# Best coffee beans



## LilieD (Oct 9, 2015)

Hi everybody,

I have a simple question, that will bring several different answers I know lol, but for my bakery I would like the best coffee, so I gonna work in London, so what are the best coffee beans that I can buy here in UK ?

I know we all have different tastes, so I'm sure we will have our own favorite coffee bean


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## DavecUK (Aug 6, 2013)

It's a tricky one...sort of like...


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## Eyedee (Sep 13, 2010)

Unless you state your taste preferences it's an impossible question.

Ian


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## Mrboots2u (May 10, 2013)

If you making 20oz latte with them I'm not sure they will taste of anything other thank milk ... What's around you ? What competition do you have . What compliments the stuff you will sell . Is your market specialty ? Or not ?


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## aaronb (Nov 16, 2012)

Could you possibly stop doing all your posts in bold, its quite galling to read. Not trying to be mean so sorry if it appears so, it just makes it harder to read.

That's a very tricky question to ask, and depend what you are aiming for.

If it's just the commodity market and mediocrity then illy.

If you want speciality coffee, then I suggest you go and visit some shops like Kaffeine, Caravan, Workshop, Alchemy to name just a few and have a coffee in them. If you choose this route you really need to get some training from whichever roaster you choose, and to rethink those cup sizes.


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## Glenn (Jun 14, 2008)

My advice would be to buy a whole lot of beans and start cupping


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## LilieD (Oct 9, 2015)

Thanks for the advices.

I know it's impossible to have the '' best '' coffee bean brand because there are many that are very good, but because I'm not a professional barista, I'm more back of house ( bakery pastry manager), I wanted to know what are the best brands for the professional who post in the forum.

About the training, that is for sure! As soon we'll have the coffee machine , looks like it would be Gaggia or Expobar, and chose the coffee beans , it's full training for everybody who will work in the bakery, I know many suppliers do training so it will be perfect for us.


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## Glenn (Jun 14, 2008)

Many of the good roasters will insist on training before supplying beans as they are putting their name to a product

Have you set a budget for the machine and training?

Do you have an idea of £/kg costs per beans (and know exactly what sort of margins you will be working towards)?

Without this in place you will not entertain any good roasters


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## LilieD (Oct 9, 2015)

We have a budget for the machine with training, around £3500. We don't know yet about the cost per beans, we have to check with different suppliers first for the price of their coffee beans.

For the machine, it gonna be between Gaggia, Expobar and maybe another brand we must see. I must say I saw a lot of very good feedbacks for Gaggia and Expobar, just need to find a good coffee bean brand now.


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## aaronb (Nov 16, 2012)

When you say bean 'brand' you are really referring to things like Illy, Lavazza etc. These arent very good quality beans.

This forum is about speciality coffee. There is no specific 'bean' - coffee is a seasonal product and what is on offer now will be different to what is on offer in 6 months time. Most roasters will offer a blend under the same name, but it's components will change.

Some popular coffee roasters in London are Square Mile, Workshop, Caravan, Nude, Alchemy again to name just a few.

Again, I honestly believe if you go to some of the cafes I mentioned earlier and try their coffee you will get a much better idea and understanding about specialty coffee cafes and the market you are trying to enter.


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## risky (May 11, 2015)

LilieD said:


> We have a budget for the machine with training, around £3500. We don't know yet about the cost per beans, we have to check with different suppliers first for the price of their coffee beans.
> 
> For the machine, it gonna be between Gaggia, Expobar and maybe another brand we must see. I must say I saw a lot of very good feedbacks for Gaggia and Expobar, just need to find a good coffee bean brand now.


And the grinder?

Are you really interested In serving speciality coffee? If not just get a Matthew Algie rental package like everyone else.


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## LilieD (Oct 9, 2015)

aaronb said:


> When you say bean 'brand' you are really referring to things like Illy, Lavazza etc. These arent very good quality beans.
> 
> This forum is about speciality coffee. There is no specific 'bean' - coffee is a seasonal product and what is on offer now will be different to what is on offer in 6 months time. Most roasters will offer a blend under the same name, but it's components will change.
> 
> ...


Yes true, Lavazza per example, many coffee machines suppliers work with them, but that's not a '' speciality coffee '' to speak in a professional way here.

We'll check the names you told me, that's professional and it's what we want. We won't be a coffee shop , a la Starbuck, I want real good coffee, there is nobody around that sell coffee or real bread so all the area would come to our bakery, to have a very good coffee ,bread, pastries, not just a take away coffee cup, like many shops do in London or other big cities.



risky said:


> And the grinder?
> 
> Are you really interested In serving speciality coffee? If not just get a Matthew Algie rental package like everyone else.


Speciality coffee, real home made bread, viennoiserie, ice cream, cakes, some savoury products as well, it would be like a real French Boulangerie Pâtisserie like you can find in France, I'm French and Portuguese, so we want a very good coffee machine, and grinder to make something special for the coffee. I don't want to be a shop for take away cheap things you know, so it's for that I registered in the forum, I'm reading a lot of post from professional people who are baristas and know a lot about their main product, coffee.

It's a very good forum to learn about everything around the coffee


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## YerbaMate170 (Jun 15, 2015)

Yes, I would strongly suggest firstly going to some cafes that are considered to be really good, and try them out - this will give you an idea of what a difference speciality coffee can make, over the standard Illy/Lavazza etc - this should be your first step, otherwise you will not know what you are aiming for.


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## Fevmeister (Oct 21, 2013)

*goes to find a picture of a can of worms*


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## 4085 (Nov 23, 2012)

Why don't you see what speciality roasters there are within a 10 mile area of you and contact them. Tell them your plans. They ought to be able to make a blend up that specifically suits your needs. You can market the fact that you are using locally sourced beans and I am sure that any roaster would help out with training etc as it is their good name you are going to sully!

