COFFEE ... ALL THINGS COFFEE

A BIT OF HISTORY 

Coffee is grown in a multitude of countries around the world,  Asia, Africa, Central and South America, the islands of the Caribbean and Pacific, and all can trace their heritage to the trees in the ancient coffee forests on the Ethiopian plateau.

The Arabs were the first, not only to cultivate coffee but also to begin its trade.
European travelers to the Near East brought back stories of the unusual dark black beverage. By the 17th century, coffee had made its way to Europe and was becoming popular across the continent. Opponents were overly cautious, calling the beverage the 'bitter invention of Satan.
The controversy was so great that Pope Clement VIII was asked to intervene. Before making a decision however, he decided to taste the beverage for himself. He found the drink so satisfying that he gave it Papal approval.
In England 'penny universities' sprang up, so called because for the price of a penny one could purchase a cup of coffee and engage in stimulating conversation.  By the mid-17th century, there were over 300 coffee houses in London, many of which attracted patrons with common interests, such as merchants, shippers, brokers and artists.
(http://www.ncausa.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=68)

THE TREE

While there are several different coffee species, two main species of coffee are cultivated today. Arabica coffee, accounts for 75-80 percent of the world's production. Robusta coffee, accounts for about 20 percent. While Robusta coffee beans are more robust than the Arabica plants, but produces an inferior tasting beverage with a higher caffeine content.  Both the Robusta and Arabica coffee plant can grow to heights of 10 meters if not pruned, but producing countries will maintain the coffee plant at a height reasonable for easy harvesting.

To watch a 30 sec video of the process please click link. 
The Bean Growing


METHODS OF HARVESTING 

Harvest by Stripping
One sweep of a branch removes the ripe as well as the unripe berries. Commercial growers use machines to remove all the berries. This method is used when the majority of the berries are ripe. Strip on to the ground or nets then sorting the ripe from unripe. 

Selective Harvesting

Let the unripe cherries remain on the tree to ripen and be harvested at a later date. Ripeness is determined by appearance and touch. Bright red and glossy. 

Mechanical Harvesting
Large commercial growers use big harvesting machines to remove the coffee cherries from the trees

What Happens Next....

Squeeze the cherries to separate the seed or the coffee bean from the fruit.

After you have separated the beans from the fruit, some meat will remain on the beans. Soak them in a bowl or bucket of water for one to two days to break down the fruit and separate it from the bean. The fruit will float to the top and can be discarded, while the beans sink to the bottom of the bowl.

Drying the beans is a lengthy process, taking between 10 to 30 days, You will know the beans are dry when their outer skin flakes off easily.

Roasting

The final step to make the coffee bean ready for brewing coffee is to roast the green beans. Without roasting, a beverage made from the green coffee bean would be bitter and extremely acidic- in short, undrinkable.
During the roasting process the green coffee changes dramatically. The process of roasting forces water out of the bean, causing it to dry and expand in the process. Some of the natural sugars in the bean are transformed into CO2 gas, and others are caramelized into the complex flavor essences that make a good coffee. The colors darken and at the end of roasting the bean is about 18 % lighter in weight and 50 to 100% larger than when it was green. After roasting the coffee continues to “degas”, emitting CO2 which helps protect the delicate flavor and aroma of the coffee. Just one week from the time it is roasted, the coffee has already started to lose some of its best flavor and aroma.

SPARKLING AND SWEET WINES

Methods for making sparkling wines(sparking wines not made in champagne France)
Although many sparkling wines use the same methods as champagne(traditional method) there are four other methods...

Transfer method

This process tries to gain the advantages of a second bottle fermentation without the riddling and disgorgement required by the champagne method. Up until this point the process is the same as champagne but the transfer method takes the bottles and pours them all into a big tank under pressure to keep the bubbles. This ensures consistent quality. Then it is filtered in bulk and re-bottled. This method is done in many new world wines. Labels might differ in the transfer method saying bottle fermented while in the traditional methos will say fermented in this bottle. 

The tank method 

Most of the inexpensive sparkling wines are made this way. In this method the second fermentation is done in a sealed tank rather than a bottle. The dry base wine is places together with sugar, yeast, nutrients and a clarifying agent in a tank after the second fermentation. Then it is filtered and bottled. This is Ideal for fruity aromatic wines like Prosecco. The quality of the base wine is important as it accounts for most of the quality of the final product.

