6 Reasons Why Coffee Is Nothing Like Wine

Once you’ve worked in the coffee industry for a while, it’s basically unavoidable. You will wind up participating in conversations about how coffee is just like wine. If you work in coffee in Cape Town, a city that is surrounded by world-class vineyards, it’s probably even more inevitable. I have to confess, I’ve probably been the one to lead a discussion on the parallels more than a handful of times over the years.

There are good reasons for these comparisons to come up of course. I think the coffee industry may be particularly fond of them because, whether due to longevity or better marketing, the wine industry has arguably done a better job of communicating with the public about how to appreciate the nuance, complexity and variety in wine. It’s helpful to use wine as an analogy when we specialty coffee lovers talk about terroir, fermentation, plant varieties, farming practices, and all these things that influence flavour in both of our beloved beverages.

My colleague Matt, has done a great job of expanding on some of these similarities in his companion blog post: 6 Reasons Why Coffee Is Just Like Wine.

Despite all those similarities and helpful parallels, I’ve found myself thinking more about what’s different between coffee and wine recently though. This may be a reaction to conversations I’ve had where people (who are in neither industry) have tried to draw conclusions about how to expand specialty coffee in South Africa, based on observations about what they see happening in wine around the world. They’re both specialty beverages derived from single crops, so the dynamics of the industries must be the same right?!

I don’t think so.

The more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve realised how fundamentally different coffee and wine are, particularly from the perspective of the dynamics of the industry. There may be parallels in the influences on flavour, and there may be lessons to learn from the wine industry on how to communicate about flavour with the public, but the coffee industry is a fundamentally different beast. I think that understanding these differences is important both to the enjoyment of and success in coffee. Here are some of the most important ones.

1. Age is not coffee’s friend

Let’s start with an obvious (though not often reflected on) difference. Coffee lives fast and dies young. Most wines will have a couple of years in them once they’ve been bottled. Some will last the better part of a decade. Some of the best wines will be great for generations. I’ve tasted wine that was older than I was at the time. Thankfully, I haven’t had to go through that experience with coffee.

Roasted coffee will taste good for 4-6 weeks from roast on average. If it’s roasted dark, used for espresso, or perhaps just a coffee that seems to be in a rush, it can be a lot less than that. Even unroasted, coffees really only last 1-2 years. You’re basically never going to taste a coffee that wasn’t grown and harvested within the last handful of years, at least not a good one.

Why does this matter? It fundamentally changes the nature of consumption and conversation around coffee. For starters, no one is ever going to build a collection of coffee beans (at least I hope not) but many wine lovers will have their collection of wine. To add insult to injury, some of those stashed wines may actually be improving in quality as they sit there, provided the conditions are right and it’s a wine made to age. I don’t think any coffee is improving past a couple of weeks from roast date, or a few months from harvest.

How does this play out for coffee lovers? It means that a lot of the time, when you’re waxing lyrical about the amazing coffee you discovered a couple of weeks ago to your friend, you don’t actually have any more of it! Either you or your friend have to go get another bag, freshly roasted, and that’s only possible if the roaster still has more of that coffee. Inevitably, that coffee will disappear, and you will never try that lot again. You may never even try that farm’s coffee again. That’s just the ephemeral nature of specialty coffee.

2. The growers and makers of coffee are not the same people

For most of the specialty end of the wine industry, the people who grow the wine and make the wine are the same people. At the very least, they are part of the same company. Of course, there are exceptions, but generally speaking, wine is made on the vineyard that grew it. That has huge implications for how wine is made, traded and sought out.

Lovers of wine will know the vineyards that produce their favourites. Those predilections will unconsciously be associated with all aspects of wine production, from the variety, to the farming techniques, to the winemaking practices. Coffee lovers may discover their favourite roasters (as they should) and return to them for trusted guidance on what to drink, but those roasters will be offering up coffees grown by dozens of different farmers from around the world, and that selection will be constantly changing. Don’t get me wrong, I think this is part of the fun of coffee, but it’s a fundamentally different experience.

