After a thread a week or so ago I decided to add some decaf coffees.
This is Black and White’s Hambela Natural, an ethyl acetate decaf grown and processed in Ethopia and then decaffeinated in Germany.
This is a very young coffee, roasted last week, but I am impatient. I used a pretty typical V60 recipe. The drawdown was a little long even accounting for a long bloom, over 4 minutes, so I’ll need to grind a bit coarser going forward. Extraction is pretty close, so to compensate for the quicker brew I’ll go up a hair on temp from 92 to probably 94.
The coffee itself has bite from its youth, but interesting flavor notes are showing. Cocoa, cranberry, tart cherry. Not a lot of natural sweetness, but I think that has more to do with the age and me needing to refine my brew. I’m not sure it’s remarkable enough that I’d favor it going forward over their standard decaf, but we’ll see. Black and White, in its usual style, does have a funkier decaf among its rotating options that I haven’t tried.
I don’t have one, but it’s been on my wish list for a while. I taught a friend to brew on one, strangely enough, and the added control was interesting, but I never got around to buying one for myself. I don’t usually find myself wanting that versatility but coincidentally would have liked it on this cup for a full immersion bloom.
I’ll update you once I feel I’ve gotten everything I can out of the coffee. I’m confident it has more to give, at least more clarity. I’m very happy with what I’m now getting out of B&W’s standard decaf, I don’t think I’d have correctly recognized it as decaf if I tasted blind. Whether that’s on my palate or the coffee I’m not sure. Probably a little bit of both.