The Asti Method 

This method is different as it is does not involve the production of a still dry wine. The must is stored at close to freezing temp.s then warmed up and the fermentation takes place in pressurized tanks. CO2 is allowed to escape until the alcohol level reaches 6%. The fermentation continues until the alcohol reaches 7-7.5%. Then it is stopped by chill filtration and then bottled.

Carbonation

This method is as it sounds. Taking a white wine and adding CO2 to it to create bubbles. This is the cheapest method and is not considered to make a quality wine.


Sweet wine
Most wines are fermented to dryness as in the yeast consumes all the sugars. But sweet wines contain un-fermented sugars and can be created in a few different ways.

Interrupting the Fermentation 

The addind of a grape spirit is the traditional way of stopping fermentation with sugars still present. This radically alters the structual balance of the wine. The resulting wine is filtered to remove any remaining yeast. Once this is done it is vital no yeast come in contact with the wine otherwise fermentation will resume.

Adding a Sweetening Component 

In some countries like Germany medium sweet wine can be created by adding unfiltered grape or Sussreserve juice.  This is a sterile product made by filtering must before fermentation. It is added to the dry wines when they are ready to be bottled.
Rectified Concentrated Grape Must (RCGM) a pure sugar solution extracted from grape juice can also be used for the same effect.

Concentrating Grape Sugars
The best sweet wines come from grapes that are extreamly rich in sugar. this can be done a few different ways.

Noble rot  

This is used in the making of the very best sweet wines including Sauternes in France and many others. Wines made this way have a distictive honey and dried fruit aromas.

Drying grapes on the vine
passerillage

Once sugars have reached full sugar ripeness they begin to dehydrate and turn into raisins on the vine. This increases sugar concentration in the juice. Conditions need to be dry and warm for this to happen or else rot can take hold. These wines have an over ripe character ans a richly texture mouth feel.

Drying grapes after picking 

This causes healthy grapes to dehydrate. Conditions need to be dry and warm for this to be successful and care must be taken to remove all rotten grapes or the rot will spread. this is used in the production of PX Sherry and the passito wines of italy. These wines have a raisiny quality.

!!!!CHAMPAGNE !!!

Champagne is unique in that it can only be made in the Champagne region in France, and there is no regional or subdivision with more straighten production requirements. With in the region there are five concentration of vineyards and they are spread over the entire region. the three most famous areas are shown in this map of the region.
Climate 
Champagne has a cold climate around 16°c this becomes difficult as growers have to fight spring frosts and winter freeze. Even the warmest years the sugar levels in the grapes stays very low with high acid. This makes them less than ideal for still(not carbonated) wine production.
To battle frost most vineyards are planted on slopes.

Grape Varieties 
The three main grapes for making champagne are:

Chardonnay, for its high acidity with floral and citrus fruit characters.
Pinot Noir, for greater body and length and provides structural back bone to most blends
Meunier,easy to drink fruitiness and especially important for wines that are ment to be enjoyed while young.

Traditional method 
 Most champagnes are white even though around 66% of the grapes used are black. To avoiid coloring the wine mechanical harvesting is forbidden. they are not destemmed or crushed. they are pressed as quickly as possible and Press Houses are found throughout vineyards to make sure this happens.
To maintain high quality only 102 liters can be pressed from 160 kilograms of grapes.

Primary fermentation: Generally this takes place in a temp. controlled stainless steel vat. Prior to this the juice is clarified to avoid the development of non-fruit flavors. The resulting wine is dry with natural characters high acidity and moderate alcohol. Most base wines is used to make up blends the year after harvest, although some wines are stored for use in future years, this reserve wine have an important role in the blending process.

Blending: Champagne is a region the is dependent on blending. Blending from different villages, varieties and vintages. Generally blenders aim to produce a wine that conforms to t the house style. The grape varieties are used to give the wine its character and structure where as the reserve wines are vital in smoothing out vintage variations and adding complexity. It is easier to achieve the house style if the blender has as many wines to blend with as possible. This is why the base wine is fermented in so many different vats and this is the key reason why champagne houses dominate. They have access to the highest range of base and reserve wines.

Secondary fermentation: Once the blend is made a small portion of liqueur de tirage (adds sweetness) (mix of wine, sugar, yeast, yeast nutrients and a clarifying agent) is added before it is bottled. The bottle is then closed with a plastic cup shaped cap. They are then stored horizontally in cellars around 10°-12°c. with these temps. the secondary fermentation takes six to eight weeks. The alcohol is raised around 2% and the CO2 that is generated by the yeast created the sparkle.

