Three Bourbons....

As tends to happen in the coffee industry, for whatever reason, a Twitter fight erupted several months ago concerning the importance of botanical cultivars versus geographic designations in retail coffee bag labelling (tawdry and banal, I know). The argument is a sensible one, trying to figure two things at once: one, which point of information is both more relateable and useful for consumers for us to transmit, and two, which of the two functions gives us a better idea of the flavor profile of a given coffee? 

My mind on this at the time was a bit of an eye-roll. As I've written previously, the flavor development in coffee comes from a number of factors -- soil, environment, processing, varietal, storage & age of the coffee, and the hows and reasons for roasting, to name just a few variables -- play into what flavors we find in a coffee. Of those, the soil & environment interplay with varietal to produce the general flavor outcomes we find in a given coffee, manipulated by roast and brewing method.  All of these variables -- such as a country's predominant botanical strain, the predominant style of processing, etc -- give way to the "general characteristics" that have long defined the flavor profile of regions or countries. On top of that, the history of testing all of those characteristics to determine what the "individual" quality of a given botanical is under average conditions -- something wine has been able to do to a point that we know what specific clones of Cabernet will do in clay, loam, and sand under various elevations and environments -- does not exist in a way that gives us something more than "Bourbons tend to be sweeter, cleaner" or "Jember tend to be earthy and herbal". A lot of coffee cultivars were bred specifically for certain conditions (SL-28, et al) or for specific resistance to diseases (Catimor), and so flavor in some varieties were not entirely a consideration. So to have this argument -- which says more, country of origin or botanical cultivar, is somewhat unnecessary. 

Now granted, this is changing -- individual farms, processors and co-ops are experimenting or examining individual cultivars, creating seperated lots, or trying different styles of processing (the 2008-9 craze of honey processing and Central American natural processing, anyone?). This degree of exploration is allowing the process of cataloguing to begin on an individual farm level (the way individual chateau do so in wine-making) and in certain cases creating national registers such as what Anacafe in Guatemala has been doing for a few years now. That all said, we need to keep an open mind when talking about the notion of which comes first -- the country or the cultivar. (The farm, for the moment, will stay out of this particular conversation, though as in wine, it can have a mixed record of use in terms of consumer utility.)

This brings me to the three samples of bourbon I've had the chance over the last week or so to sample: Stumptown's El Injerto Bourbon (Guatemala, Washed), Counter Culture's Varietal: Bourbon (a blend of two bourbons -- Guatemala and El Salvador, both washed) and the MadCap Coffee Varietal Series El Porvenir (which is Bourbon with trace amounts of Typica, all washed). All three were sampled from days 4 - 15 post-roast, stored appropriately, and done either as V60 pour-overs or as Japanese-style iced coffee (hot-brew). All three bags emphasize that these are rooted in the varietal / botanical cultivar of coffee and are supposed to be representative of the cultivar in question, in this case Bourbon.

Here's where things get tricky. Bourbon is not a uniform class of coffee -- there are a number of sub-cultivars and mutations that exist in its class. Orange, Yellow, Red and "pink" Bourbon exist, as well as a number of cultivars ("Kent") that are taken as Bourbon but do represent in some cases a biologically distinct cultivar. All coffees are washed, which I won't take argument with here (based upon distinctions that may exist in certain cases, but largely speaking we considered the processing here to be a constant). Also in consideration but not weighted was soil -- all the farms connected here have differing soil types, elevations, and enrichment programs (speaking for El Porvenir, there is an extensive composting and enrichment program that exists at all of Gloria's farms). Lastly, the roasters in question are all qualified, and all produce awesome product. Aside from regional distinctions in roasting profiles, we also considered these constants, of a sort.

The reason I raise the points above -- all three were distinctly different coffees. El Injerto was a bright, snappy, deeply citrus-and-olive oil affair, fruity with a balance familiar to coffees from Huehuetenango; the El Porvenir deeply chocolately, heavy bodied, and unctuous, with a kirsch-like element; and the Varietal Bourbon was the most balanced and delicate of the bunch, with an elegant acidity and a mild spice-cake like finish. These are three radically different taste profiles coming from 3 roasters (4 farms total) from 2 countries (Guatemala and El Salvador) and 2 regions (Huehuetenango and Apaneca-Illanpatec). From this view, its hard to say that there is/was a firm case that arguing cultivar is a key way to inform consumers when the notion of what those cultivars do -- in conjunction with all those other stages -- can be so very distinct. This is not a criticism of cultivar-centric labelling or projects, but as coffee pros we need to be open to the ways in which coffee, and the ways we manipulate it, can be as individual and distinct as the people who grow it. I'll get the taste clouds posted soon -- Squarespace is having an issue bringing them up, but I'm sure they'd be insightful. 

The Ever Elusive "Taste of Place".

A note from Terroir during it's Summer of Riesling celebrations. Photo courtesy of Brunello's Have More FunWhen I first named this blog, I was inspired by the use of term "terroir" upon the illustrious and often long-winded menus of Paul Grieco at Terroir Wine Bar. Paul establishes a sense of terroir through assembling wine lists that are not only comprehensive and speak to particular vintners, wine growers and brewers with a particular point of view, but also include delicious screeds about things like street fairs, the USDA, or Real Madrid football. In this sense, terroir is being built two ways -- there is a distinguishable quality to the space, the idea, and the format of what Terroir Wine Bar encapsulates, but also represents something with an undeniable sense of self.

