Why we care (or don’t care) about seasonality

Why we care (or don’t care) about seasonality

U.S. Coffee Championships 2023 Baltimore Qualifiers Results

More than 100 competitors brought their talent to Baltimore to take part in six competitions, and 63 will progress to nationals in April. BY NATE KLOCKBARISTA MAGAZINE ONLINE Photos by Matthew Temple courtesy of the U.S. Coffee Championships Last weekend, my hometown welcomed the U.S. Coffee Championships (USCC) qualifiers with the charm only Baltimore could […]


Hawaiian Legislators Introduce Bills for Stricter Coffee Labeling

Legislators representing the Kona district of Hawaii have introduced a series of bills that would require more strict labeling requirements for single-origin coffees and blends containing Hawaiian-grown coffees. Some Kona…


Breaking New Ground: A Sicilian Coffee Plantation, Part 2

The Morettino family has successfully cultivated a coffee plantation right in Sicily. Next on the agenda: making the island an international coffee hub. BY JOSEPH PHELANSPECIAL TO BARISTA MAGAZINE ONLINE Feature photo by Tomas Anton Escobar via Unsplash Editor’s note: Check out part one of this story here. Andrea Morettino’s family has proven that coffee […]


Bypass coffee brewing: How can it improve extraction?

There is a lot of science to brewing coffee. Whether knowingly or unknowingly, we trigger – and try to control – an almost endless number of chemical reactions to achieve the perfect extraction. To do so, we have to tweak different variables – such as grind size, temperature, and coffee-to-water ratio – to get the […]

Why we care (or don’t care) about seasonality

Understanding the Process: Anaerobic Processing

We continue our series on fermentation with a look at the anaerobic process, which has quickly become a favorite in cafés worldwide. BY TANYA NANETTISENIOR ONLINE CORRESPONDENT Photos courtesy of Bram de Hoog for Ally Coffee A simple cup of well-brewed coffee can have endless variations of flavors and aromas. These are closely linked to […]


Miami-Made Panther Coffee is Popping Up in Manhattan

Beloved Miami specialty coffee company Panther Coffee is making its first major New York City showing with the opening of a popup shop in Soho. With a soft opening scheduled…


Hawaiian Legislators Introduce Bills for Stricter Coffee Labeling

Legislators representing the Kona district of Hawaii have introduced a series of bills that would require more strict labeling requirements for single-origin coffees and blends containing Hawaiian-grown coffees. Some Kona…


Know Your Sweeteners: Agave: Part One — Indigenous Use

Known today primarily as a sweetener, agave can be traced back thousands of years. BY EMILY JOY MENESESBARISTA MAGAZINE ONLINE Featured photo by Bruno Cervera via Unsplash Recently, we launched our brand new article series “Know Your Sweeteners,” where we’re discussing a variety of sweeteners and syrups, and analyzing the unique characteristics of each one. […]

Why we care (or don’t care) about seasonality

Weekly Coffee News: Grounds for Health Week + Iconic SF Shop Closes

Welcome to DCN’s Weekly Coffee News. Keep up with all the latest coffee industry stories and career opportunities by subscribing to DCN’s newsletter. Tell our editors about your news here. Registration Opens for Inaugural…


What I Learned from My First Tea Ceremony

After taking in a brief moment of a tea ceremony in Thailand, I finally had the chance to participate in the full experience recently in Malaysia. BY TANYA NANETTI SENIOR ONLINE CORRESPONDENT Photos by Tanya Nanetti In the years that I worked as a barista in a café, tea always played a marginal role in […]


The Caripe Variety: A Groundbreaking Milestone in Venezuelan Coffee Farming

Today, we unveil the story behind the Caripe variety and its significance for the Venezuelan coffee industry. BY VASILEIA FANARIOTISENIOR ONLINE CORRESPONDENT Featured photo by Carlos Felipe Ramírez Mesa via Unsplash In the heart of Venezuela, nestled among the picturesque states of Monagas, Anzoátegui, and Sucre, lies a legacy deeply rooted in coffee cultivation. This […]


Brewing at Home and on the Road with Justin Pierce

In this series, we ask coffee professionals how they like to drink their coffee while at home and when traveling. BY TANYA NANETTISENIOR ONLINE CORRESPONDENT Feature photo courtesy of Justin Pierce Coffee professionals tend to spend most of their days brewing coffee. Baristas brew coffee behind the bar for their customers. Roasters brew it to […]

Why we care (or don’t care) about seasonality

Why we care (or don’t care) about seasonality

minimum dose size?

Jan 31, 2024 |

I use the Hario switch to brew my coffee and am trying to reduce my caffeine consumption. Hence I would like to brew smaller cups of coffee. I am currently using 10g of coffee with 160g of water. (1:16 Ratio) I am wondering if there is a minimum amount of coffee...