Yeast Autolysis: once fermentaion is done the extra sediment froms at the bottom of the bottle. These dead yeast cells break down and release proteins and other chemical compounds into the wine that create that toast or biscuit flavors in sparking wine made this way. Autolysis lasts for four to five years but has been know to last up to ten. Once disgorged the wine will mature very quickly.

Riddling: To get the sediment out of the bottle after it has matured you riddle it then disgorge it. Riddling is moving the bottle from horizontal to invert vertical very slowly and a gental shake and twist the bottle a bit each time to get the sediment into the cap.
*jour means Day

This takes up to eight weeks when done by hand. But macines created can do this in eight days. But this is still done by hand for bottles of unusual shape and size.

Disgorgement and Corking: The neck of the bottle is submerged into a very cold brine(water and salt) which freezes the wine in the neck. GThis freezes the sediment into the neck of the wine bottle the keep the wine clear. The crown cap is then removed and the pressure from inside the bottle shootle out the frozen sediment. The wine is then topped with a liquer d'expedition (adds sweetness)(mix of wine and cane sugar solution) then sealed with a cork and held secure with a wire cage.

RED WINE PROCESS & OAK

This chart shows a simplified way of making red wine 

The key to red wine is the successful extraction on the tannin and color from the skins of the black/red grapes. This is accomplished by mixing the skins around during the fermentation process.
The grapes must be harvested when tannins are ripe but not affected by noble rot( used in the making of some sweet wines) 

Pre-fermentation extraction 

Some wine makers prefer to leave the grapes to macerate(soften or break down by using liquid) for a time to extract greater color and flavor aromas. Or heat the grapes to encourage the grapes to release color this can reduce the fresh fruit aromas.

Extraction during fermentation 

The presence of skins makes alcohol fermentation in oak barrels impractical because it would be difficult to maintain contact between the skin and the juice. Red wine fermentation normally reaches between 30°-32°c higher temp.s improve extraction of color and tannins. But fermentation will stop(as described in Wine making:The beginning) if temp. gets above 35°c.

If left to itself the wine will soon have a thick mass of pulp and skins on the surface, called the cap, and will not extract color or flavor.

There are several extraction methods

• Pumping over: Drawing off the wine from the bottom of the tank and pumping it over the top. This is used in the production of most red wines and is usually done several times. The oxygen is useful for helping the yeast populations grow.

• Punching down: Punching down the cap by hand using paddles. This was dangerous because the workers could have been over come by carbon dioxide.  
• Rack and Return: Draining all the juice, leaving the cap behind, racking the cap and pumping the juice back over. 
• Rotary fermenters: a modern device that ferments the wine is rotating horizontal tanks 

Post-fermentation extractions 

The fermentation time will vary but is typically from one to tree weeks for red wines. The length of the time the juice is in contact with the skin depends on the style of wine being made. Example: to produce a low tannin fruity wine the skins will be drawn off once fermentation is finished. Or to create a wine that will age for a long time the skin will stay in contact for several weeks after fermentation. French and Italian wines use this for high-quality wines that are intended to age. 
 Once the juice is drained off the remaining mass is pressed to create a press wine. This has deep color and high in tannins. This is used to balance color and tannins in the blending process.


OAK

Is primarily used to add tannins which add to the structure, color and texture complexity in red wines.
The wines also extract aromas such as vanilla toast and smokiness from the oak. There are two different kinds of oak vessels
French Oak:This is more expensive and tends to give vanilla and toast flavors.
American Oak: Generally more aromatic flavors such as Sweet vanilla and coconut.
New heavily charred barrels give the most flavor. Small oak barrels have a far greater impact on the final flavor of the wines than the larger barrels. The standard small size is 225 Liters and is generally used for aging red wines. This produces 300 bottles. Large oak barrels give very little oak flavor and can be as large as 200 Hectoliters

Oak flavors can also be added to the wine by using Oak chips or Oak staves. Both methods ensure oak and wine come in contact and come at a much lower cost than using barrels.

WHITE WINE & ROSE WINE PROCESS

This chart shows a simplified way of making white wine

After crushing the free run juice(must) (best quality) is separated and treated separately from the rest that is sent to the press. There are normally different steps to pressing and each time the must is separated into different vats. All go through the same process but separately. 

