Hello: What is known about the imported beans from Italy? 1st Line sells several and I want to try some but thought I'd ask here first. I have been using Black Cat for quite a while and think it is fine but want to experiment.
KDM

There are so many fantastic options domestically, that I haven't really tried the imported blends, other than Illy.

I and most people here have a bias towards fresh-roasted coffee (which the imported blends are not once they get to you).

There is a roaster in your part of California that makes elegant Northern Italian-style espresso blends -- check out Ecco Caffe.

Another blend I enjoy in the Northern Italian style is Caffe Fresco's Daterra Reserve.

You can find Illy at Sur La Table on 4th st. I wouldn't be surprised to find Illy at the Marketplace on College Ave. or maybe even the Berkeley Bowl.

Try the medium roast whole beans (red cap). If you are wondering about the non-Illy blends, sorry I haven't tried them. I second the nod for trying Ecco as well.

duke-one wrote:Hello: What is known about the imported beans from Italy? 1st Line sells several and I want to try some but thought I'd ask here first. I have been using Black Cat for quite a while and think it is fine but want to experiment.
KDM

Coffee beans sitting in a can for months are like canned mushrooms: a poor substitute for the fresh item. You buy the canned item when the fresh item is unavailable.

So I would recommend that you experiment by ordering mailorder from artisan roasters around the country (quite a few are sponsors here); they typically roast the coffee the day it ships or perhaps the day before. You may even have a local artisan roaster. Berkeley isn't a backwater.

The roast depth of espresso is very often indicated in terms of Italy's regions, the lightest roasts coming from the north, the darkest from the south. Why not order a northern roast, a southern roast, and a central-roast and see what you like best?

There's no doubt that fresh is best. I certainly get all my SO beans from UK gourmet roasters.

HOWEVER....

I have no experience of the many renowned US gourmet/artisan roasters, but there are very very few English gourmet roasters (I'm being polite here) who can put a blend together in the same way as the best Italians. Unfortunately very few of the Italians are geared to exporting or internet sales.

A couple of peculiar exceptions worth trying are Marosticana (http://www.marosticanacaffe.com), who sell through coffeeitalia.co.uk and italiankitchenaids.com. I have a soft spot for their wood-roasted four bean arabica (blue packet). Their stuff won't be as fresh as a US artisan roaster but keeps shockingly well in its sealed (no valve) foil packs. It is a very smooth and forgiving classic bittersweet northern Italian blend.

Also worth trying are one of Olympia's coffee partners (or whatever they call them) La Semeuse in Chaux-de-Fonds Switzerland - a roasting institution in Switzerland that dates back to the turn of the last century. Their "Il Piacere" blend is a good recreation of a Northern Italian blend with similar characteristics to the Marosticana blue and is available from their online shop here.

Cheers

Mike

duke-one wrote:Hello: What is known about the imported beans from Italy? 1st Line sells several and I want to try some but thought I'd ask here first.

Why?

Seriously, why?

OK, you can buy Illy, Lavazza and a number of other Italian coffees at Andronico's (Shattuck, Solano, Telegraph), as well as Sur La Table on 4th St., Market Hall, and probably a dozen other places in Berkeley. (Yeah, I know -- Market Hall is in Oakland, but still.) They are old, stale, and generally not very interesting.

Take a look at "Battle North America vs. Italy - The Results", as one example, and the companion discussion, "Peet's, Baskets & Italian vs. N. American Blends by Mark Prince". There's lots more discussions both here on HB and over at Coffee Geek -- the search engine will help you find them.

Keep in mind that so-called "Italian Roast" isn't really anything like what Italy roasts, as a nation, any more than things in the US are only done a single way. Southern Italy -- notably from roasters based in Sicily and Naples -- traditionally roasts their coffees darker than is traditional in, say, Rome, Tuscany, or in the Italian Alps (and the Swiss canton of Ticino).

You may want to take a look at the List of our favorite Roasters -- all of these are recommended, quality roasters that roast-to-order and ship immediately. In particular, my three favorite "go to" roasters (from that list) are:

• Espresso Vivace Roasteria, Seattle, WA -- they only offer three coffees, all blends; I regularly use their Dolce and Decaf, and they arrive 2-3 days after roasting.
• Caffè Fresco, Port Griffith, PA -- they offer a wide variety of blends and single origin beans; my favorites (so far) are the Ambrosia and the Luna Nova decaf, and they, too, arrive 2-3 days after roasting.
• Metropolis Coffee, Chicago, IL -- they offer a wide variety of blends and single origin beans; I really like their Redline Espresso and Redline Decaf, but these take 4-5 days to arrive.

