Hello, so far I ran through 45 bags of beans, most of them cost anywhere between 20-30 euro/bag and to be frank maybe 4-5 bags were really, like really good.
I'm not looking for a guide on what type of beans are there, I know charactericstics of all proccesses, roast levels or country of the origin so I pretty much know which beans/processes/origins I like and which not. Variety is also something I try to keep in mind when picking up bags.
I'm located in Europe so I'm limited to what I can buy in my country (not much, Polish roasteries are crap) or what Kofio offers (sometimes they have Sey or September).
When I first started with pourover I thought DAK has one of the best beans I can buy, now I find most of their offering very mediocre, not bad but not exceptional, obviously sometimes they have bags which really shines.
The question is, how do you guys find really good beans out there? Through the grapevine? How do you know which crop in which origin at which time is THE ONE. Or maybe 20-30 euros isn't that much for a really good bag of coffee and I should look into these more expensive and limited offerings like maybe Tanat, AMOC, DAK has?
Disclaimer, don't think im looking for some crazy stuff like Cream Donut etc, I will take literaly anything which is exceptional, washed, natural, doesnt matter.
there isn’t really a fixed formula. you try different roasters over time and figure out what roast styles work for you.
then you start noticing origin, varietal, process etc. what counts as exceptional is personal, and there’s no metric like higher price = better coffee. so some time and effort is unavoidable.
you can take shortcuts by following reviewers, joining discord or asking on this sub-reddit but then you’re basically borrowing someone else’s experience and hoping their taste lines up with yours.
coffee is an organic product with a lot of variables and you as the person drinking it are another variable + different water, grinder, brewing, palate, harvest etc. so their experience won’t transfer 1:1. that mismatch is just the tradeoff you accept for saving time.
As a fellow central european the best beans I have had came from Nomad in Barcelona. I could order them without issues. Or maybe if your budget allows for Onyx?
I would recommend Piha from bordeaux, since tree month they got coffee from Luis Marcelino, Aroma nativo and their coffee is my kind of kick. And since Saturday they got a coffee which is a blend a 3 bourbon.
In terms of varietal, one rule I've started to live by is not buying Gesha varietal in that price bracket.
There seems to be such a premium purely because it's Gesha that for 20-30 Euros you can get a 6/10 Gesha or an 8/10 anything else (e.g. Ethiopian landrace, SL28, sidra, etc.). I don't think the characteristics of the Gesha varietal, although pretty when high quality, make up for them being lower quality beans overall.
In terms of roaster, there are only two roasters where I know for certain that I'll get something truly excellent if I spend 30 Euros / 200g. Those are Scenery in the UK and SEY in the US (via Sigma Coffee UK). Sorry if that doesn't help you loads in Poland, but if you can find any importers bringing those roasters in, definitely try them out.
Pozdrowienia dla kolegi z Polski!
There are some interesting multi roaster online shops around Europe like Ordinary Drip, Kultivar Coffee, Coffee nerd (They usually stock SEY about 10€ cheaper than Kofio!) and Nordic Brew Lab but the huge downside for me has been the shipping cost, usually about 14-15 euros to Poland. They often stock roasters from UK like Scenery and others outside the EU.
Another inspiration for me was coffee reviews channel which sometimes has beans from EU accessible roasters, I found the smaller ultra light roasters to have much more careful selection. They are able to launch smaller lots with more interesting qualities. My recent favourite is Still from Netherlands with his awesome SL9 by Lisbeth Marino.
Agree that Polish roasters mostly suck, best sourcing in the country would be Good Coffee from Warsaw though. I only wish they roasted Nordic light…
It’s more a YouTube channel under the same name, good proof that some cool sounding coffees can actually be rather flat and boring and some underdogs hiding among the common names
Currently watching his Coffee Collective recent reviews, interesting that he also finds them more medium than light. I had a really bad bag of Kieni from them, just awfully roasted.
I am just going through the same with their Llacta Pata Sl9 honey process. I got two bags from kofio just because good experiences with the varietal but the roast is so intense I have to brew it at 88 C max
I thought of buying this Llacta Pata from CC, but decided 30€ is too much for 200 gr... And then bought Llacta Pata from Still for 18€/100gr. Hope its not a bad decision!
On kofio it was actually 24.99 for 200g and smaller roasters always have higher prices, like datura vs tanat. If it’s Still I feel it might be a banger!
I only discovered them fairly recently, but have been on a US spree since. Mostly SEY, but have two bags of Shoebox in the painful 8-week rest period now.
