Sam’s Club has
recently begun selling “FIREHOUSE COFFEE ROASTERS” whole bean coffees in their
clubs here in the Phoenix Valley (http://www.firehouseroastery.com/
). FIREHOUSE claims to be exclusively a Specialty Coffee roaster, so I had to
try a bag. After sniffing each type through the vent while physically abusing
the poor bag, I decided to try the “Island Blend”, which is described as “South
Pacific coffees with sweet & complex notes. Wonderful aromatics”. That is
about as specific as my horoscope today – You will be presented with great
opportunities if you know where to look – but it did smell good.
The big question in my mind remained: Can specialty coffee
be mass roasted and distributed, or would the excessive shelf time be a
violation of Geneva Conventions?
At the office, we opened the bag and whipped out the pour
over paraphernalia to the usual rolling of coworker eyes. The coffee smelled
delicious and had a beautiful, even roast, somewhere in the City to City Plus
region. We weighed out the standard 16:1 ratio, ground it in the Hario Skerton,
and brewed it in the Hario V60.
Results: The coffee is indeed quite nice. It is clearly a
high quality coffee, roasted with care and expertise. The individual flavors
are hard to pick out, but dried fruit and floral notes are certainly present.
Despite the quality and special character, the flavor may be muted compared to
what FIREHOUSE can serve in store.
To be clear, the coffee is much better than all of the other
coffee I have tried from Sam’s Club or Costco. The downside to this coffee is
that it sits on a warehouse shelf for too long. How can I make such a
statement? Sadly very easily: The coffee does not bloom much.
When I roast my own coffee or purchase freshly roasted
coffee from my favorite roaster, the coffee blooms beautifully in the V60 or
Kone. That freshness is obvious not only in the filter, but also in the cup.
Flavors pounce on my palate, slapping my taste buds around in a frenzy of
joyful stimulation. If I fail to brew those beautiful, fresh coffees quickly
enough, the coffee is still quite nice, but the taste bud slap-fest is gone.
Sam’s Club FIREHOUSE coffee is nice, but I would argue they
have still not figured out enough of the supply chain to guarantee only the
freshest coffee reaches the end consumer. It is also unclear if FIREHOUSE
nitrogen flushes the coffee while packaging: I e-mailed this question to
FIREHOUSE but have yet to hear back. I will probably purchase their coffee as a
nice fallback for those times when I cannot find time to roast my own, but I
honestly hope FIREHOUSE refines the supply chain to accomplish “Just in Time”
delivery.
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