3. There’s one more key step in the production chain

There are of course dozens, if not hundreds of steps in the production of both wine and coffee. I don’t mean to oversimplify; however, if you look at these at a macro level, the reality is that coffee has at least one more important one.

Like wine, coffee is grown, harvested, processed & “made”, but unlike wine, that “made” part needs to be split into two parts. Coffee first needs to be roasted, and then it needs to be brewed. These are both critical steps and essential prerequisites to the enjoyment of a good cup of coffee. The reality is that this makes the production chain more complex. It introduces an exponentially larger amount of possible combinations of variables that may influence the beverage’s flavour, and this is in comparison to an already very complex beverage!

4. You actually need to make coffee!

It’s definitely worth zeroing in on this last step in coffee’s production chain as well. This may sound incredibly obvious, but the fact that you need to make coffee just before consuming it is an absolutely massive difference to the world of wine. Sometimes I envy people in the wine industry on this point. All their customers have to do is open the bottle and drink it. Maybe they have to serve it at the right temperature; they probably should buy some decent glasses, but really, it’s relatively hard for them to screw it up.

In coffee, on the other hand, you could hand someone the very best bag of beans you ever tasted, and they could make something horrible with it if they didn’t know what they were doing. You can’t make a great cup of coffee from bad beans, but you sure can make a terrible cup of coffee from excellent beans. Tragic, isn’t it?

This problem is compounded by the fact that there are dozens, if not hundreds, heck, if not thousands of ways to make coffee. Even worse, each one tastes a bit different! Someone can taste a great wine at a farm or a restaurant, and buy a bottle of that wine and enjoy pretty much the same flavour experience at home. Most people will never get close to replicating the same flavour experience that they have in a cafe at home.

5. Serving great coffee requires equipment

Part of the challenge of replicating those flavour experiences is skill, no doubt, but the other part is equipment. Coffee makers and grinders vary in price and complexity but you need at least one of each to make your coffee. What does someone need to enjoy a glass of wine at home? Basically, just a mouth; maybe a corkscrew, but even that is going out of fashion.

This is where the coffee industry often gets snagged, because what do specialty cafes use to make coffee? They use machines that cost more than your car did. Is it surprising then that many drinkers of coffee decide that they really can only enjoy high quality coffee when they’re out? I personally believe that they’re mistaken, but I don’t blame them for thinking that. The coffee equipment required is a serious impediment to the widespread appreciation of specialty coffee at home, albeit one that we’re working on!

6. Milk & sugar

Man, have I got beef with milk and sugar. The latter has an outright ban at Cape Coffee Beans HQ, and while I’ve relented on the former, no one gets to consume milk in their coffee without a quip from me about milk being a substance that exists to turn small cows into big ones.

Our task in the coffee industry is seriously hampered by the fact that the vast majority of the people who drink our beloved beverage love to mix it with other things. Why?! Imagine if the wine industry needed to contend with huge amounts of people sweetening or diluting their products with other drinks. I suppose the whisky industry can probably sympathise with us here.

We have a real challenge in coffee. Most people don’t like coffee, they like coffee-flavoured sweetened milk. Maybe they would like coffee, if they’d ever tried a decent example of it, but the reality is that most people react to the mention of black coffee with a face that looks like they just smelled a fart. They are probably remembering that one time that they had one sip of black instant or crappy robusta-based grocery store blends because they somehow managed to run out of both milk and sugar at the same time.

The wine industry is lucky not to have to contend with a cultural norm of adulterating their product. This is one thing that I particularly envy, because the reality is that once you put milk and sugar in them, the differences between good and bad coffees are definitely muted.

Coffee... It's complicated

If you’ve made it to the end of this writing rant (a wrant maybe?) you’re probably thinking, “sheesh, coffee is complicated!”

Bingo! Coffee is really complicated.

That is both a blessing and a curse. It offers a wonderful world of nuance, variety and exploration. It allows the consumer to participate in the process in a way that I don’t think any wine lover would even think of. The challenge is that it makes the barriers to entry into the wonderful world of speciality coffee quite a bit higher. It makes marketing and growing the industry and individual businesses much more challenging. It can make specialty coffee seem less accessible, and even make some less educated consumers doubt the value of what is on the other side of that barrier.

