A blend of different roast levels is called a Melange, and it’s a great tool for home roasters!
MelangeA blend containing a coffee that has been roasted to a different levels (or steps) - light to dark.: A blend containing a coffee that has been roasted... just means “a mix” or a medley. Doesn’t sound so fancy when we put it that way! In coffee, I have always understood it to means something specific. It’s not just a mix or blend, but it’s a blend of different roast levels, lighter and darker. For home roasters, blending different roast levels can be a great tool. When you want to pull more dimension out of a coffee, get more roast tasteThe set of flavors that result from the degree-of-roast.: Roast Taste is a term we started to distinguish it from "Origin Flavor". We use the "roast taste" term... without sacrificing the bright notes of a lighter roast, a melange is a good option. I am using it lately for decafs, to try to punch up the acidity
Acidity is a positive flavor attribute in coffee, also referred to as brightness or liveliness. It adds a brilliance to the cup, whereas low acid coffees can seem... level a bit.
This video is part of my article on the melange, just talking about the cases where a melange is useful:
Mixing and Cupping a Melange
I was working with a bunch of decaf coffee roasts I had done, and noting that I wasn’t getting the brightnessA euphemistic term we use often to describe acidity in coffee. A bright coffee has more high, acidic notes. : A euphemistic term to describe acidity in coffee...., the top end snap from the cups. I though a blend of roast levels would be a good idea. While I am showing decaf roasts here (which do look a bit different than most non-decaf coffee), the same ideas apply.
Like I said in the video, blending different roast levels together (whether it’s the same coffee or different roast levels of different coffees) … it’s not my first option. I like to taste single roasts of simple originIn coffee talk, it refers to a coffee-producing region or country; such as, "I was just at origin." Of course "Origin" for most product we use is not... coffees primarily.
For me, the logic of blending, or in this case a melange, stems from first tasting the coffee on it’s own. If I feel like there was more in the coffee my roast did not reveal, then my first step is to re-roast the coffee and see.
Only after that, when I feel a coffee isn’t entirely what I am looking for, do I think about a melange. It’s a bit like using HDR modes on an SLR camera. There are certain lighting situations where you can’t get the range you want, so HDR becomes a good option. But always using HDR means you aren’t using it very wisely, by first establishing the need for it, and then implementing it as a means to and end.
Start first with unblended single roasts as a basis. In my decaf test I was unhappy with the top end flavors missing in the cup, but wanted to keep some of the roast tones of the more developed roast levels. Melange made sense.
In fact, it showed me that I preferred the same coffee with slightly different roast levels, vs. using different roast levels of different coffees. In particular the BrazilBrazil is a coffee giant . As Frank Sinatra sang, "they grow an awful lot of coffee in Brazil".: Brazil is a coffee giant . As Frank Sinatra... SWPSWP means Swiss Water Process is a patented water filtration decaf method, not a chemical solvent method. The plant is in Vancouver, Canada. process with 50 seconds of different in roast between the 2 batches was ideal. (And a bit like naturalistic use of HDR, felt like I was still tasting the same coffee, not something punched up to seem extreme for its own sake).
Good Job! You’re already making melanges, I bet!
My inspiration for this article was a conversation I had with a customer. They though blending roasts was somehow bad. Like many of you, they roast on the small scale machine – Popper in this case. They need 8 oz of coffee so they are often roasting 2 batches and blending them.
On the contrary (as I told them) it’s a great thing in most cases. In my case these decafs benefitted from the melange approach, but there are other coffees that are really attractive in the cup, great “drinking coffees” as we call them, but don’t have the pop and sizzle of other origins. GuatemalaGuatemalan coffee is considered a top quality coffee producer in Central America. Due to our proximity to Guatemala, some of the nicest coffees from this origin come to... Antigua area coffees are delicious, but don’t have the acidity of the Huehuetenango. They are a good candidate for melange.
Start first with unblended single roasts as a basis. In my decaf test I was unhappy with the top end flavors missing in the cup, but wanted to keep some of the roast tones of the more developed roast levels. Melange made sense.
In fact, it showed me that I preferred the same coffee with slightly different roast levels, vs. using different roast levels of different coffees. In particular the Brazil SWP process with 50 seconds of different in roast between the 2 batches was ideal. (And a bit like naturalistic use of HDR, felt like I was still tasting the same coffee, not something punched up to seem extreme for its own sake).
3 Responses
Tom…
I got an e-mail notification of you responding. Clicking the link in the e-mail takes me to the Melange article page where there are no comments shown. Not your ‘test’ and ‘test test’, nor my comment. Can you tell me what I’m not ‘getting’? Seems like I need to be clicking, or allowing, or ??? to see the comments.