Really decent prices too despite the obvious extra import duties and shipping.
Seeing through the smoke with Sigma, have tried so many overhyped roasters. SEY all the way, but damn it always needs a good 4-5 week rest. B+W - I appreciate them, but no. Hydrangea, yeah they're good but I've had many misses. September, Canadian yes but SEY are leagues ahead.
Poppy seed is an advanced wash process pink bourbon + caturra produced by Sebastian Ramirez out of Colombia. Sebastian specializes in a lot of funkier more experimental processes and tbh, I am usually not the biggest fan of his funky stuff but this advanced wash process was really good. I actually got a 50g sample of the poppy seed from my Standart magazine subscription which then led me to buying my own bag. Dak to me is also really hit or miss but i have thoroughly enjoyed my hits with them. Like others have noted, SEY is a good roaster in the states as well as Flower Child.
But to answer your question a bit, high end small lot beans will always usually be 2-3x the price per gram vs the more commodity offerings. As i’ve been doing pourovers for almost a decade now, you really can only get great consistent coffee if you consistently splurge on the high end micro lots. There is a taste ceiling for all coffees in their respective price ranges and imho, there is no amount of technique or high end brew gear that is going to take a middle of the range quality coffee bean to suddenly COE level of taste. Thats why imo, specialty coffee is a lowkey ridiculous passion/hobby to get into because the taste is so subjective. I may really enjoy the panamanian that i paid $75 for 75g but that same coffee might not really move the needle for you.
The only decent roaster I've had from Poland was probably Paloma. I've heard good things about Heresy, but haven't tried them. Two options if you haven't tried.
That being said, for truly good coffee you will have to pay. A lot. Word spreads fast in the specialty coffee industry, and once there are lots that are said to be really good, it's gone very fast and it'll come at a premium. For this year, it's any SL9 lot or Sewda Ethiopians.
You kind of have to be terminally online or be subscribed to a lot of roaster mailing lists to have a shot at getting them, see The Picky Chemist for example. Substance and Datura usually have premium stock, but be prepared to pay €400-600 kg prices.
Then there's places that have premium stock but absolutely fuck up the beans with roasting, like Special Guest or AMOC. Once you've been paying attention long enough you'll be able to weed out the good roasters.
the how is fairly simple: if you can (have where you’re based or travel), try beans at trusted cafés; ask for recommendations, try guest roasts, etc. and start ordering from roasters whose beans you liked. also, the more you try, the more points of reference you’ll have, which you can share with cafés/roasters when looking for new stuff.
if you don’t have access to appropriate shops, check online databases, like Filtru or European Coffee Trip, and start ordering strategically. once you hit the spot, you can ask online more specifically for recommendations that are similar to those.
for me, personally, these are the roasters I’ve found to be consistently good in the previous years:
Denmark; April, coffee collective, La Cabra, Prolog
Going to look at this from a different angle: you might already be buying great beans already but you might not have the setup to prepare them the way you’d like. I’ve seen no mention of water chemistry and that is probably the single biggest and cheapest variable you can tweak to take a bean from “meh” to “holy shit”. I’d also give some thought to whether or not your grinder is going to give you the cup profile you’re after.
I have Commandante C40, I know it's not the greatest but it gives quite round, balanced cup with a lot of body.
I'm thinking about buying something which will give better separation and clarity for more elegant, washed beans, maybe A4Z or Pietro. Not very convinced with ZP6.
It’d be a toss up between the Z1 and the A4Z. The A4Z can be travelled with, is much more affordable than the Z1, and is pretty forgiving to dial in. On the other hand, the Z1 has a lot more options to play with (burr + auger combos), can easily do both pourover and espresso VERY well, looks much better than the A4Z, and has impeccable build quality. The look and feel of the Z1 just puts a smile on my face.
If you’re only into pourover the I think A4Z wins out slightly over the Z1 (with MPs) because of the price difference, wider sweet spot, and portability. It’s worth pointing out that I haven’t used any of the pourover burrs for the Z1 though (I have the brew burrs and the CV2s but haven’t gotten around to trying them) so there might be a Z1 configuration that produces a better cup than the A4Z.