Thankfully, there are more and more of us who get it, and who are helping to spread the word. Yes, it’s complicated, but it’s definitely worth it!

About the author

Phaedon is the founder of Cape Coffee Beans. He's a former strategy consultant turned eCommerce guy who came to South Africa for 6 months and wound up staying a decade (and counting). Back in 2013, he decided to try to turn a budding interest in coffee into a business and so Cape Coffee Beans was born. These days he spends most of his time thinking about how to expand the reach of specialty coffee in South Africa. He's also pretty partial to a good glass of South African wine.

6 Reasons Why Coffee Is Just Like Wine

Initially, this blog post began with the title 6 reasons why coffee is nothing like wine. As you might have noticed, the topic of the blog has changed slightly. I'm Matt, the new(ish) marketing guy at Cape Coffee Beans, and I love coffee (particularly interesting and experimental coffee). I also love wine (particularly interesting and experimental wine). When Phaedon (the boss) suggested we write a blog post on why coffee is nothing like wine, I thought this was a great idea. That is until I began to write it, and I quickly realised that I think that coffee is quite a lot like wine.

So instead of the initial idea, I am writing this blog post with 6 reasons why coffee is just like wine and Phaedon is writing another blog post - 6 Reasons Why Coffee Is Nothing Like Wine. We'll let you read them both and make up your own mind, and we'd love to hear your thoughts!

So without further ado, here are 6 reasons why coffee is just like wine.

1. Flavour

Every time a coffee lover hears the expression “it just tastes like coffee”, something inside of us dies a little. If you are a wine lover, I’m pretty sure it’s tantamount to the expression “it tastes like red/white wine”. The reality is that coffee, like wine, is complex and nuanced, with a myriad of flavours to be found, explored and tasted.

You might be thinking to yourself “but wine has things like sommeliers and entire careers dedicated to professional tasting and quality control.” Well, coffee has these as well. They are called Q-graders, and they are highly respected within the industry. Admittedly, these sorts of careers in coffee are very much still in their infancy, but there is no doubt that they will evolve as the industry comes into its own.

2. Variety

I’m sure you’ve all heard the names of various grape varieties used in wine; words like Sauvignon Blanc or Merlot are firmly engrained in most of our vocabularies. Some of you might not know that the same amount of variation occurs in coffee fruit and with this variation comes very distinct flavour profiles. There are the more common varieties such as Bourbon and Caturra, then there are the highly prized and notoriously difficult to grow varieties such as Gesha, not to mention the rare and exotic varietals like Marogogype or Pacas, and there are even laboratory-developed varieties such SL28 or SL34. In short, there is no shortage of diversity.

Coffee lovers around the world are only just beginning to pay more attention to the coffee variety that they are drinking, but as the supply chain becomes more transparent and we have access to more information about our coffees, these details will become increasingly important. 

3. Viticulture & Wine Making

This leads us quite nicely to the topic of viticulture - the study of wine farming. Each variety needs specific attention and care. Some coffees grow better in sunlight, others in shade. Certain varieties are disease resistant, and others you need to be wary of. With so much variety and specialty coffee farming being a relatively new branch of the coffee industry, there is very little formal education in this field. The best education you can get in coffee farming is to study viticulture. Although the specifics might be different, the overarching agricultural concepts still apply! Many viticulture professionals are having a huge influence in the coffee-growing world and many people who studied viticulture are finding themselves more and more drawn into the world of coffee farming. 

Not only does the study of wine growing help coffee farmers, but due to the controlled fermentation that is needed to process coffee, knowledge of winemaking can also be invaluable to coffee producers. If you're interested in reading more on coffee processing, check out our blog post on the topic.

6. Culture

The cultural impact of coffee is going through a bit of a renaissance at the moment. For years, cafes were viewed in a similar vein to fast food joints: get in, get your fix, get out and get on with your day. This mentality is changing drastically. Cafes are becoming social hubs of the community, places for people to meet up, catch up, and spend time together. In a large way, the cafe is replacing the bar as the go-to gathering place. This is happening to such an extent, that cafes have begun to extend their opening hours into the evening and even started selling wine.