Within California, certainly Ritual Coffee Roasters and Four Barrel Coffee -- both in San Francisco -- are excellent (you can get Ritual coffees at Remedy, a café on Telegraph & 42nd in Oakland). You can get Bluebottle Coffee at the Saturday Berkeley Farmer's Market and the Sunday Temescal Farmer's Market at the DMV on Claremont in Oakland. And you should not overlook Ecco Caffè in Sonoma County -- they ship UPS to the Bay Area and the beans usually arrive 3-4 days after the order.

Let me say that I like Black Cat, but I prefer to get it at Intelligentsia. I personally prefer the coffees I get from the above roasters.

Cheers,
Jason

portamento wrote:There are so many fantastic options domestically, that I haven't really tried the imported blends, other than Illy.

I and most people here have a bias towards fresh-roasted coffee (which the imported blends are not once they get to you).

There is a roaster in your part of California that makes supremely elegant, Northern Italian-style espresso blends -- check out Ecco Caffe.

Another blend I enjoy in the Northern Italian style is Caffe Fresco's Daterra Reserve.

In addition to Illy, I've tried a few Lavazza blends as well as a few from Segafredo, all while I was in Germany. While much fresher there, all paled in comparison to the fresh beans I mail ordered from Intelligentsia, PT's Coffee, and Caffe Fresco.

Never had any Ecco's but have had Caffe Fresco's Daterra Reserve - very smooth chocolate bomb. If you like Illy's medium roast, I think you will love the Daterra Reserve or PT's La Bella Vita, which is very similar. Closer to you is Barefoot Coffee, who has a blend you must try - The Boss; heavy slightly darker chocolate that is great as a shot and absolutely remarkable in a macchiato or cappuccino.

Best of luck with your search.

FWIW: I honestly don't think there's any point in comparing Italy's big industrial roasters with the small specialist shops in the US.

Are there no Italian family roasters in the US roasting fresh Italian-style blends that have been refined over the generations? Surely, if you can get cannoli Siciliani in NYC.....

Cheers

Michael

michaelbenis wrote:I have no experience of the many renowned US gourmet/artisan roasters, but there are very very few English gourmet roasters (I'm being polite here) who can put a blend together in the same way as the best Italians.

So you haven't been impressed by the Square Mile blends?
I'm a bit surprised.

Thanks all for so many ideas. I'll pick one or two and do what I need to to dial it in, one of the reasons I like to stick with what has worked well. To those of you who switch back and forth between favorites how do you keep up with shot weights/grinds/packing? Do you compleatly clean out the grinder between them?
KDM

duke-one wrote:To those of you who switch back and forth between favorites how do you keep up with shot weights/grinds/packing? Do you compleatly clean out the grinder between them?

Last question, first: yes.

I can only speak for myself, so . . .

In terms of "keeping up" with shot weights, it's not that big of a deal -- perhaps because I have an Elektra T1 and they are very sensitive to "updosing." Thus, my shot weight is always 14.5-15.0 grams.

In terms of grinds, the grind needs to be adjusted regularly anyway, given a bean's age (post-roast), the ambient humidity/weather conditions, and so on. New beans -- even the same blend, from the same roaster -- still need to be "dialed in," even though it may be simpler to do so with the same blend compared to a significantly different one.

In terms of packing . . . what do you mean, how hard you tamp? Tamping is the least important part of the whole process. I just tamp.

Cheers,
Jason

michaelbenis wrote:Are there no Italian family roasters in the US roasting fresh Italian-style blends that have been refined over the generations? Surely, if you can get cannoli Siciliani in NYC.....

Caffe D'Arte in Seattle fits your description. They offer a full array of regional-style blends.

Hi folks,
actually, this is my first post to this forum, but I really felt the need to post a reply here.
I guess the real problem is how to find some shop importing more than the usual big selling roasts to the US. If someone knows one, why not post it here?
There are hundreds of espressos being roasted in Italy. I checked the quoted articles comparing US to Italy - they were comparing high quality to not-so-high quality (maybe except for the Illy on a bad day),
Unfortunately, I am not experienced with fresh roasts from the US, but based on my experience with fresh roasts from small roasters here in Germany, there surely are fantastic espressos from Italy worth trying.
Regards, Jan

Update: I ordered a couple of different blends from Ecco; Brazil Fazenda Sertãozinho & Organic Brazil Serra do Boné Reserve. Looking forward to trying these and noting the individual details of taste. If I come up with anything worth commenting on I'll post it.
Duke Masters

jc69 wrote: . . . based on my experience with fresh roasts from small roasters here in Germany, there surely are fantastic espressos from Italy worth trying.