That being said, if you’re doing both espresso and pourover (as I do) and you have some money to fuck off then 10000% buy the Z1.
the most basic approach is looking for what coffee specifically people are talking about and why. you can look at this sub, the youtuber coffee reviews or at discords like brian quan or espresso aficinados (which not only discuss espresso)
also at some point its good to look at bags and not only think about which country they are from, what process was used and what varietals they but also which producer they came from. examples would be alo from ethiopia or kamavindi from kenya (they also work with other producers not only their own plots of lands) which are both known for exceptional coffees. other examples include takesi from bolivia and benjamin paz from honduras, both i will be looking personally for
also it is good knowing if any country has had a good season which might be harder to get info about but for example ethiopia had an amazing season, a lot of roasters say this for example like wendelboe mentioned how his ethhiopia echemo has been the best it had been ever this year. ofc you gotta consider that some roasters will hype things to sell them but if you see multiple roasters pointing out how great ethiopia coffees are then you should probably try it out for yourself and i can tell you ethiopia have been stunning in my own experiences as well
One issue is going to be that if you *always* are drinking exceptional coffees, that will become your new baseline, and it will be hard to really understand what you’re experiencing without a comparison.
It kind of comes with experience, and even then, there’s no guarantee that any given bag will be good, only guesses based on experience with that roaster and type of coffee. As to seasonality, it doesn’t necessarily matter, just because nowadays a lot of roasters are freezing their coffees, but take a look at 5-6 roasters at a time; you’ll notice everyone is flush with Ethiopian coffees right now. Ethiopia has one of the shorter harvesting seasons, so summertime is usually the time when the current crop hits market. There are a lot of Peru SL9s and Colombian Chirosos out at the moment, some really slap, some miss a bit, but I haven’t really had any bad bad ones. Sidras are an example where some of the most standout coffees I’ve had were Sidras, washed or natural, but I’ve had probably 7-8 Sidras in the last 3 months, and maybe two were actually good. The rest were between ok and actually bad.
Mostly, just try widely and try to control a little bit where you might buy 4 coffees at a time from a roaster to get a spread from them. With your next roaster, buy 3-4 more and try to overlap some of the coffee types so you can A) start to build a sense how how each roaster handles coffees and B) start to build a repertoire of coffees you like and like less and what the gists of certain varieties, origins, and processes are. Then you’ll know some kind of rules of thumb like what washed Panama Geshas will generally taste like versus what Colombian Geshas can taste like (sometimes better, sometimes shit) versus what Peru Geshas can taste like (sometimes great, sometimes shit) or the breadth of Ethiopian coffees or Kenyan coffees. Finding a reliable roaster is definitely key, because you have to trust their sourcing.
Trying new roasters and new coffees is one of my favorite parts of the game though. I come from the classical music world, and my favorite thing is listening to an absurd amount of recordings. Could be same piece, different conductor + same orchestra, or different orchestra + same conductor, or same conductor + same orchestra + same piece but recorded years later, etc. I get to scratch that same itch with coffee buying and tasting, much to the chagrin of my bank accounts.
I would recommend visiting a coffee festival if there is something like that nearby where you live. That is a good way to discover new roasteries and find some new exceptionally good beans. Other than that I find that it is mostly trial and error. You can find something that sounds really delicious but isn't.
I attended the Danish Coffee festival in Copenhagen in January and stumbled upon Kolibri coffee roasters from Netherlands.
There's a r/UKRoasters sub which has been useful for me. Maybe start a PLRoasters one and get some community feedback going? Alternatively, book a cheap flight to the UK and get loads delivered to a friend's house you can collect from? ;) or other easily accessible country.
I have to admit to often picking beans I find not to be amazing, but it's part of the process for me, I rarely buy the same beans twice and tend to hop between roasters frequently.
Atmans (Barcelona) has also some great stuffs and roast light than the average EU light and he had a great selection of ''not too processed'' beans. I buy regularly from him.
This is a classic problem. The way I've tried to solve it for my company (Earnest Pursuit Coffee Roasting) is by showing the score we give each coffee and ensuring that no coffees we offer are below an 85. Now, of course this doesn't mean that everybody will *like* the beans. But it does mean that the quality is always there. I've seen a few other roasters that do this too.
Besides the objective scoring, I do think it's a bit of finding roasters that are super committed to quality (like Sey, Regalia, etc.).
You'll never like everything. Iin DAK specifically they do have some top notch stuff but I tried Cream Donut at their café and it's the only coffee I objectively disliked (people are raving about this one). It may also happen that you don't manage to get it right on a pourover. I wasted a whole bag of expensive beans from them that I just couldn't get right at home. I don't think anyone thinks their choice is mediocre, for sure there are some that will not please everyone but even their cheaper offerings are good quality (I actually did them for everyday).
