Why is SOE Always More Expensive than Blended Coffee?

Nowadays, to create their own unique brand characteristics, many coffee shops offer personalized SOE (Single Origin Espresso) coffee beans for customers to choose from. When we confirm that the coffee will be changed from a blend to SOE, there's always an additional charge of several yuan. Why is this?

Understanding SOE

SOE is the abbreviation for "Single Original Espresso," which literally means single-origin espresso coffee, clearly distinguishing it from traditional Italian blend espresso (House Blend Espresso).

In the early days when Italian coffee first became popular, coffee shops around the world all used single-origin beans, such as Mocha coffee and Brazilian coffee. Since this was considered standard practice, no one particularly emphasized or explained it. As coffee consumption demand continued to increase, coffee beans from various regions began to show inconsistent quality, with potential instability in production, quality, and flavor. To avoid these risks in extraction, some merchants started blending coffee beans from different origins to allow them to complement each other.

At the same time, producers also used dark roasting to eliminate unpleasant textures and acidity. Dark roasting could also mask defects, stabilize coffee flavor, and extract rich coffee oils. This way, even if individual batches from certain origins were of lower quality, or if a particular growing region had crop failure the following year, the blend formula could be adjusted to "save" the product.

Therefore, before the specialty coffee wave arrived, the raw materials used for making espresso were typically blends of coffee beans from two or more origins, without much emphasis on coffee origin and batch. As for flavor, due to the "charcoal-dark" dark roasting, it was basically fixed in rich and mellow textures like caramel, dark chocolate, nuts, cream, and cocoa.

The Rise of SOE

By the 1980s, the industry improved the quality of coffee beans from many regions through a series of scientific methods, and people began to emphasize the concept of "specialty coffee." Roasters also realized that coffee beans from each origin had their own characteristics, so they consciously adjusted the roasting degree of some beans to be lighter to highlight their regional characteristics while also "uncovering" more floral and fruity flavors.

Initially, single-origin coffee beans were only used in drip/immersion brewing methods such as pour-over, siphon, and French press. It wasn't until 2007, when WBC World Barista Championship competitor James Hoffmann used single-origin beans to make espresso to stand out in the competition, winning the championship that year. And so, SOE gradually became popular with the specialty coffee wave.

SOE Characteristics and Value

It's not difficult to find that SOE, which advocates for single origin, often uses lighter-roasted fruity acidic beans, aiming to present rich and light aroma and texture characteristics that differ from traditional bitter coffee. For example, the citrus and lemon notes of Ethiopian beans, the raisin-honey sensation of Costa Rican beans, and the tomato-berry notes of Kenyan beans. The higher recognizability allows consumers to more easily remember the characteristics of SOE, but from a cost perspective, higher-quality single-origin beans naturally come with a higher price, making the additional charge reasonable.

FrontStreet Coffee believes that the original intention of SOE is to highlight the inherent advantages of the beans and showcase the "personalization" of espresso. Compared to blended coffee beans, there's no distinction between superior and inferior - the key lies in whether the user wants to express a rich, balanced, and affordable cocoa-flavored coffee, or a floral-fruity coffee with higher requirements for exquisite flavors.

SOE in Today's Coffee Culture

Today, SOE has undoubtedly become mainstream. Many coffee shops are also following the new trend, introducing single-origin beans with more detailed traceability information into the espresso category, hoping to create eye-catching flavors. However, among them, some single-origin espressos fail to meet expectations. Although they carry the "SOE" banner, they fail to bring out the unique characteristics of the coffee flavor.

As FrontStreet Coffee mentioned above, SOE uses highly recognizable coffee flavor as its main selling point. Therefore, whether a cup of SOE coffee tastes good depends not only on the prerequisite of high-quality coffee beans but also greatly tests the "interpretation" abilities of both roasters and baristas.

Technical Challenges of SOE

If the coffee beans used for SOE are roasted too dark, the resulting espresso tends to have a bitter taste, and aromatic substances cannot be expressed; if roasted too light, first, the mellow substances are difficult to develop, and second, the requirements for extraction are higher. Once parameters such as grinding, temperature, and ratio are not properly controlled, the espresso easily becomes sour or bland, and when made into Americano or latte, it lacks "coffee flavor."

Therefore, if the roasting and extraction are not properly executed, even if the highest quality and most expensive beans are selected, no matter how much their "singularity" is emphasized, it won't have much significance.

- END -

FrontStreet Coffee

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

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473