How many 'speciality' coffee shops have you been in, that you would not go back to?


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## LilieD (Oct 9, 2015)

dfk41 said:


> Why don't you see what speciality roasters there are within a 10 mile area of you and contact them. Tell them your plans. They ought to be able to make a blend up that specifically suits your needs. You can market the fact that you are using locally sourced beans and I am sure that any roaster would help out with training etc as it is their good name you are going to sully!
> 
> How many 'speciality' coffee shops have you been in, that you would not go back to?


Yes it's what we gonna do this week, we have 4 around London, 1 outside of London . That's the best way to find what we want that's true, just the taste!



YerbaMate170 said:


> Yes, I would strongly suggest firstly going to some cafes that are considered to be really good, and try them out - this will give you an idea of what a difference speciality coffee can make, over the standard Illy/Lavazza etc - this should be your first step, otherwise you will not know what you are aiming for.


Yes it's on my rota, for this week









Thanks again for your advices guys.


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## YerbaMate170 (Jun 15, 2015)

LilieD said:


> Yes it's what we gonna do this week, we have 4 around London, 1 outside of London . That's the best way to find what we want that's true, just the taste!
> 
> Yes it's on my rota, for this week
> 
> ...


Let us know how you get on, based on your experiences we may be able to make better/further suggestions.


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## LilieD (Oct 9, 2015)

YerbaMate170 said:


> Let us know how you get on, based on your experiences we may be able to make better/further suggestions.


I will let you know, I'll post after the tasting.


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## PeterF (Aug 25, 2014)

Good luck


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## LilieD (Oct 9, 2015)

After some tastings and meetings with some coffee roasters in London, we found maybe our future coffee supplier.

The last one we visited, was the best, it's Caravan http://www.caravankingscross.co.uk/

Very very good espresso and even latte with their Market blend Espresso. Very good after taste, no strong body and no extra acidity, so a perfect espresso. My colleague, who likes latte (I can't drink latte my stomach can't stand the mix of milk with coffee







) said it was the best latte she has drank in UK.

They are very good with their trainings as well, we sell their coffee so they need to train all your staff to be sure you know how to serve a very good coffee.

They have some good prices with suppliers for coffee machines, that's very good.

We tasted as well the Daily, very good, very smooth, so for these who like latte, they can even drink espresso, it was very good.

I must say that I like a lot the coffee at Nude Espresso Coffee http://www.nudeespresso.com/ , very good espresso, good with services with custumers . For latte, their East blend was not very good, not enough coffee taste.

WorkShop Coffee was good as well, but for Square Mile Coffee, we were really disappointed, the only taste after drinking an espresso was just acidity, and I like strong coffee but their espresso, seriously not good at all, for my taste.

We have to find a good balance for our coffee for our business, and the best one we tasted was really at Caravan. Very good taste, very good services for equipments, trainings, orders etc....

For our bakery, the best will be Caravan, we can have a very good espresso and with the same blend, Market or Daily, we can have very good latte too.

We saw a very good example to make good coffee or bad coffee (by mistakes)during our tasting lol , so it was a good example for a good training!

And I don't know for you, but I drank some coffees , made with freshly roasted coffee beans,some hours before used to make the coffee and some with roasted coffee beans rested for 1 week minimum, and their is a big difference, to rest 1 week the coffee, it's really better for the taste.


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## aaronb (Nov 16, 2012)

Glad the research trip went well for you and opened your eyes to what coffee can be!

We will have to agree to disagree about SquareMile and some of the lighter roasts but Caravan is a solid choice and having a good coffee offering from them will surely give you an advantage over your competitors using illy and Lavaza.

Can I also suggest you think about offering some form of brewed coffee? Batch Brewed coffee is quite easy to prepare (Caravan should be able help you with this) and then you can offer customers mugs of black coffee to go with their croissants too.

Good luck with the business venture, keep us informed.


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## LilieD (Oct 9, 2015)

aaronb said:


> Glad the research trip went well for you and opened your eyes to what coffee can be!
> 
> We will have to agree to disagree about SquareMile and some of the lighter roasts but Caravan is a solid choice and having a good coffee offering from them will surely give you an advantage over your competitors using illy and Lavaza.
> 
> ...


We could serve some brewed coffee, but later, when everything will be in place in the bakery, and that our coffee will be something special for our customers. Caravan will help us with that for sure, they seem to have a very good training, like Nude Espresso, they really want you to make a very good coffee and they have different levels for training, really professional companies.


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## julesee (Aug 12, 2014)

Aaron which Square Mile beans do you recommend?


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## aaronb (Nov 16, 2012)

julesee said:


> Aaron which Square Mile beans do you recommend?


Whatever appeals to you.

How are you brewing them?

I wouldn't say they are my favourite by the way, just that I disagree about the acidity - but then I much only drink lighter roasts.


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## Danm (Jan 26, 2012)

Where will your new place be based?


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## insatiableOne (Jul 29, 2015)

Since the vast majority of people here drink milk related coffees, the Brazilian blends compliment that. As most of the better Cafe' will serve that as their go to bean.

Sumatra is a double edge sword, people either love or hate it, seems no middle ground.

My favorite is Ethiopian- Sidamo Guiji natural.


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## Faizan Alam (Feb 28, 2020)

Hi Lilied,

This is the digital world and you can buy any type of coffee bean from anywhere in the world. I suggest you to try some famous coffee beans and then take votes from your audience for best coffee beans.

Recently I was searching for coffee beans and I found this

Check it out:

https://www.infomult.com/best-coffee-beans-in-the-world/


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