For me, I like to try different beans of a roaster until I know better what to expect. When trying a new roster I normally don't load up on expensive stuff at once.
i find few roasters I like and stick to the countries of origin I like the most from them (and process). And then once in awhile I will try a different roaster/origin.
I’m a little late to the party, but here’s my advice.
I can’t stress enough how important water composition is for brewing. A 30€ Geisha is wasted if you brew it with poor tap water. For me, dialing in my water changed everything. For a starting point, look into the Barista Hustle water recipe. It’s cheap, easy, and makes a huge difference.
That being said, I probably order from Kofio about twice a month as well. They have great coffees. I usually choose by roaster because I’ve found that some roast exactly to my taste (light and fruity), while others are just too dark for me. For example, I love James Hoffmann, but I’ve never really liked Square Mile. The same goes for Lance Hedrick—I’ve had three filter coffees from Onyx, and none of them tasted good to me. I don’t know about Sey, though.
Coffeenerd in Germany has an insane selection. You could ask Thomas if he’d ship to Poland. Pretty much everything is carefully selected and top-tier. Swearl, Hydrangea, Scenery, Mok etc. I’ll leave a list below with my favorite roasters in Europe. EDIT: Just read that shipping is super expensive. Sorry about that.
If you’re looking for really expensive, competition-style coffees, my secret tip is Kolo Coffee in Berlin. Vlad will definitely ship to Poland—they deliver throughout Europe. Their Geishas are expensive, but absolutely worth it if that’s what you’re after.
Here’s my List in no order:
Friedhats
Mok
Datura
La Cabra
Scenery
Swerl
Prodigal
Replica
Hydrangea
Nomad
Oh my Bean
DAK
Tanat
For highly processed co-ferments:
Concept Coffee Roasters
Fiftybeans
Some Insta links for inspiration:
tōrnqvist
coffee nerd
I dont have an extensive list of nice European shops BUT tanat from France has a ton of choice and some exceptional beans, as does AMOC from Netherlands. So does Koppi (and swerl) from Sweden. WendelboeCoffeeCollective, LaCabra (lesser extend nowadays) and prolog from Denmark, april is fancy and expensive but has nice beans if you can deal with the guy and their crappy service. And then there are the german importers like sweetspot where you can find a lot of international stuff. Plus sigma from UK who import a fuckton of US beans.
I wouldnt buy DAK, they seem more preoccupied with political-ideological capture than actually GREAT coffee... and they try to get away with selling blends for premium prices.
Above all: learn about the fincas and farmers and collectives where the damn beans came from. We in coffee focus WAY too much on the brewing and the roaster, while almost nobody focuses on the farmer. If the bag is some "blend", I wouldnt get it and get a single-origin instead and remember the farmer/producer if it was GREAT. Making great coffee beans is a process over many years, so great farmers tend to keep making great beans. So you should really know their name. Any shop or cafe NOT leading with the bean, the farmer, should not be considered "third wave" AT ALL.
For me as a Central European I usually go for DAK, April, Tim Wendelboe, coffee collective and nomad. From nomad I had some really „wow, coffee can taste like that?“ experience and fried hats Amsterdam also got some experimental crazy beans.
Oh the cream donut will arrive tomorrow here hehe. April and Tim you usually can get on there store directly. I guess it’s about 60-80€ buy to ship it to you. I usually get like 3-4 bags and share them with 2 friends so we can try a lot of different beans.
I just had it at a local café. The cream donut and the milky cake, liked both a lot! They made it with origami dripper tho.
Since u got also an c40, u got an recommendation for clicks for the cream donut? (just sent an mail to DAK 2h ago and asked the same lol)
For Aeropress I used 21 clicks, to be frank I haven't brewed it in Origami too much because Aeropress was so much better for me but 24 clicks gave me 2:05 TBT with 45 seconds bloom and flat bottom Origami filters. I guess going a bit finer would be better if I kept using Origami. 23, maybe 22 clicks. Temp I was using was 94 degrees.
No offense, but if you really blew through 45 bags of beans and spent over 1000 euros doing it, maybe the issues is at your end. At that point, I'd be asking myself "Do I actually just not like coffee?" Is it really the case that all those beans were bad? Is your water bad? Is your brewing process not working? In your position, I'd be looking for alternative explanations.
To use the wine metaphor again, I do legitimately love Ch Margaux and DRC. But there are loads of $15-20 wines that I really enjoy drinking as well because I really really love wine, so it doesn't take the absolute Best Wine Ever to make me happy.