In some cases of certain aromatic wines such as Muscat, Riesling and Albarino the wine maker chooses to keep the must in contact with the skins to shortly to increase there flavor intensity. 

Pure grape juice can still carry fragments of the grape and is thus clarified before fermentation and before bottling.

The alcoholic fermentation: White wine will ferment between 12°-22°c, lower fermentation temperatures slow down the process and encourage the development of aromas. If the winemaker wants to maintain the pure grape fruit flavor then they will choose to ferment in a steal tank or vat, thus not adding any additional flavors.
If they choose to ferment in oak barrels (like chardonnay) which will give the wine more integrated and subtle oak flavors. Temp. control is more difficult in barrels so they are normally housed in cool cellars nevertheless they still run on the higher temp. scale for fermentation. 



Malolactic fermentation as explained in WINE MAKING: The Beginning, is not for most white wines as it adds buttery and nutty flavors and reduce the pure fruit aromas associated with white wine. 

ROSE WINE

Rose wine can be made in 4 different ways (Oak is rarely if ever used)

Direct Pressing
Same process as making white wine but in this case the wine maker uses black grapes. This creates the most delicate color rose wines. 

Drawing off
Red grapes are used like in red wine making(coming in next article) but once fermentation is under way the juice is drawn from the skins after 6- 48 hours depending on the desired color.  Longer contact deeper color. Once it has been drawn off it continues like white wine at low temperatures. 

Bleeding
same as Drawing but only a portion of the juice is drawn off. The rest continues to be red wine and the rose is merely a by-product. 

Blending
Mixing a bit of red wine to white wine. This is not permitted in the EU with rose Champagne being the exception. Cheap new age rose wine is made this way.  

To learn more see Wines and Spirits (understanding style and quality) 

WINE MAKING: The Beginning

Understanding the grape


Stalk and pipes: both there parts contain tannins, pipes also contain bitter oils, the stalk/stems are only available to the winemaker if the grapes are hand harvested 

Mesocarp (Pulp): water and sugar are the largest part of the pulp. The yeast will will use the sugar to make alcohol. As the sugar levels rise in the grape so does the density of the juice.

Exocarp(Skins): the skin, the immediate level underneath it contains high concentration of flavor compounds and gives wine some of the verital characters. they also have tannins and in black grapes, color compounds. The waxy surface of skin also contains yeast that can be used to ferment the wine.   

Tannins: gives red wine its texture and structure, they help age the wine. During fermentation they combine with color compounds and oxygen to create a more stable color. 

Grape prepossessing/making the juice(must)

• hand sorting away the unripe or rotten grapes
• Desteming and crushing(optional), a machine takes away the stem and crushes the skin of the grape with out damaging the bitter pipes. This creates free run juice. 
• Pressing, this separates the liquids and the solids, for white wines this happens before fermentation, for reds and rose wines they separate them a period after contact between skin and juice. Pipes are still avoided. 

A rough guide: 1kg of grapes=75cl wine

Adjustments

Sugar and alcohol: In cooler climates the grapes may not have the desired sugar content for the amount of alcohol. So the wine maker may carry out a must enrichment to increase the end result of alcohol, this is illegal in most places and controlled were its not. Sugar can also be increased by adding must from other grapes.

Acid: De-acidfaction happens mostly in colder climates. Acid can be neutralized by adding potassium bicarbonate or a mixture of calcium carbonate and calcium tartrate-malate, this can be done in conjunction with enrichment.

Tannin: If there are not enough tannins levels can be raised with tannin powder or wooden staves to the fermentation vat or by using some of the stems (Wines and Spirits).  

Fermentation 

This is a chemical reaction the is caused by the actions of yeast. The role of yeast is to create alcohol but they also create flavor. 

Alcohol fermentation: The conversion of sugar to alcohol. The byproducts of this processes is heat and flavor compounds. this fermentation will not start if the temp. is below 5° c or above 35°c-38°c.  This will normally continue until there is no sugar left or the alcohol gets so high the yeast dies normally around 15%. There are different ways to stop fermentation as well. Cooling, heating, raising alcohol content or filtering out the yeast. Controlling temp. is important, too hot yeast die, fermenting at aa lower temp. can avoid the loss of delicate volatile aromas and can encourage development of fruity esters in white wine. Fermenting at higher temp. is necessary for the extraction of color and tannins from black grapes.

