Welcome our new clients!

Tweet

Hello Everyone,

Its been a busy week for us! We are happy to welcome some new clients to our family. I hope you have the opportunity to stop by these establishments because they are fantastic!

1) Vegeria

8407 Broadway

San Antonio TX 78209

210-826-4223

http://www.myvegeria.com/

Coffee-

Kaldi

Ethiopia Sidamo

Vegeria is 100% vegan and gluten-free and the food is delicious! The cuisine is Tex-Mex and the dishes we tried were full of flavor and wonderful. This comes from someone who is definitely not vegan or gluten-free so stop by and give it a try and I am sure you will find something you love. 

2) Barraca

1420 S.Alamo Suite 101

San Antonio, TX 78210

(210) 445-2203

https://www.facebook.com/Barracatx

Coffee- 

Huipil

Brazil

Tea- 

Black Current

Barraca's is a restaurant and bar that offers delicious Spanish inspired cuisine using both local and Spanish ingredients. They have plenty of options to choose from and sometimes there is even some live music so be sure to check them out, especially if you find yourself in need of a paella fix. 

3) Mellissa Guerra Latin Kitchen Market

303 Pearl Parkway, Suite 104
San Antonio, Texas 78215
210-293-3983

http://www.melissaguerra.com/

Coffee-

Huipil

Abrazo

Mexico

Melissa Guerra is a Latin American culinary store located at The Pearl Brewery near downtown San Antonio. Like a mercado, you'll find a vast array of items for the kitchen, but you'll also find fun jewelry and home decor from Latin America.

This store has a fantastic selection beautiful tableware, jewlery, and Latin American kitchen implements. They will be offering our coffee to purchase retail as well as have a coffee grinder available so you can have your coffee freshly ground and ready to brew.  

Q Grading Day!

Tweet

Its another hot hot Labor Day here in San Antonio, Texas. We hope everyone is enjoying themselves and taking the opportunity to celebrate our country's "yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country". I decided out of curiosity, to look into the history of Labor Day and its beginnings and found that quote on U.S. Department of Labor website :) . 

We are still working over here but we love our job so its all good. Today Susan is escaping the normal hustle of a regular work day and taking the time to do one of the things she enjoys most about her job, Q grading and roasting samples. We receive a LOT of samples throughout the year from coffee growers all over the world asking Susan to Q Grade and cup their coffee. Its important for them to know what their coffee grade is so they know at what price they should sell their coffee and if there are any important defects in their coffee that they need to take care of so that their next harvest can be even better. 

Today on the board we have samples from 10 different growers in various countries. The process begins by grading the green coffee. 

Here is where we would check different things like water content in the beans and the amount of defects the coffee has...

We then write all the results down and give the green coffee a grade of Premium, Specialty, or Commercial. Just a bit of info, we only purchase and sell Premium and Specialty graded coffees which means that our coffee is guaranteed to have little to no defects. Defects can have a huge impact on the quality and taste of the coffee. Make sure to check and see if your local roaster is a certified Q Grader and what grades and origins of coffee they purchase.

After grading the coffee it is then roasted and will need to degas for a period of time before we can come in and cup it. From that point we can find the flavor profile of the coffee. Its a fun process and its one we take a lot of pride in. We will send the results to the growers which they will use to better promote their coffee and ensure they receive a fair price for their product. Hopefully we will be contacting the growers with the premium coffees and start putting our orders in! For the growers that ranked at a commercial we like to offer as much help as we can. While they may not get as much for this harvest we still want to help them make sure they can get as much as possible while also letting them know exactly what problems we found and how they can correct these issues so that their next harvest will rank better.

Look at all the pretties!!! 

So there you have it folks, a typical Q grading day for Susan. How are you celebrating your Labor Day? :D 

-Anna

How we help the grower...

Tweet

Anyone who has met us and heard our story always knows that at the heart of our company is the grower. We do what we do because we are their biggest fans and we love their work and if we haven't conveyed that to every person we meet then we know we aren't doing our job right. 

It is is unfortunate then to realize that even though the coffee grower is the first in line in the coffee industry they are the last to ever receive any training or information in the latest developments in coffee. How can they be expected to grow an amazing product and meet the demands of the consumer without knowledge on whats happening in this industry. It is a sad truth that the majority of growers do not even know the quality of their coffee nor have they ever tried it roasted and prepared. 

With the help of the Norman Borlaug Institute for Agriculture we developed a program to train the coffee grower not only the value chain of their product but how to understand the quality of their coffee in the international market according to the protocols of the Coffee Quality Institute and Specialty Coffee Association of America. Also how to roast, cup and analyze the economics of their production. Giving the coffee grower all the tools that he or she needs to be a profitable and well equipped business men or women.

  

We have seen first hand what this training does and it is truly life changing for them.  This also allows the grower to learn better practices in their land management, sustainable practices and prevention of plagues through natural and organic practices.  All the technology used in this training is possible by utilizing compatible technologies. This allows the growers to utilize what they already have to make their job easier.

