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What is Gourmet Coffee

Question

What is "gourmet coffee?"I have friends who only want to buy gourmet coffee beans. Is the coffee worth more if its label says that it is gourmet coffee? What is the difference from other coffee?

Answer:

Thanks for the question. It comes down to knowing what you are buying. Just because a coffee beans have a label that says "Gourmet Coffee," that doesn't really tell you anything about the quality or origin of the beans.

The best beans are 100% Arabica beans, and you would want the roaster to start with high quality green beans. That would be my minimum definition of gourmet coffee.

Unfortunately, there is regulation or even consensus about what the term, "gourmet coffee, should mean. In the United States, high quality, darker roasted coffee started in the 1960's when Alfred Peet started his coffeehouse in California, which was a precursor to Starbucks. When Peet cane to America, most people bought low quality beans with a light roast, like they brewed at the local diner. Nobody paid attention to the type or quality of the coffee bean, or worried about when or how the beans had been roasted. And really, if you are going to percolate coffee like was mostly done then, maybe it doesn't make much difference.

Today the coffee business has completely changed. People want rich coffee flavor, and they are willing to pay several dollars for a cup of coffee at Starbucks or the local coffee house, to get that premium coffee flavor.

Just as with gourmet cooking, you expect higher quality and attention to detail from gourmet coffee beans. However, in reality the gourmet label should simply be a notice that you should ask more questions. To make sure that the gourmet label means something, you need to ask more about the origin of the beans, their quality, and the roasting process.

You can learn more about what to look for in gourmet coffee beans, on our gourmet coffee page.

For more about Peet's, Albert Peet eventually sold out to a large cofffe company. But his coffeeshops are still going strong, and here is the Peet's Coffe web site.