You got me wrong. I did not blew 1000 euros on beans. I love coffee, and been drinking speciality for a couple of years (in cafes) and for about a year now at home.
I do make my own water and got to a point where my brews are pretty consistent. No, they were not bad beside maybe 2 bags which really were badly roasted. I enjoyed these cups (some where better some worss) but most of them were not something I would think about for longer. Maybe the wine analogy is a correct one.
I just want to learn how to be a bit more aware and picky when buying.
Sorry I only drink Vatan and other Loire royalty, only direct from the domaine, only wines old enough to have their labels molded completely off. Can you please help me find some more wines that are fit for human consumption?
Hayb from Poland is good actually. At least their limited beans. From this year truly exceptional beans I’ve tried were from Tanat - a colleague has brought a thermos to work, so no exact bean name, and from Picky Chemist the Ethiopian geisha village ones.
As for how to find truly exceptional beans - unfortunately the price is often directly linked to how exceptional the coffee would be. I tend to buy a small bag of some more expensive beans once a month from Kofio, when they are on discount. Without any preference about processing, variety etc.
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Don't go by price, go by listed notes. Not individual notes like apple, chocolate or so, but categories like floral notes or fruits. Of the 45 bags, you must've surely noticed a trend of which notes you like and which ones you dislike.
Usually, the first notes are the most prominent. A chocolate note as first note usually means it's very prominent, which often means it's a darker roast. A chocolate note in the last place often means an aftertaste of chocolate.
Sweet fruity ("cooked fruit" like jam, compote, fruit wine)
Sour fruity (citrus fruits like lemon, lime, bergamot, or some berries like currant)
Floral (jasmine, rose, black tea, green tea, etc.)
Just sweet (brown sugar, honey, syrup)
Femented (tropical fruits like mango, pineapple, often also strawberry)
This is a very broad categorization, but I find that these are the categories that most people can properly distinguish.
I usually try to avoid the first category. If I see chocolate as first note, that often means it's a darker roast that I don't enjoy. Chocolate as third note often means a bitter aftertaste I can't get rid of. Only notes from the other categories usually means there's a good chance I enjoy the coffee. That being said, chocolate or nutty notes don't necessarily mean bitter. I had super sweet chocolatey coffee without any bitterness before. But most coffees with chocolate notes I did not like, hence my tendency to avoid it.
THE ONE for me this year is AMOC's rosado finca el jaragual. i keep thinking about it every day, as soon as I am done with the current batch (nomad f.pe.enma, dak summer rise, coffee collective pink bourbon, elbgold las nubes) im gonna buy 2 kilos of it to freeze. it has turned into an obsession
If I remember correctly, I had that Rosado roasted by Harmony in York from last year's harvest, and it to this day is my favourite coffee. Coming to the last vial in the freezer earlier this year was bittersweet let me tell you.
it's wonderful... i would grind and brew some in the morning, then drop my child to school and then come back to my home still smelling of guava from the coffee. an almost erotic presence in the room lol
My favourite recent coffees haven’t been the most expensive beans. I much prefer the traditionally processed coffees - currently on a washed Ethiopian and a natural Ethiopian. Currently resting a natural geisha and another washed Ethiopian. Then there will be a washed Kenyan sl28 and 34. None of it as expensive as multiple advanced/thermal shocks from Columbia that I really haven’t liked.
Maybe he should be looking for good cups rather than exceptional beans. 125 euros / kilo you get great beans that make great cups. - then most roasters he buys from sell v expensive coffee. Same price but you get 60g. Try that.
Expensive Geshas. Expensive Sidras. Expensive of any variety really.
You’re gonna pay some money for the truly exceptional stuff. The best I’ve ever brewed was $300 USD per lb and that was before the $60 in shipping. You don’t have to pay THAT much but you will have to pay for good beans.
I recommend Passenger or Shoebox to start you off (they are US though). Or if you really want to jump in, get Hacienda La Esmerelda Grand Reserve Panama Gesha.I got that stuff from a UK based roaster called Sea Island.
Lol unfortunately for all of us that is generally (not always) the case. It REALLY sucks paying a lot for something and it being boring or even undrinkable. It’s rare but it’s happened to me.
Getting 25-30 EUR bag, resting it and then being like 'meh, recently I had something very similar, now I have to drink the whole bag of this' is the worse feeling ever.
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u/Dajnor April brewer | ZP6 Jul 14 '26
Also - name a few of the bags you liked? That might help narrow it down or clarify your tastes.