Why we care (or don’t care) about seasonality

red cherries for ryan's post.jpg

*A guest post by Ryan Brown, author of Dear Coffee Buyer*

I can’t help myself from occasional banter with baristas. Often this leads to playful arguments, and while I’d like to think that I usually win these arguments, I painfully remember a time I was wrong.

In late fall, while visiting a cafe & roastery, I asked how they had come into possession of what was being marketed as a new crop Kenya.

The best Kenyan coffees typically begin harvesting in late November and arriving in February. Despite the esteem for the country’s quality, it may surprise you to learn that a huge majority of what you’ve ever tasted comes from a pretty small area surrounding Mt. Kenya, so there’s little fluctuation in this timing.

It is entirely possible the coffee was from Kenya’s fly crop—its small, mid-season harvest that is rarely purchased by specialty buyers, as the quality is considered predictably lower than the main crop. But still, it was extremely unlikely that this was a new crop of Kenya being offered in early November.

I insisted to the barista that it had to either be a fly crop selection or else a coffee from the previous year. A lengthy disagreement ensued with the barista, whom I would later learn was also the coffee buyer

Whether the coffee was fly crop or old crop is beside the point. I was wrong to ask the question at all. (Granted, I wasn’t trying to make a point when I asked, it was merely curiosity.) As I note in Dear Coffee Buyer: A Guide to Sourcing Green Coffee: “I’ve generally been able to rely on coffees from Ethiopia and Kenya lasting a very long time after harvest.”

But what about all of this talk of seasonality? Isn’t it important for me to buy the right coffees at the right time? I address these questions in DCB:

green coffee pile for ryan's post.jpeg

Seasonality in coffee is an attempt to apply standards to how fresh green can, or perhaps should, be. Most attempts at seasonality standards are based on duration of, or at least relation to, recurring harvest cycles. For example, some roasters may deem a coffee “seasonal” only if it is within six months of harvest.


This nomenclature is too arbitrary. Such rules don’t justify the presence on your menu of a coffee that’s only three months from harvest but has faded, lost its character, or, even worse, picked up papery, aged flavors. Likewise, the rules are cruel to a coffee that is twelve months old but still vibrant, clean, and free of any hint of past-crop flavor. In my early days as a coffee buyer, I attempted to create a schedule of origins and their corresponding seasonality calendar, but I realized that the best solution was to do away with any consideration of time, as it missed the point.

We care about seasonality because we care about cup quality.

Understanding the seasonal crop cycles will naturally inform your purchase decisions, but if you set strict rules for how long after harvest you should roast coffees, you’ll either be unfairly cruel to some, too lenient on others, or both. “A coffee should be considered seasonal so long as the cup is vibrant, shows structured acidity, and is free of any signs of age (paper, bagginess, astringency, etc). It doesn’t need to be any more complicated than that.”

Click on image below to learn more about Dear Coffee Buyer

Click here to buy Dear Coffee Buyer


Why we care (or don’t care) about seasonality

Perfect Little Beans

Chinmey Hill Coffee uses specialty-grade beans with zero primary defects (such as black beans or sour beans) and less than five secondary defects (such as broken beans). This is important because primary defects will greatly affect the taste of the coffee. Having zero defects allows the coffee to be the most optimal flavor.

Window for Optimal Flavor

Chimney Hill Coffee ships our coffee the same day it was roasted, so you will receive it before it enters the window of optimal flavor.  This means you’ll never miss the opportunity to enjoy the coffee’s peak flavor.

Coffee Ratings

Coffee undergoes many scoring processes by professionals who achieved their Q Grader certification. Coffee is first graded when it’s green. If there are defects the coffee is determined to be “not-specialty grade”. For those coffees that pass green grading, they are sample roasted and cupped. (Cupping is the official term for critically tasting and scoring coffees. The official cupping form is standard worldwide, and where the 100-point scoring system comes from.) A coffee’s dry fragrance, wet aroma, flavor, aftertaste, body, acidity, balance, and overall impression are taken into consideration while uniformity issues and defects, will lower the overall score.

Specialty Coffee

Specialty coffee, coined by Erna Knutsen in 1974, refers to a coffee that receives a quality grading score of 80 percent or higher. While “premium” or “gourmet” seem like they’re synonymous with “specialty,” they simply are marketing terms with no defined standards. Specialty coffees are grown in specific and ideal micro-climates, and have distinctive and unique flavor profiles, with little to no defects.

Third-Wave Coffee

We’re currently in the third wave of coffee. The first wave of American coffee put pre-ground, vacuum-sealed cans in kitchens across America. The second wave started with the late ‘60s introduction of Peet’s coffee (by Alfred Peet) through the proliferation of Starbucks. The third wave of coffee focuses on origin transparency, nuanced flavors, and artisan roasting. The term “third wave” is synonymous with specialty coffee.

Why we care (or don’t care) about seasonality

Shopping cart0
There are no products in the cart!
Continue shopping
0