Bean to Cup
Bean Sorting
Warehouse Walk
Later in the Morning we visited their small warehouse that has their stock of beans. During Harvest Season this warehouse would be packed with Bags and the machines running throughout the day.
Robusuta
While Elon Farm does produce more than just Robusta, its their staple and the one we got to see in the warehouse. Its a coffee plant primarily grown in Vietnam that has significantly higher levels of caffeine and a bolder taste versus Arabica beans that we tend to get at home in North America.
It can be difficult to get out of Vietnam as the demand is so high domestically especially the higher quality ones needed for speciality coffee. This combined with the more limited production capacity and cost prohibitive nature of international trade also can be attributed to this.
Sorting Process
The part of the process most intriguing is the Sorting Process and how a simple shaking mechanical bed is enough to sort beans. Shaking heavier Beans to one side for Speciality Coffee with Lighter Beans pushed to the other side to be used for instant coffee or cheaper roasts. Nothing is left un-sold or un-used including coffee skin or chaff maximizing their value / return on harvest. Chaff can be used in composting or skincare for exfoliation.
In the Warehouse we got to see the mesmerizing process of how the beans move about in a largely mechanical and manual process to sort through the beans to prepare for roasting. These 30kg Bags of Beans are poured into Machines that use Mechanical Processes like vibrations to remove dried parchment, cleaning the skin and eventually sorting by weight to identify quality beans.