While there still is the existence of “fast food cafes” (for lack of a better term), the emergence of this new type of cafe, a cafe that is interested in flavour, quality and experience, has largely blurred the line of where cafes end and bars begin. The only inherent difference in the experience of going out for a glass of wine or going out for a cup of coffee is the liquid in your glass and perhaps the time of day. Although this is a relatively new culturural phenomenon in South Africa, this has largely been the norm in European countries since cafes began, and I, for one, am very excited about its arrival.

What's the point?

Well done, if you managed to get through my meandering thoughts on coffee and wine, I think we've both done a good job. Although, at this point, I'm sure you are wondering (as am I), what is the point of this blog post.

After some reflection, I think the point is that there is no such thing as "just coffee". It is diverse and interesting and the industry is blossoming into this beautiful behemoth with so much to offer!

There is so much to be gained if we start treating how we purchase coffee the way we treat purchasing wine; we all have our favourite wine grapes, some of us have a favourite wine region, many of us love wine produced by certain farms and producers. Let's start paying attention to these similar (albeit also quite different) details in our coffee. Let's learn about our coffee's story. Let's not just have a favourite roaster, but a favourite origin, variety, producer and process! 

I have to give credit where it's due, Phaedon said it perfectly succinctly in his blog post "Coffee... It's complicated".

About the author

Matt began his coffee journey as a humble barista. After working his way up through the years to eventually running a coffee roastery in Ireland, he realised that as much as he loved (and was mildly obsessed with) making coffee, he loved talking about it far more! This spurred a bit of sidestep in his coffee career where he moved into marketing and joined the team at Cape Coffee Beans where he gets to wax lyrical about the wonders of coffee all day long.

Washed, Naturals, Honeys - What's The Deal?

It seems that the world of speciality coffee is hurtling forward at an incredibly fast rate. Part of this progression means that as a consumer, we have so much more information about the different coffees we drink. While this progress is amazing for the industry and for coffee lovers alike, it can seem daunting to suddenly have unfamiliar coffee jargon thrown at you. In this article we'll be looking at coffee processing, some of the terms you might come across, what they mean and how they affect the flavours in your cup.

What is coffee processing

As you might know, coffee grows as a fruit that looks very similar to a cherry; it is in fact called a coffee cherry. This fruit contains a thin layer of fleshy fruit and usually two seeds. These seeds are what we know as coffee beans. Coffee processing quite simply refers to the method used to extract these seeds from the fruit. This process has a huge impact on the coffee it produces. It impacts every step of the coffee's journey from the farm to the roast to the brew.

Most notably, the processing method will affect the flavour of the coffee in a drastic way, not necessarily making it better or worse but making it taste significantly different. It also affects the density and sugar content of the coffee, meaning that roasters will need to approach how they roast these coffees completely differently. Lastly, different processing methods often lend themselves to being brewed differently, not referring to brew methods as such, but more to the nuances of one's brew recipe.

This article will explore the different processing methods, what they entail and what you can expect from them in the cup.

Natural processing / dry method

The method

The natural process is the oldest coffee processing method, dating back thousands of years to ancient Ethiopia. Naturally processed coffees are picked, sorted and laid out to dry in the sun. This means that the coffee cherry dries with all of the fruit still intact. The dried flesh of the cherry is then mechanically removed, leaving the green coffee, ready to be roasted.

Leaving the sugary flesh of the fruit intact during this process, leads to the fruit and coffee bean undergoing a lot more fermentation. While this fermentation can be desirable and lead to incredible tasting coffee, it requires intense monitoring and expertise to get right. If the layer of coffee is too thick, the fermentation can turn to rot; if the coffee is not turned often enough, the underside of fruit can develop mildew; if it is turned too often, you can stall the fermentation. It is a delicate art, but when done right, the reward is superb.

The natural process is the longest and most labour intensive as it can take up 4 weeks for the coffee cherries to dry sufficiently and the beans to reach the required moisture content of around 11% for export.

