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Tuesday Morning Cup: 60% Costa Rica Don Mayo La Ponderosa Bourbon & 40% of Ethiopia Beloya Selection Eight
Written by Letoto on Mar 2nd, 2010
This morning, I brewed a batch in the V60 at home, then brought it here to the office. Since I had a lot of leftover batches lying around my kitchen, I combined the end of two batches to get an acceptable amount of coffee for my desired yield size. The coffees? Roughly 60% of Costa Rica Don Mayo La Ponderosa Bourbon and 40% of Ethiopia Beloya Selection Eight, both of which were kept on the lighter side of the roasting spectrum. The Costa Rican was a slightly darker roast, though, since I wanted to bring out a little of the depth that lurks within that Bourbon varietal, a deeper City+ that went close to the edge of Full City. The Ethiopian, however, was something I kept light, light, light...barely out of first crack, and just enough to ensure that there would not be an under-roasted grassy note to the coffee.
Back to the brew itself.
Both batches were also a little older (a week and a half of post-roast rest), which meant I needed to use them. Fortunately, they've not faded overly much, and the cup shows it. The Costa Rican is accented nicely by the Ethiopian, creating a vivid, red-fruited tone to the clean sweetness of the overall cup. It seems almost playful, if that makes any sense. The mouthfeel is clean, giving evidence to the pour-over nature of the brew, but it's not an entirely dry cup, which is something I often find to be the case with natural-processed Ethiopians. I would say that the Costa Rican balances this out quite well, which makes for a hefty, juicy cup, something between a cup I'd like to just sip and something I want to guzzle on.
In short, it's delicious.
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