Because we understand the vitality and importance of reaching out and establishing our company as an important partner in the coffee growers lives we realize we are there to help them and to learn from them.  We have learned so much and all this amazing exchange makes our product top of the line.

Austin!!

Tweet

So Susan loves going to Austin! I am pretty sure if she could pack up and move there tomorrow she probably would. I myself love San Antonio but do enjoy the occasional trip to Austin. The fact is Austin is just plain fun and additionally its home to some of our favorite people who we got to visit with yesterday. :) 

Chef Troy Knapp at the Driskill Hotel was our first stop...

We had a wonderful time having lunch in the beautiful historic Driskill and then meeting with some of the fantastic chefs and management. Susan spent some time teaching them a bit about how we Q grade our coffee and the story behind our company...

 Then it was sniffing and slurping time! 

I love watching folks participate in their first cupping. Its always fun to watch them be a little nervous about the first slurping action and then needing to spit the coffee out into a cup. Of course the jokes and teasing commenced and it was all in good fun. In the end I like to think they left with a much better understanding about coffee and how to incorporate it into their menu. We love educating people on just how lovely and complex coffee really is. We look forward to working with them more in the future. 

Next stop...El Naranjo!!

My mother has been friends with Ernesto and Iliana De La Vega for a long time. Their restaurant in Austin is hands down one of my favorite places to eat. The food is always delicious!

I have never had a dish there I didn't like so next time you are in Austin you have to make this a stop. Their coffee blend is one they designed specifically for their menu with Susan and its FANTASTIC. 

Our visit was short and sweet and just a quick stop to catch up and say hello. All in all an awesome day trip meeting with friends and clients and spreading some more coffee bean love. 

-Anna

Embracing the new...

Tweet

Hello Folks!!

These past few months have brought so many exciting changes for us here at Ferra Coffee. Its amazing how much can happen in such a short amount of time. 

First let me say that I have been tasked with keeping this blog up to date on the life of coffee roaster. I will do my best to fulfill this responsibility. Hey! Roasting coffee is exciting stuff!! :D

So I guess the biggest announcement I should start with is that we are now working with a local distributor! This is kind of a HUGE deal! All this time we have been our own manufacturer and distributor but we started to get so busy we realized it was time to call in some big guns. With that we welcomed GauchoGourmet to the family. 

I can't say enough wonderful things about these guys. They are the very definition of awesome. They have the same heart as we do and value customer service above all else. We couldn't have picked better people to help us care for our accounts and keep on supplying people with the best coffee in the world! So if you are a restaurant or business interested in carrying our coffee or just a customer interested in taking a pound home to your family give GauchoGourmet a call or stop by their location. They have the nicest display of our coffee including a self serve bar out of our lovely little wooden barrels. I love seeing that every time I walk in. 

Having this happen is such an exciting step for us and I hope you all are as excited as we are :) . 

Well that's the first bit of good news I will share for now. More and more to come. In the meantime I must prepare for a trip to Austin tomorrow to see a most beloved friend and chef who is always so wonderful to work with. We will let you know what exciting things we come up with from that. Also...iced coffee. Hmmm...what are the possibilities? ;) 

-Anna

New website and online store! Hoooraay!!!

Tweet

Please forgive the delay!! It has been a very busy couple of weeks. The changes we talked about earlier are finally done and our new website and new online store is up and running!! 

We hope you enjoy the new look! You will also find that the new online store is very user friendly and should make your experience quick and easy. 

Please remember we roast to order. This guarantees your coffee is fresh and of the best quality when you receive it. You have the option of ordering whole bean or choosing from two different grind options. 

We plan to have our newsletter set up soon so that customers can subscribe for news on special offers and coupon codes.

With all that in mind we thank you for your patience and hope these changes make your experience with us a very pleasant one. We would love to get the word out about our awesome product! 

Check us out on our new site!!

Coffee...not just a breakfast and dessert beverage!

Tweet

Coffee is an amazing beverage. Its every bit as diverse and complex as wine. Coffee shares a broad spectrum of flavors and undertones depending on the region where it grown, the altitude, the crops growing around the coffee, and the type of roast it is. Its hard to imagine that so many variables can have such an effect on your morning brew!

Just to give you an example, our organic coffee from Chiapas, Mexico is nutty and full of amazing dark chocolate undertones where as our organic Peru is citrusy with hints of lemongrass. Our Mexico would pair perfectly with a savory spicy meal where as our Peru would better compliment maybe a nice Mediterranean dish, full of fresh flavors. 

Coffee can be the perfect companion to meals other than breakfast and dessert. Which is why we decided to map it out for you. We have created a chart to help guide you to pairing your coffee with different types of cuisine. 

We also made new labels for the back of our coffee bags to go along with our new charts!!

The primary color along the side shows you which group of cuisine this coffee would best compliment however many of our coffees go great with other types as well which is why we have also included smaller strips of color to indicate what else you might be able to pair it with. 

We hope this new system helps you to further enjoy this remarkable bean!!