What Happens When You Use Espresso Beans for Pour-Over Coffee? Characteristics and Flavor Recommendations for Espresso Blend Coffee Beans

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With the growing specialty coffee market, many people have started exploring espresso and pour-over coffee. Coffee enthusiasts who regularly drink espresso know that espresso uses blended coffee beans, while pour-over coffee uses single-origin coffee beans. So what's the difference between these two? Can espresso beans be used for pour-over coffee? FrontStreet Coffee is here to explore this topic with coffee enthusiasts.

What is Espresso Blend Coffee?

As FrontStreet Coffee mentioned above, blended coffee beans are mainly used for espresso. Blended coffee beans are made by mixing coffee beans from different origins and varieties, typically two or three different beans. The purpose of blending is quite obvious - to gather the flavors of different coffee beans together, presenting a completely new flavor profile to achieve a more balanced effect, while also serving as the store's signature blend.

For example, if one coffee bean is smooth but lacks aroma, another aromatic bean can be added to complement each other's strengths and weaknesses. Another purpose of espresso blend coffee beans is cost reduction. Traditional espresso blends often include Robusta variety coffee beans because Robusta beans have rich, mellow flavors. Although cupping scores may not reach those of single-origin coffee, when paired with single-origin beans, they can provide richer, thicker crema for espresso and create a thick, smooth texture characteristic when used as a base for milk-based drinks.

Furthermore, according to FrontStreet Coffee's understanding, the original emergence of Italian blend coffee was due to the popularity of rich, bitter espresso at the time, while single-origin coffees had pronounced flavor characteristics - meaning they had both strengths and weaknesses. Additionally, high-quality single-origin coffee beans were expensive, while blended coffee offered better value with lower prices than single-origin coffee but still unique flavors. Therefore, many Italians at the time chose blended coffee over single-origin coffee, and this is how blended coffee developed and became popular to this day.

What is Pour-Over Single-Origin Coffee?

Single-origin coffee beans refer to coffee beans from a single origin, consumed as pure coffee without milk or sugar. Single-origin coffee has distinct characteristics and special tastes - either fresh and gentle or fragrant and smooth. The cost is relatively high, making it more expensive.

For example, the more famous single-origin coffees at FrontStreet Coffee include FrontStreet Coffee's Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee, FrontStreet Coffee's Ethiopia Yirgacheffe Coffee, and FrontStreet Coffee's Indonesia Mandheling Coffee - all single-origin coffees named after their bean origins. These coffee beans also represent regional flavor characteristics. Secondly, single-origin coffee allows tracing back to the estate and its story - such as the estate's growing conditions, processing quality, and other information that ensures the coffee beans' flavor quality. Therefore, FrontStreet Coffee's packaging for each bag of coffee beans also includes some relevant information.

The Difference Between Blended and Single-Origin Coffee

From what FrontStreet Coffee described above, it's clear that blended coffee refers to mixing several single-origin coffees from different regions to form a blend, while single-origin coffee refers to coffee beans from a single region. The reason they are distinguished is because espresso machines have a characteristic of amplifying the bitter flavors of coffee beans. Therefore, FrontStreet Coffee would not use single-variety coffee beans to make espresso, as the resulting coffee flavor would be very unbalanced and affect the taste. This is also why espresso must be made with blended coffee beans.

However, single-origin coffee beans can actually be used with espresso machines. This type of coffee preparation is called "SOE coffee" (Single Origin Espresso), but the parameters must be constantly adjusted, and the flavor is quite unstable. FrontStreet Coffee was founded with the intention of letting coffee enthusiasts taste stable regional coffee flavors, so we don't dare to risk launching SOE coffee at this time.

Can Espresso Blend Coffee Beans Be Used for Pour-Over Coffee?

Since single-origin coffee beans can be used with espresso machines, similarly, espresso blend coffee beans can also be brewed as pour-over coffee. However, the brewed flavor will always have some differences compared to espresso machine brewing. Similarly, the grind parameters for pour-over must also be adjusted, and the flavor might be quite "special." It mainly depends on personal preference. If interested coffee enthusiasts want to try, FrontStreet Coffee can also provide pour-over parameter references below.

FrontStreet Coffee's pour-over parameters: V60 dripper, 15g coffee dose, 90°C water temperature, 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio, grind size (80% pass-through on #20 standard sieve, coarser than espresso grind)

FrontStreet Coffee's brewing method: segmented extraction, bloom with 30g water for 30 seconds, small circular pour until reaching 125g then segment, continue pouring to 225g when water level is about to expose the coffee bed, remove dripper when water level is about to expose the coffee bed again (timing starts from bloom), extraction time 2'00".

