We want coffee to kick us in the mouth with big dark flavours, wake us up with a serious caffeine hit and leave us tasting the smokey after taste long after we’ve put the cup down. https://hebtro.co/product-category/coffee/
The best way to get what you want is to do it yourself, with the help of the best guys you can find. Luckily for us we found our coffee guy just over the hill.
To get what we wanted we visited master roaster Chicago John in his man cave come roastery, tucked away in an old mill on the edge of the high Pennine moors of proper Yorkshire.
The deep, warm and complex aroma of coffee; big sacks full of unroasted green coffee beans in hessian sacks, printed with names of exotic locations; soft lighting, sharpened senses; the romance of an old mill building with rustic furnishings. Bottle all that up and slap in on all over yourself. We knew this was all going to go full HebTroCo.
“Stick your heads in these tins and just tell me what you like.” For sure there is science involved in roasting and blending coffee, but unless it tastes good and you want to drink it, it doesn’t mean shit.
Choosing a blend is a visceral thing. Go with the smells and your first instinct on tasting. If it’s good you’re going to love it without thinking about it. Lucking we both share a similar taste. We like peaty whisky, strong double IPA beers, weird world foods and with relevance to this story, strong tasting, smokey dark chocolate tasting coffee. We’ve always made ‘seat of the pants’ decisions and what we tasted in John’s world was kicking our asses.
After trying small shot glasses of espresso from our chosen favourite three single origin coffees, we got down to tasting blends. Serious caffeine was kicking in now and it took some focus to stay on track. We rejected our first blend, but then hit the golden coffee jackpot.
To make sure we weren’t just swept up in the moment we tried the coffee at home in the cold light of the following morning and it passed the test. It really did taste just as good. Ed grinds his own beans and uses an Aeropress. brant uses ready ground in a cafetière. We think this blend is something really special and so does John.
We don’t try to make clothes that everyone will like. We make clothes that we really like and we hope enough other people will come along with us for the ride, so that we can sell enough to make a living. This coffee is not for everyone. It’s really full on. If you like strong flavour that punches you in the throat and stops you in your tracks, then maybe you’ll like Double Black. We love it. We hope you do and we’d certainly like to know what you think.