Are Italian Blend Coffee Beans Suitable for Pour-Over Coffee?

Understanding Coffee Beans: Single Origin vs. Espresso Blends

When searching for coffee beans on shopping platforms, you'll typically encounter two types: single-origin coffee beans with detailed origin information, suitable for most extraction methods such as pour-over, French press, cold brew, etc., usually sold in quantities under half a pound.

The other type is espresso beans specifically designed for extraction in espresso machines. These are typically blends with a darker roast profile, commonly sold in 500g, 1-pound, or larger quantities. Since these packages are quite large, some people who consume coffee more slowly might wonder: can these espresso beans also be used for pour-over coffee? How would they taste?

Characteristics of Espresso Beans

Considering the need to adapt to extraction in espresso machines under high temperature and pressure, allowing espresso to exhibit more stable flavor and texture, espresso beans typically consist of blends using batches from two or more different origins. They employ a darker roast degree to ensure the espresso has both appropriate crema and excellent richness. Therefore, espresso beans are often directly referred to as blend beans by consumers.

Due to different purposes, espresso blend formulas can vary greatly, but typically consider three aspects: cost-effectiveness, stability, and flavor performance.

For example, when FrontStreet Coffee customized a commercial blend coffee bean, the focus was on high cost-effectiveness, using 10% washed Robusta + 30% washed Colombian + 60% semi-natural Brazil, allowing the espresso to have rich crema, nutty aroma, and the advantage of being reasonably priced. When customizing the FrontStreet Coffee Sunflower Warm Sun Blend, the emphasis was on flavor performance, hoping it would have both the fermented wine aroma of Honduras Sherry and the fruity sweetness of natural Red Cherry. Therefore, it selected 30% FrontStreet Coffee Ethiopia Natural Red Cherry + 70% FrontStreet Coffee Honduras Sherry.

Can All Coffee Beans Be Used for Pour-Over?

Pour-over is just a very common brewing method. As long as you have the corresponding equipment and raw materials (coffee beans/ground coffee), you can extract using the pour-over method. Therefore, we can understand that any roasted coffee beans can be used for pour-over, including the espresso beans we've been discussing. As for whether they taste good, it depends on the quality of the coffee beans and whether you've mastered the brewing parameters.

As mentioned above, most espresso beans have a darker roast degree, typically exhibiting a roasted and aromatic flavor profile, such as dark chocolate, nuts, caramel, cream... When made into espresso, the texture emphasizes rich fragrance and fullness, while with pour-over drip extraction, the flavor tends toward mellow and solid bitterness. For coffee beans used to make SOE (Single Origin Espresso), to highlight fruit acidity, the roast is usually slightly lighter, and when extracted using pour-over, it requires adjustment to brewing parameters suitable for medium-light roast coffee beans.

Let's Try the Taste

Since we're already discussing this topic, out of curiosity, FrontStreet Coffee also "dug up" some espresso blend beans from the warehouse to brew a pot of coffee, let's see how the FrontStreet Coffee Sunflower Warm Sun Blend tastes when brewed as pour-over~

Since the FrontStreet Coffee Sunflower Warm Sun Blend sold in stores uses a medium-dark roast, FrontStreet Coffee used lower water temperature and medium grind for this brewing, hoping to avoid excessive negative bitterness. To highlight the tropical fruit acidity of FrontStreet Coffee Natural Red Cherry, FrontStreet Coffee chose a V60 dripper, combined with a 1:16 coffee-to-water ratio, to make the coffee flavor more layered and lively.

Coffee Beans: 15g FrontStreet Coffee Sunflower Warm Sun Blend Espresso Beans

Coffee-to-water ratio: 1:16

Water temperature: 88°C

Grind size: 75% pass-through rate on #20 sieve (EK43s setting 10.5)

Method: Three-stage pouring

Dripper: Hario V60

Extraction time: 2 minutes 4 seconds

The pour-over extracted FrontStreet Coffee Sunflower Warm Sun Blend exhibits distinct vanilla and dark chocolate flavors, with a slight fermented wine aroma and citrus acidity. It enters the mouth as smooth as cream, with medium-high body, leaving a trace of caramel aroma in the mouth after swallowing.

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FrontStreet Coffee

No. 10, Bao'an Front Street, Yandun Road, Dongshankou, Yuexiu District, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province

Important Notice :

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FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473