About Coffee
Q: What is the difference between espresso and filter roast?
A: At 49th, our roasting teams creates a dedicated roast profile for each coffee relating to the brewing method we recommend.
Our espresso roast profiles are developed to have higher solubility and focus on enhancing sweetness and body, making them easier to use on a espresso machine.
Our filter roast profiles are developed to taste best on drip or pour machines, as they are roasted to taste best over the longer brewing times typical in filter coffee preparation (3-5 minutes).
We recommend making sure you're using the right type of roast for your method of preparation to get the best results in your cup!
Q: Are your coffee beans 100% Arabica?
A: YES! All of our coffees are 100% arabica, always.
Q: How are the caffeine levels in the different roasts?
A: Caffeine content in our coffee is largely determined by its genetics. It remains fairly stable in temperature range that we use for roasting coffee (227C/440F max), so darker roast won't result in significantly different caffeine level than lighter roast of the same variety. Since we only source coffee from the arabica species, this doesn't have much variance.
Q: What coffee should I get to produce more crema?
A: After roast is completed, coffee degasses CO2 that creates crema in espresso shots. That crema declines as coffee gets older. It can be challenging to create balanced and sweet shot when CO2 is still very active; thus, proper age is very important. Also, darker roasts produce more crema than lighter ones, for the same age.
Q: Do you sell organic certified coffee?
A: Yes, we do. We are organic certified by CCOF. We have a variety of roast levels of organic coffee. You can find our organic collection here.
Q: What is the difference between different roast levels?
A: We sell a variety of roast levels and each of them offers a different experience:
For our light roast, we want to highlight origin flavours of our coffees such as our single origins. These will be more bright, acidic, floral, and/or fruit-forward in profile; country, region, elevation, variety, and process method.
For our dark roast, we want to highlight the roasting flavours. These will have a generally bolder, bitter taste which reminding you of chocolatey, cocoa, and dark caramel flavours.
For our medium roast, it will have more body than our light roast. A more balanced flavour, aroma, and acidity between origin and roast flavours.
Q: How long is the your coffee stay fresh in an unopened bag?
A: We recommend using our coffee within three months. The unopened coffee bags are good to be consumed within nine months if they're stored properly. Please refer to this blog on how to keep your coffee fresh and let me know if you have any questions.