Those “factory farm” coffee plantations are the ones that produce most of the crap coffee out there. You can get super high quality beans from say, Costa Rica, for under $7/pound – and that’s not even the bulk price. Those beans are hand harvested, the pickers going through the plants many times to pick at the exact right time. I visited a plantation this past winter and I can’t remember what they said the pickers are paid but it’s nearly nothing.
This idea that you can produce that level of quality in California, is one thing – and it might be true. Thinking that people are going to pay $100/pound for it is quite another.
civet coffee is a crime. Animals are caged and fed a diet of coffee cherries (usually poor quality beans) and are mistreated, often dying prematurely with malnutrition and disease. Horrible industry. Boycott.
Proud Mary is opening up a place in Portland and will target the $8-$15 cup of coffee market. I’ve had their Auction Lot Panama Geishas a few times in Vancouver BC at 12CDN and been impressed. (Aubade Coffee, if you’re ever there).
Not sure if it’s ironic or absurd that a wine board is criticizing the price of an incredibly complex, hand prepared beverage.
I can taste a big difference between most $10 wines and most $100 wines. I’ve tried expensive coffees and cannot tell a big difference. My favorite coffee is from East Timor and is usually <$10/pound. I roast it myself, grind it myself and make it myself in my Technivorm. I have never tasted better coffee than this. Maybe I have a yak palate. I wonder how much of that $8-15 cup of coffee is retail markup. Is Proud Mary paying $100/pound for those beans? The “hand prepared beverage” is an interesting way of looking at it. I’m viewing this through a green bean lens. Looking at it through a finished cup lens is very different. It just seems to me that they’re trying to fit a square peg in a round hole.
the geishas are too subtle for me and not worth the dollars. Never get the alleged jasmine out of them. I, too, roast my own, usually Guatemalas from Huehuetenango, my “Cote d’Or” of coffee site. I also grind and use a Technivorm. I usually pay under $6.50 per lb for my greens, often $4.
Geishas? I’d pay $20 for a cupa Joe with a happy ending.
Sorry, couldn’t resist.
It can’t get better than a great cup of Kona peaberry or extra fancy to me. I’ve tried Filipino civet coffee and it just tasted like decent coffee to me.
John Alban and his brother Joe developed a trellising technique for coffee that Joe uses in Kona.
When I first tried the beer, it was several years ago, and I don’t think that was the case. Though after posting about it this week, I also read the same stories you are referencing…so yes, I will not buy it again.