Jan, welcome to Home-Barista.

I need to be clear here about something, and since your English is better than my German . . . let's try this in English.

I have no doubt that there are a number of outstanding roasters in Germany, and in Italy, and in Switzerland for that matter. The problem is not the quality of European roasters, Jan. The problem is that -- by the time the coffee is shipped Europe to North America, stocked in a New York warehouse, shipped to the California distributor, then delivered to the local market, and finally purchased by the consumer -- the coffee is incredibly stale, old, and tired.

And that is a difficult problem to overcome.

Cheers,
Jason

zin1953 wrote:...The problem is not the quality of European roasters, Jan. The problem is that -- by the time the coffee is shipped Europe to North America, stocked in a New York warehouse, shipped to the California distributor, then delivered to the local market, and finally purchased by the consumer -- the coffee is incredibly stale, old, and tired.

Jason,

I see that point, surely for fresh roasts. But even the better Italian roasts come in industrial bags or cans and you can almost be sure that they are a few weeks - if not month - old when buying them anywhere.

However, there are so many people with a deep link to Italy in the US and I really can't believe that nobody is importing smaller (but large enough for a sale) quantities on a direct way. And I am sure that most roasts from Italian roasters will stand a few month waiting to be opened.

Anyway, I have some friends near Detroit, maybe they can bring me some of the roasts you mentioned.

Regards, Jan

PS.: Thanks for the welcome. Glad to be with you. You can be sure that there's no such site as this one over here...

Welcome Jan.

I probably am (one of) the oddball in this forum because I have admitted and even proclaimed my love for a particular brand of Nitrogen Vacuum pack Italian espresso blend. It is the Miscela Doro Argento (very sweet and chocolaty with a light smell and taste of candy). It is the only imported coffee that I buy and I love it.

Quoting Ken Fox (somewhat out of context) that summarised it much better than I could: The Italian blend are less... "intense and "in your face" (than) N. American type blends." Ken, please correct me if I misunderstood your statement.

I like tasty sweet but more subdued espresso that is elegant and delicate but not any less complex and this is why I like my Argento imported Italian espresso blend.

I also like a bold, fruity, floral, intense and fragrant espresso and this is why I like one of the fresh roasted North American style espresso blends (Epic, from 49th parallel). There are many others...

I am also adventurous and like to expend the limits of my taste buds experience and try every so often a single origin bean. This is a hit-and-miss endeavour, where I have been left with 450g (out of 500) of coffee beans that I really do not like and sometime I love it so much that I am sadden because I cannot find more of that coffee anymore.

I pitch in my two Canadian cents worth to ensure that some, if not everyone else, keep in mind that it is possible to actually really like the taste of a vacuum pack imported Italian blend for what they are and for what they are not. They all need to be prepared with a very different process but it is possible to make something wonderful with some of them.

Final disclaimer: I do not like any Lavazza or Illy beans. Or at the very least I have never tried any of Lavazza or Illy blends that I liked. I am mentioning these two because they are the one being mentioned most of the time, but have tried many others that I did not like.

jc69 wrote:And I am sure that most roasts from Italian roasters will stand a few month waiting to be opened.

There are few (if any) coffees that are optimal after more than 10 days post roast.
The majority are optimal between 3 and 6 days post roast.

Nitrogen flushing and vacuum packing may halt the staling process to a reasonable degree but only until the sealed container is opened. At that point the staling process occurs extremely rapidly. Alas... I think it's unrealistic to expect that a large bag or can of coffee roasted and sealed in Italy would actually be on the shelf for retail sale here in the US in as little as a month. I think two months would be the minimum due to containerized shipping, distribution chain etc. but my guess is that it would actually be far longer than that.

Some years back - when my tastes were less developed - my GF brought back from Italy a kilo of some Lavazza in a black bag with gold lettering. It's one I had not seen here and I'll guess that it no more than a few weeks past roast date when the bag was opened. Although my tasting experiences were limited at the time and this was easily 7 years ago or more I recall it as being rather good and it totally blew away any Illy I ever tried before or since (including Illy that I tried in Italy).

That said... although I now do my own roasting... when i do buy beans it is only from sources that ship promptly after roasting and can get it to me within four days of roast date. If I moved to Italy I'd buy from roaster there but not until then.

The reason why many people get better shots from Italian imports is actually kind of obvious in hindsight

Seems that on an espresso machine, well ground coffee that's completely stale still beats fresh poorly ground coffee.