Malolactic Fermentation(MLF): Takes place after alcohol fermentation has finished and is carried out by lactic bacteria. they convert malic acids( found in apples) into softer lactic acids(found in milk). All red wines go through MLK but is avoided in some white wines. This softens and reduces acid and creates flavor profiles like butter and hazelnut but can also reduce some pure fruit aromas. 

To learn more see Wines and Spirits (understanding style and quality) 

SENSORY ... how our senses interact to create a full understanding of a meal

Important understanding if you want to understand gastronomy;

Senses, our senses inter act with one another to create everything we perceive and experience in our everyday lives. From our sense of smell, taste, touch, sight and hearing. in this post i will in a general sense go over how these are all tied together. 

Limbic system: 

FL: Carries out higher mental processes such as thinking, decision making, and planning(your personality)

T: Aside from sense of smell, all other sensory processes involve a thalamic nucleus receiving a sensory signal which is then directed to the relevant cortical area.(sending info to other brain parts for prepossessing)

HI: is important in forming new memories and connecting emotions and senses, such as smell and sound, to memories.(what you like and do not like)

AM:involves emotions and motivations, particularly those that are related to survival (do or do not eat)

HY: govern body temperature, thirst, hunger, sleep, circadian rhythm, moods, sex drive, and the release of other hormones in the body.(responsible for mouth watering)

OG: receives neural input about odors detected by cells in the nasal cavity. (your sense of smell)

Taste:

Our sense of taste is there to give us information if something is eatable or not, it is our last control system for survival and if often confused with our sense of smell.

Humans detect taste with taste receptor cells. These are clustered in taste buds and scattered in other areas of the body. Each taste bud has a pore that opens out to the surface of the tongue enabling molecules and ions taken into the mouth to reach the receptor cells inside.

• this chart leaves out the new 5th taste profile Umami.

Salty:(NaCl)The main function of aldosterone (a hormone that increases salt receptors) is to maintain normal sodium levels in the body,

Sour: Sour receptors detect the protons (H⁺) liberated by sour substances (acids). This closes transmembrane K⁺ channels which leads to depolarization of the cell (link), and the release of the neurotransmitter serotonin into its synapse with a sensory neuron.

Sweet: surcose binds with (GPCRs) The hormone leptin inhibits sweet cells by opening their K⁺ channels. This hyperpolarizes the cell making the generation of action potentials more difficult. 

Bitter: [PTC] also binds with (GPCRs)  there are 25 different bitter receptors ("T2Rs")

Umami: Umami is the response to salts of glutamic acid — like monosodium glutamate (MSG) a flavor enhancer used in many processed foods and in many Asian dishes. Processed meats and cheeses (proteins) also contain glutamate.

Smell:

first response (you can smell a fire before you see it)
Smell depends on sensory receptors that respond to airborne chemicals. In humans, these chemoreceptors are located in the olfactory epithelium — a patch of tissue about the size of a postage stamp located high in the nasal cavity. The olfactory epithelium is made up of three kinds of cells:

• sensory neurons each with a primary cilium
• supporting cells between them
• basal cells that divide regularly producing a fresh crop of sensory neurons to replace those that die

humans can differentiate between 5,000-50,000 smells but have a huge problem naming them.

Our sense of smell is the oldest and starts developing when we are in the whom, and is the main factor in what most people perceive as taste. smell is central to one part of the brain the Olfactory bulb and like most other parts of your body it can be trained. 

Fun fact:Many odorous substances activate not only the olfactory system but also the ‘somatosensory’ system -the nerve endings in our noses which are sensitive to temperature, pain etc. This is why ‘anosmics’ (patients who have completely lost their sense of smell ) can still detect menthol, phenylethyl alcohol and many other substances. In a study testing anosmics’ ability to perceive odorous substances, it was found that many so-called odours are in fact affecting the pain- and temperature-sensitive nerve-endings, rather than the olfactory receptors. Out of 47 ‘odorous’ substances, anosmics could detect 45. (Only two substances could not be detected by the anosmic patients: these were decanoic acid and vanillin, which affect only the olfactory receptors, and can thus safely be classified as ‘pure’ odours.) Some unpleasant ‘smells’ do more than just annoy or disgust us, they actually cause us pain. (http://www.sirc.org/publik/smell_human.html)

If you are interested in further reading check out "The psychology of eating and drinking"