We all know that having a delicious, barista made coffee in the morning can help you start the day right.
The UK’s number one syrup brand, MONIN, wants to inspire the nation to create mouthwatering, barista level coffee, from the comfort of their own home.
MONIN want to help you go beyond simple coffee tips, such as using good coffee and grinding, and help you to go from making a good morning coffee to creating the ultimate barista coffee experience at home.
Dan Fellows, Double World Coffee in Good Spirits Champion, has curated 5 tips to help you elevate your coffee experience further and create a delicious coffee, every time.
1. Talk to your favourite barista
Baristas love to talk about coffee! Obviously be mindful to avoid hassling a busy barista under pressure, but if they are available and open to it, a good conversation can provide useful insights into making great coffee. Many coffee businesses offer enthusiast and professional training courses like roasting classes with Current Crop which can be an amazing way to level up your coffee skills.
2. Learn how to de-code a coffee bag label
Coffee bags can be very intimidating with lots of information which you may not understand, and with no relation to what ends up in the cup. Once you understand what each of the variables means and how it impacts the cup, you can make educated decisions on which coffee to choose rather than buying blind or based on branding. Here is a very brief overview:
Origin: Different countries and regions have different growing conditions and so yield different flavour characteristics. If you find you always love coffee from a particular part of the world, you can explore different processes from this area to see which is your favourite.
Processing: The process of getting coffee from growing on a tree into an unroasted bean is complex. There are many ways to do this, each of which will impact the cup profile. Three processing methods you will commonly find are ‘natural’ (where the coffee fruits known as coffee cherries are dried whole), ‘pulped natural’ (where some of the fruit is removed before drying) and ‘washed’ (where the fruit is removed to dry the beans). Very broadly speaking, naturally processed coffee have plenty of fruit character and heavier weight, pulped natural processed coffees have good sweetness and body with a little less fruit than naturals, and washed coffees are clean, vibrant and lighter bodied.
Roast: Generally speaking, darker roasts can mask the character of the coffee you buy. My personal preference is to buy great coffee with a light or medium roast level to allow the character of the excellent coffee to shine through.
3. Be creative
I love to use coffee as an ingredient to make delicious drinks. I always like to add some sweetness to iced drinks and coffee cocktails. The MONIN range is the perfect way to provide balance and can add new flavours to iced coffee and coffee cocktails.
Don’t be too bound by the traditional flavours to complement coffee either (vanilla, caramel, hazelnut), there are lots of interesting flavours that can pair with the right coffee to create epic drinks – my personal favourites are coconut, white chocolate and winter spice.
4. Balance is key
Whatever drink you are making, it is critical to balance together the ingredients. With filter coffee, you want to fine tune the sweetness, acidity and bitterness, and to balance the strength of the end result to be a great intensity. With iced drinks and coffee cocktails, you need to ensure the sweetness level is appropriate and allows each of the ingredients to be best represented.
5. Enjoy the process
Ultimately, a cup of coffee at home should be an enjoyable experience. Always log what you do and how you can improve the results, but don’t put too much pressure on yourself! Grab your favourite coffee, brewer and cup, sit down and enjoy a moment.
The Best Pina Colada On The Planet
