Maas Coffee Roasters offers the freshest, highest quality coffees available. We have a commitment to introduce every possible piece of information available so that you may be able to inform your customers and yourself about the specialty coffee market.

It is important to educate the customer about what makes specialty coffee special: care and cultivation of the plant, processing and the dynamic flavors of coffees around the world.

When a harvest concludes, processing must take place to remove the coffee beans inside each cherry. Two processing methods exist: the wet (washed) method, and the dry (unwashed) method.

The processing method helps determine the ultimate flavor of the brewed coffee. For example, wet-processed coffees tend to have a cleaner flavor, while dry-processed coffees often exhibit a heavier body and earthy flavor.

In the wet method of processing coffee, a machine breaks away the cherries' outer skin, removing most of the pulp and exposing the parchment-covered beans. To remove the sticky coating called mucilage, the beans are placed in large tanks of water to ferment for about 24 hours and then are throughly washed. The clean beans dry in the sun for two or three days or dry by machine. In the last step, a hulling (milling) machine removes most of the parchement and silver skin to expose the green beans.

Wet-processed coffees usually range in color from blue/green to gray/green. They tend to command higher prices because of the additional labor and equipment involved in the process.

Countries lacking sufficient water supplies, such as Brazil and Ehtiopia, most often use the oldest and simplest method of processing - the dry method. In this method, the ripe cherries partially dry while on the tree and then spread out in the sun on patios. Raked and turned several times a day, the beans dry for another two to three weeks. Finally, the dried beans move through hulling machines to remove the dried pulp, parchment, and silver skin.

Dry-processed coffees tend to be greenish to brownish in color. The coffee industry sometimes refers to these coffees as "naturals."

Before we purchase a green coffee, we always evaluate it first. We contact our suppliers and have them ship us small samples to cup (a process of evaluating coffee quality and identifying faults) and then place them in competition with each other and our current origin coffee in house. This cupping is always blind so that we can evaluate without prejudice. The winner is then purchased and shipped to Maas.

Our coffee is intially green and unroasted when shipped to Maas. Coffee can be roasted to varying degrees of roast, but it takes experience and skill to develop the most flavorful degree of roast for a specific Arabica bean. The majority of our coffees are roasted to brown tones, what we refer to as a Full City, with slight variations to heighten each beans's potential flavor. Vienna and French roasted beans have been carefully roasted beyond Full City. With colors of deep cherry-red brown to dark brown, these specifically selected beans withstand this darker roasting process, developing deeper flavor, smokey tones and a tangy, bittersweet character.

Freshness

We go to great lengths to offer such great coffee as fresh as possible. We are fortunate that our service and product offerings have grown but we will continue to expect, rely and demand upon our freshness standards. We will never compromise our coffee's freshness. Our roasters work at least five days a week and monitor the daily sales of each bean. Our customer can always count on the fact that our quality and freshness standards are unequalled. This very notion is what will always seperate us from every other roaster/retailer and the outstanding knowledge and service that you provided will ensure this.

House Blends

Many coffees are well known for their outstanding characteristics, Kenya's fine acidity, Sumatra's syrupy body and Costa Rica's clean flavor certainly come to mind. The art of blending coffee requires an understanding of each bean's elemental qualities so when combined, each flavor contributes to an increase in overall complexity. Blending coffee therefore is a quest for enhancing flavor. Blend components are roasted individually - to regulate each bean's optimum roast - and then combined. Some blends have varying degrees of roast color, from light to dark, while others have consistent roast colors. The process of blending is time consuming and accomplished by hand. Blends are tried and re-tried until a harmony of flavors shines through.

Organics

A large national demand has given rise to our carrying certified organic coffees. Five years prior to the coffee being certified organic, the soil and crop must be tested for fertilizer and pesticide use. Greatly less than significant levels of trace elements are found in any coffees, and the certified organic label assures none contact the environment.

FYI

All coffee-producing countries produce different grades of their coffees varying in price and quality. It is important for our customers to know what they are buying. A company that offers 100% Columbian coffee is more than likely telling the truth. However, the coffee may consist of low grades of Arabica coffees all grown in Columbia but lacking in quality. Desirable flavor characteristics and, probably freshness, at a premium price. At Maas, all of the coffees we offer are what we say they are. We never alter or adjust our labeling to misrepresent a grade of coffee or trick our customers into buying low quality coffees at a higher price.