Cafe Imports gives an example of natural coffee processing in Ethiopia

What to expect in the cup

Drying the coffee in direct contact with all the sugars in the fruit gives natural coffees a noticeable and accessible sweetness, while the fermentation that it undergoes leads to these coffees having an intense and full-bodied mouthfeel. This sweetness and body mean that they are often favoured in espresso-style brews and would make a good option for those who enjoy milk in their coffee.

Natural coffees which are grown at a high altitude usually have berry-forward tasting notes (often intense blueberry or strawberry), while those grown at a lower altitude lend themselves towards chocolate, caramel and nutty flavours. Occasionally, the fermentation comes through in the taste of the coffee with a boozy sweetness reminiscent of sherry or late harvest wine.

When done well, fermentation can be used to highlight sweetness and fruitiness and add a lovely rounded body to a cup. This body and sweetness can come at a slight trade-off however, as natural coffees tend to have a much lower acidity than washed coffees. While this might seem like a good thing, the acidity in coffee is often what leads to the complexities of flavour in the cup. Without this acidity, naturally processed coffees can lack the diversity of other processing methods but when done with the meticulous attention to detail that you can see from an experienced producer, the additional sweetness can highlight the acidity while bringing balance to the cup.

In recent years, we have seen a resurgence in the popularity of natural coffees. This is due to a number of factors. We've seen producers begin to experiment with fermentation which has, in turn, led to some exceptionally exciting and unique coffees. Furthermore, the accessible sweetness and intensity of flavour found in naturally processed coffee mean that it tends to be a firm favourite for people new to the world of specialty coffee; you don't need an experienced palate or have a wealth of knowledge and understanding to have a coffee that tastes like a fruit bomb.

Check out all our natural coffees here.

Washed processing / wet method

The method

Washed coffee processing, also known as wet-processing, is the most common method of processing coffee in the world today. The process begins, as with most high-quality coffee production, with handpicking the ripest coffee cherries. These cherries are then sorted for defects (a simple float test - the cherries are submerged in water and defective cherries which float to the surface are then discarded) and de-pulped using a mechanical pulper. What is left at this point is a coffee bean covered in a sticky layer of fruit.

As with all processing, fermentation is a necessary part of the process, however, with washed coffee, the goal is to keep the fermentation as short and as controlled as possible. Fermentation helps to break down the sticky fruit layer (know as mucilage) and to help remove it from the coffee bean. There are two main ways to achieve this: either leaving the coffee to dry ferment, once it is de-pulped, or submerging it to ferment in water. The method used generally depends on the climate and coffee processing traditions of the region.

Once fermentation has reached an optimal level, the coffee beans are then submerged in a washing tank and left anywhere from a few hours to a few days, until all the fruit has been removed and what is left is a clean coffee bean. Some producers will wash their coffee multiple times to ensure that all the mucilage is removed

At this point, the coffee is laid out to dry. Producers must pay close attention to the drying stage of processing, turning the coffee regularly, as it is imperative that the coffee dries evenly and that mould or bacteria isn't allowed to grow on the coffee beans. Once the coffee beans reach ~11% moisture content (this varies in time depending on climate and whether the producer chooses to dry in direct sunlight, with a parabolic drier or shade dry the coffee), they are ready to be packaged and shipped. 

One of the downsides of this processing method is that it uses a significant amount of water that needs considerable processing before it can be returned to the local water table. As such, this method can pose problems in regions that don't have an abundance of water.

Cafe Imports gives an example of washed coffee processing in Peru

What to expect in the cup

Washed coffees are prized for their clarity, acidity and unique flavour profiles. They are able to achieve much more definitive origin characteristics; for example, a washed Ethiopian can produce intense florals and stone fruit flavours, while a Kenyan will give you bright grapefruit and raspberry and a Colombian can taste like a tropical melon salad. These coffees tend to be vibrant and bright with clear fruity acidity and layers of complexity.

Because these coffee beans spend less time in contact with the sugars, their sweetness is often more subtle and nuanced. Having said that, they tend to have a much higher acidity which can lead to higher perceived sweetness; for example, if you taste notes of raspberry in your coffee, you will associate this flavour with sweetness and, while the coffee won't have any more sugar compounds, it will seem to taste sweeter.

