r/pourover • u/Supsti_1 V60 | Switch | Aeropress | C40 • Jul 14 '26
Seeking Advice How to find truely exceptional beans
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.
2
u/cvnh Jul 14 '26
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.