Our Approach
When coffee drinkers pick up a cup of Supreme coffee they have high expectations – so we try very hard to not disappoint them. Our approach is based on finding the best quality raw materials – the green beans – that we can obtain, and then roasting them carefully so that the entire inherent flavor potential comes through in the cup.
Over the years we have developed a lot of respect for the product, and for the care, consideration, and hard work that goes into growing great coffee and getting it from the farm into the cup. Understanding and respecting the effort that goes into great coffee means we pay growers well for really good coffees. We invest in building relationships at origin, and we take into account the complexities of sustainability when we choose with whom to trade. It also means we care about how well coffee is made – we do not want to see all that effort squandered by the end user – so we pay a lot of attention to quality control and barista training.
When we do our job well, coffee facilitates good relationships – between consumers enjoying good coffee together – and in the bigger picture, all the way along the chain from growers, exporters and roasters, to café owners, consumers and coffee enthusiasts.
To learn more visit “How We Source Coffee”
Roasting
On a typical day we roast coffees from all four corners of the globe. Each behaves differently in the roasting process – they have different moisture levels, different densities, and different bean sizes. Our roasters juggle time, temperature, and airflow to bring out the full flavour potential of each coffee. The degree of roast – how light or dark coffee is – has a dramatic effect on flavour, and can accentuate or obliterate the differences between beans from different regions. Darker roasting suppresses acidity and enhances body and sweetness, up to a point… too dark and the best flavours just go up in smoke. Lighter roasting enhances acidity and fruit flavours.
To see what we are roasting, check the menus in “Our Coffees”
Freshness
Freshness is paramount. Under ideal storage conditions whole bean coffee will remain fresh enough to make good drinks for about ten days after roasting – not much longer. Coffee beans are best kept in a cool dark place in a sealed container – do not refrigerate or freeze your beans! Once coffee is ground it begins to deteriorate immediately. Whether you are making coffee by espresso, plunger, or filter, you should only grind beans immediately before brewing. Freshly ground tastes better every time. Our coffee has the date the beans are roasted on the pack, so you know exactly what age your coffee is, and can use it at its best.
R & D
The flavour of coffee is complex and often subjective. Depending on what you have recently eaten, the ph level of your saliva, even your state of health, the way a coffee tastes will be affected. But even amongst professional tasters, though each might describe a coffee a little differently, they’ll usually agree on what was good and what was not.
To get beyond simply saying whether or not coffee tastes bitter or stale requires developing your palate and finding suitable language to describe flavour complexity – it’s a bit like developing a taste for good wine. In the coffee industry the process of tasting and documenting coffee flavor is called cupping. We do a lot of it.
Supreme runs an R&D program where our roasters cup coffee daily for quality control and to make purchasing decisions. Most of our company enjoy getting together frequently for cupping to make sure they know our coffees well, to enhance their cupping skills, and so they can communicate clearly about the olfactory and tactile qualities of our coffees.