You oughta know #22
In this week’s issue: Growing the good stuff in Northland; The coffee family tree gets easier to understand; New scheme to help farmers grow more coffee; The Drumming Barista x La Marzocco.
Nau mai, hoki mai, welcome back to The Magic Roast and You oughta know.
It’s the school hols! As a work from home Dad, the school hols means whipping out the Moccamaster for my bulk coffee needs. It also means I’m listening non-stop to repeats of The Floor with DJ Coda on RadioActive.Fm. Choons.
In this week’s issue: Growing the good stuff in Northland; The coffee family tree gets easier to understand; New scheme to help farmers grow more coffee; The Drumming Barista x La Marzocco.
Growing the good stuff in Northland (coffee, that is).
Did you know we can grow coffee in New Zealand? Thanks to changes in climate, the coffee belt is expanding, and Northland is benefiting from this.
Things up in Northland are going from strength to strength. A group of landowners (Māori and non-Māori) and others in the industry in Northland are developing a business case to determine the viability of a coffee growing industry.
They’ve started some market research, targeted at Kiwi coffee folk, to see what interest there is. You can check it out here, if you’re interest.
Country Calendar did a yarn about Northland’s coffee growing industry back in 2020 and chatted to the team behind Ikarus Coffee. It’s a great story! Have a below.
Coffee varieties - how do they all fit together?
The mamma and pappa of all the coffee in the world are Arabica and Robusta (check out this Robusta yarn I did a few months back). They have a bunch of kids, off shoots and weird 7-toed cousins that make up our morning cup, and it’s hard to keep up with it all.
If you’re interested in seeing how they’re all related, World Coffee Research pulled together a coffee varietal family tree. It sort of looks like the family tree of the royals, but much less gross.
Here’s what they say:
“You can download the poster that celebrates key coffee varieties from 22 countries around the world. It visually represents the lineage and relatedness of different coffee varieties included in the World Coffee Research Coffee Varieties Catalog, which profiles over 100 coffee varieties from the two species of coffee plants that are in wide cultivation globally—C. arabica (known as Arabica), and C. canephora (known as Robusta).”
It’s pretty rad and definitely worth checking out (and printing! For free!)
Love The Magic Roast? I love pulling it together, learning about new things, trends and people, and going down coffee rabbit holes!
I’m fueled by coffee - so if you want to support The Magic Roast, buy me a coffee.
Change creating change - the Coffee Change Fund
Here’s a yarn I saw over on The Pourover - the Coffee Change Fund.
The Coffee Change Fund is a scheme under development that will help farmers grow better coffee, at less cost. The idea is that coffee industry types (roasters, cafes, consumers) pledge a regular amount that goes to farmers to purchase soil nutrition products.
Having more resources to look after the land means that farmers will be able to grow more, grow better, and grow cheaper. This makes growing coffee more financially sustainable for the farmer.
Seems like a pretty cool idea!
Check out the story at The Pourover to read more about this exciting development in coffee production.
The Drumming Barista getting down with La Marzocco!
The Drumming Barista has inked a sweet content deal with La Marzocco, where we gets to play with the Linea Micra and the Pico grinder.
These are sweet products that are aimed at the home market. I’m pretty excited to see what Sean has in store for us over the next wee while! Will this be the replacement to my Breville Barista Express that I’ve been looking for? I’m sure I’ll know the answer soon!
Nice work Sean!
This week on The Magic Roast
On Thursday I’m dropping a yarn about whether you need to care about pouring techniques when you’re brewing filter coffee at home. The results were surprising!
Have a great week!
