Lovely Redber decaffeinated coffee
Ordering some Redber coffee from Amazon had me quite excited. I can tell you my excitement went into orbit when the 500g package arrived!
You see, this decaf lark is all very well but I have been missing out on the finest coffee taste as there is such a limited range of ground coffees from the supermarkets. Supermarket coffee is mostly okay, not bad, mediocre, hum-drum, get the drift? Before I gave up caffeine I would occasionally buy coffee beans as a special treat and grind them myself (using our Krups grinder). Frustrated by the usual supermarkets not stocking decaffeinated coffee beans, I started to search the internet and came up with these from Redber, via Amazon.
There’s something really nice about having a date stamped on the packaging to show when it was roasted. I read “Roasted on 17 August 2016” as being roasted especially for me; now whether mine was done as part of a larger batch or not, I’ll never know but it doesn’t really matter. Fact is, it was roasted for ME on that date and I like that.
Grinding
So once I had the beans, grinding was needed and I think there’s quite an art to grinding coffee. Too little grinding and you end up with a grit-like powder which gives a weak coffee. Grind too much and you end up with a stronger cup with fine powder sticking together in clumps and some passes through the filter to bring that extra “texture” to an otherwise nice coffee. So once again with a little bit of trial and error, I got it just right and ground a couple of handfuls of beans.
In terms of how much to grind each time, I’m sure coffee connoisseurs would grind their beans for each cup of coffee. That’s a bit too tedious for me and so I grind enough for a few days in advance. I find this to be absolutely fine.
Tasting the American Decaf Blend
Initially I wasn’t sure I had made the right choice. It seemed a bit too intense and strong. So next I experimented with the strength and found a weaker coffee was better. Yes, the weaker version smelt better and tasted better and has quickly grown on me.
The description “luxurious, velvety smooth body, great aroma of warming spices and a sweet and gentle acidity” is a little lost on me. I don’t really get the description but I can tell you I really do like it.
For me, one of the tests of a nice coffee is drinking without milk. Although I normally have a little milk, it is always nice to try without and having this coffee black is very nice indeed.
Probably worth saying a little about Redber
Redder are a specialist coffee roasting enterprise in Guildford, Surrey. If you’re interested please do take a look at their interesting website as there’s far too much to say here. Once again I find myself admiring such folk who build a business like this and the joys of the internet make it easier to discover them.
I fired a question about the decaffeinating process and they quickly responded by saying:
“This coffee is decaffeinated using supercritical C02, which dissipates once normal atmospheric pressure resumes, taking the caffeine with it. So, no chemicals or solvents used whatsoever. Our other decaffs use the Swiss Water process, which as the name suggests, uses only water”. So that’s good to know.
One thing I learnt was that although you can buy their coffees through Amazon (as I did) ordering direct via their website means they send a further 125g bag of coffee which is matched to the original order. You can even place a coffee subscription order, so you have a regular supply of freshly roasted coffee dropping through your letter box. That’s pretty cool.
They do a good wide range of coffees, mostly stored as green beans and then roasted and ground as required. It is fascinating seeing the variety and also the gadgets and equipment, all coffee related.
Would I buy again?
Yes. Definitely.
Link to Redber – click here
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