FrontStreet Coffee's Espresso Blend Coffee Bean Recommendations

Furthermore, FrontStreet Coffee believes that blending coffee beans is an art form because coffee blenders must understand the different flavor characteristics of coffee from various regions to create enticing aromas and make coffee more delicious. This not only requires extensive coffee experience and inspiration but also precise ratio calculations. Therefore, saying that the process of blending coffee beans is an art form is no exaggeration. Next, FrontStreet Coffee will share the flavor characteristics of four blended coffee beans developed by FrontStreet Coffee's blenders over several years.

FrontStreet Coffee Sunflower Warm Sunshine Blend

Flavor: Noticeable fruit acidity, light berry aroma, wine notes, rich chocolate flavor, obvious sweet aftertaste.

Formula: FrontStreet Coffee Honduras Sherry : FrontStreet Coffee Yirgacheffe Red Cherry = 6:4

For this blend, FrontStreet Coffee uses FrontStreet Coffee's Yirgacheffe natural Red Cherry and FrontStreet Coffee's Honduras Sherry. FrontStreet Coffee's design concept for this blend is that it can be used for both espresso and pour-over. When used to make espresso, it emits noticeable fermented wine notes. Upon tasting, citrus and berry acidity immediately emerge, with whiskey-like aroma and a black chocolate finish.

When brewing this FrontStreet Coffee Warm Sunshine blend with pour-over method, the flavor is not as rich as when making espresso. After brewing, there are fermented wine notes and a hint of citrus aroma. When tasted hot, there are only obvious wine notes and black chocolate finish. As the temperature drops, the citrus and berry acidity become slightly apparent, with an overall clean and fresh profile, no vanilla cream texture.

FrontStreet Coffee Premium Blend

Flavor: Gentle slight acidity, clean sweetness, nutty aftertaste, overall feeling is not too stimulating, balanced, medium crema.

Formula: Colombia : Brazil = 3:7

For this blend, FrontStreet Coffee uses Brazil and Colombia. When tasting, it has a light roasted grass aroma, fresh fragrance with slight bitterness, sweet and smooth, with a pleasant aftertaste. This is because Colombian Huilan region coffee beans have pleasant acidity, fragrant aroma, moderate acidity, and rich sweetness that is intriguing, while Brazil Cerrado region coffee beans have comfortable bitter-sweetness and are extremely smooth when tasting. So the combination is simply wonderful.

FrontStreet Coffee Commercial Blend

Flavor: Caramel sweetness, nuts and cocoa, black chocolate flavors, balanced sweet and sour, slight bitterness, long aftertaste.

Formula: Colombia : Brazil : Robusta = 3:6:1

For this blend, FrontStreet Coffee uses Brazilian, Colombian coffee beans and 10% Robusta coffee beans. The taste is classic. FrontStreet Coffee believes this blend has rich crema and texture with caramel sweetness, also featuring nuts, cocoa, and black chocolate flavors, balanced sweet and sour, slight bitterness, and long aftertaste. This FrontStreet Coffee Commercial blend, like FrontStreet Coffee's Premium blend, uses Colombian and Brazilian coffee bean ratios, but the addition of Robusta provides rich crema, making the coffee texture more mellow.

FrontStreet Coffee Basic Blend

Flavor: Gentle fruit acidity, caramel sweetness, nuts, black chocolate flavors, smooth and thick, but flavor is relatively light.

Formula: Yunnan : Brazil = 3:7

For this blend, FrontStreet Coffee uses Brazil and Yunnan. FrontStreet Coffee believes it tastes with gentle fruit acidity and caramel sweetness, as well as nuts, black chocolate flavors, smooth and thick, but the flavor is relatively light. This is because Yunnan's natural conditions are very similar to Colombia's - high altitude, large temperature differences between day and night, with mellow flavor characteristics, moderate acidity, rich and mellow taste, uniform beans, high oil content, and with fruit aroma. Its quality and texture are similar to Colombian coffee. However, the taste is slightly lighter than Colombian coffee, while Brazil Cerrado region coffee beans have comfortable bitter-sweetness and are extremely smooth when tasting. Therefore, the combination of these two coffee beans also has good flavor, and this FrontStreet Coffee Basic blend offers excellent value, suitable for espresso beginners and small coffee shops.

The above is FrontStreet Coffee's organized information about the differences between espresso blend coffee and pour-over coffee. We hope this helps coffee enthusiasts better understand related knowledge to choose coffee beans with flavors suitable for them in the future.

For more specialty coffee beans, please add FrontStreet Coffee's private WeChat account: kaixinguoguo0925

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473