This cuts to the core of the issue surrounding the definition of terroir -- a concept often misunderstood, misrepresnted, or largely ignored. Terroir is, largely, a recent term -- while the first sensations of the term begin as far back as Apicious and various Classical & Renaissance scholars and epicures, the word itself does not arrive until the late 1800's by the work of geographer Maurice Edmond Sailland, nee Curonsky, who utilized the notion of of various regionalized culinary traditions in his magnum opus Le tresor gastronomique du France. In the book, Curonsky lionizes the various foodways of Frances regions, and in conjunction with the nascent French auto industry (for its Bibendum publication, precursor to the Michelin guides) of its time, began to set aside day trips for Parisian and other urban middle classes to explore the culinary diversity of France, digging into the nostalgia of places from which those middle classes may have originated. Over time, this concept evolved as an economic development tool, leading to the creation of the Institute National des Appelations d'Origine in 1905, the organization that even today manages the regulation of the AOC system in France. 

From this place, we get the start of what defined official designations of terroir; soil, ecology, environment, and process. By wine standards, and even as far as food from the regions, the Appelation system concerns itself largely from the environmental & biological, looking at longstanding traditions (do communities have a history of making this wine or cheese), generally widespread utility of crop or foodstuff (is it grown widely or consumed widely by the community), shared process (are wines or cheeses made the same way using the same name). The matrix is quite simple: the minerals and content of the soil, going back millenia, interact with the rootstock of particular varieties of wine grapes, or grow the grass that become the fodder for cattle. The weather of a specific year the general ecology of these places interplay, and the handling of the products in processing, along with those two variables, produce the vintage. This collection -- soil, plant varietal, weather, ecology, and processing -- forms the basis of what the INAO would call "terroir"

In some regions, communities will oftentimes define terroir by an additional aspect, the social character of the geography. This has been best characterized by l'affair Mondavi, where the California winemaker Robert Mondavi was prevented from setting up a winery in Southern France, mostly on the contention by the local community that the property he was seeking to develop was essential to the "terroir" of the village itself. The property Mondavi was seeking to purchase was used as both a hiking, hunting, and foraging preserve as well as a waterway & a windbreak for the village for many generations, and was held in trust by the city. Many in the village made the case that development of the land would remove an essential character of the region, its people, and indeed its ecology & environment. 

While not commonly held, this last note of the social nature of terroir perhaps best captures what many organizations determine as "the taste of place". Outside of the wine world, especially where groups like Tierra Madre or The Ark of Taste are concerned, "cultural appropriateness" plays a part in what constitutes the terroir of a product. Simply because McDonald's has become traditional in certain environments does not make it part of what is culturally, ecologically, or otherwise attuned to a space; there's a context to be considered. To groups like this, which also have a strong connectivity to locavores, bioregionalists, and foodshed developers, talk about the ecological knowledge, the know-how to grow, prepare, and execute certain dishes, and stlyes of eating. These types of assessments of terroir come from the same people who'll tell you why you can't find Pekin-style duck in Sichuan, or why most Scandiavian breads are ryes instead of white flour (or perhaps, why it's inappropriate to think of making Italian-style loaves in Scandinavia). 

What's best to walk away with from this synopsis are a few key things. One, terroir is not an exact science. Two, it is highly regulated by both social norms (in unofficial capacities) or by regulatory agencies (in institutional capacities). Three, it is recent, though it must be noted that the idea certainly is part of what makes things "traditional" or "authentic" to a place; indeed, it's this last point that should be readily considered when we talk about "the taste of place". And lastly, it is more about knowledge than about taste or flavor. The idea behind anything terroir-based is on its face a notion of preserving, encouraging, and promoting longstanding traditions and ways of making things; it is about not cutting corners, and more explicitly about why one shouldn't cut corners.

Perhaps famous in this regard are the Canauliers of Bordeaux, the bakers of the canale, specifically the AOC-protected Canale de Bordeaux. For these gentlemen (as yes, it is only men who can be Canauliers), the creation of these little cakes is a tradition spanning back at least 300 years. Made in copper molds coated with beeswax, the cakelets have an indeliable crispness of texture on the exterior, with a custardy interior just barely cooked through, these cakelets are a symbol of the region. The molds they are made from replciate the shape of Roman guard towers, and the types of ingredients called for in canele de Bordeaux -- rum, vanilla, and butter/milk -- mark its connectivity to older trade routes (it was Frances port for West Indies imports), the dairy known on the Atlantic seaboards, and lingering Anglo influences in the Aquitaine. Only cakes made from those conditions can be called Canale de Bordeaux, which is why you have so many impersonators, mostly made in silicone molds and discounting the rum, which are soft, chewy but not toothsome, and without the characteristic flavors of dark sweetness made from the caramelization on copper. Its a different thing. Sure you can have the item in question, but does it speak the same language?

Which brings us back, oddly, to Paul Grieco. See, Paul continues to serve wines, in his idiosyncratic style, from equally precocious and idiosyncratic producers of some of the best places around. His bars, like the wines he's selected, reflect the place of their mooring -- his East Village bar is a far cry from the Murray Hill shop, one speaking to the intimate, enclosed & raucus spaces of the Village, the other designed for a more genteel, timid crew. He builds his menus to suit both his spaces and his crowds and his wine selection. All of these lead to a place that has its own terroir, at least in my definition -- it's a place that shows thoughtfulness, a point of view, and an ecology of design with the intention of promoting one thing: the wines. And if the wines Paul serves are indicator, you're getting Terroir from the minute you walk in the door to the last sip in your glass.