This ability to highlight the origin characteristics and more intricate flavours have led many coffee aficionados to believe that with washed coffee, you are tasting the coffee: the origin, the terroir, the bean varietal, the altitude; whereas with other processing methods, the dominant flavours come from the processing.

This brighter acidity, clarity and more nuanced flavour, often make washed coffees preferable on lighter brew methods that highlight the more delicate flavour profiles and complexity that can be found in these coffees.

Check out all our washed coffee here.

Pulped natural and honey processes

The pulped natural method

The pulped natural processing was developed in the '90s in Brazil. It came about when producers wanted to maintain the clarity and vibrance of washed coffee while achieving the body and sweetness found in naturally processed coffee. The result is the pulped natural process, a hybrid of the washed and natural processes.

In this process, the coffee cherry is de-pulped, similarly to in the washed process, leaving a layer of mucilage (sticky, sugary and mineral rich flesh from the coffee cherry fruit) on the coffee bean. These coffee beans are then laid out to dry. Leaving the flesh of the fruit on the coffee bean during this stage allows more fermentation to occur than in the washed process but less fermentation than with naturally processed coffees. Similarly to the previous processing methods, this stage of the process requires meticulous attention to detail to ensure that over-fermentation doesn't occur and that the beans dry evenly

Once the coffee beans reach the desired moisture content of ~11%, the mucilage, which has now turned into a dry husk, is mechanically removed and the beans are ready to be packaged and transported.

The honey processing method

In recent years, a group of Costa Rican producers began experimenting with controlling the pulped natural process. This resulted in the birth of the honey process. The differentiating factor between the two processes is controlling precisely how much mucilage is left on the coffee bean and how long it is fermented for. This allows further control on where between the washed and the natural processes the final coffee would lie. The following is what we ended up with.

Yellow honey: Yellow honey is processed with the smallest amount mucilage remaining on the coffee, roughly 25%, and is dried as quickly as possible in order to mitigate fermentation. Due to water shortages in Costa Rica, this process was primarily developed to be as similar to the washed process as possible, without having the water waste.

Red honey: The red honey process maintains about 50% mucilage on the coffee bean and is designed to provide an even balance between the characteristics of a washed coffee and those of a natural coffee. The producer can choose to dry these coffees quicker or slower in order to achieve more or less fermented flavours.

Black honey: Lastly, we have the black honey process. This is very similar to the natural process as it involves leaving 100% of the mucilage intact. The results are coffees with intense body and sweetness that share a lot of characteristics with naturally processed coffee.

Cafe Imports gives an example of honey processing methods in Costa Rica

A lot of producers believe that this processing method is where the future of coffee lies. The ability fine-tune the balance of sweetness, body and acidity in the final cup gives producers more control of the flavours in the coffee than they have ever had before. Furthermore, being a low waste processing method adds to its popularity with producers.

What to expect In the cup

It's hard to be specific about what to expect from these coffees as pulped natural and honey processed coffees cover such a broad spectrum of approaches and flavours. What we can say is that you can expect a cup that maintains the delicate clarity of washed coffees while bringing to the table the body and sweetness found in naturals. These tend to be beautifully balanced and delicious coffees that have a lot to offer in any brew method.

Check out all our pulped natural and honey processed coffees here.

Final thoughts

As is the case with a product as diverse as coffee, nothing is set in stone. While coffees of certain processing methods do tend in certain sensory directions, that does not mean that you can't get a vibrant and floral natural coffee with fruity acidity or a bold and sticky, sweet washed coffee.

Brewing and roasting have gone through an incredible renaissance in the last few decades, and we are now able to achieve things that we never knew were possible. We are seeing this mindset of progression and experimentation carry through to the coffee producers, and the results are increasingly delicious and varied. The world of coffee processing is no longer as simple as washed and natural coffees; we are seeing unique styles of fermentation such as anaerobic fermentation and more control over variables such as in the honey processes. The consistency and quality improvements we are seeing as a result of this are huge. It really is an exciting time to be a coffee lover and an even more exciting time to begin your journey into the world of specialty coffee.