Coffee Education and the word "roastery"

As I was brainstorming about this weeks blog and thinking about what I would write about, I look up at my wall and see the framed piece of paper with my name that says "Master of Education" which immediately makes me smile. The reason I smile is because its a reminder of how much I love teaching. Education and teaching, along with music and coffee are great passions of mine. As a new school year approaches and I get ready to enter my 14th year as a public school educator I thought why not put some of my passion of education to use and open up a conversation about coffee to discuss the word roastery and what exactly are we creating in our new space on Maine Street! 
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For todays class we will start with ----Chapter 1 - Is "Roastery" even a word? 
Well to start my spell check does not recognize it as a word which led me to look it up in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Nope not there. Really! Go check if you don't believe me...I was also amazed that a word my 6th grade teacher taught me how to spell and was supposedly supposed to be the longest word in the dictionary was not there either! Antidisestablishmentarianism. You can check that one too ;) What is going on? 

Chapter 2 - What exactly is a roastery?
Simply put it is a place where coffee is roasted using a commercial drum roaster. Roasting coffee transforms the chemical and physical properties of green coffee beans into roasted coffee products. The roasting process is what produces the characteristic flavor of coffee by causing the green coffee beans to change in taste.
Bonus Fun Fact:The word came from this movement of producing high-quality coffee, and consider coffee as an artisanal foodstuff, like wine, rather than a commodity. That movement is referred to as Third Wave of Coffee. (1st wave being: Growing coffee consumption exponentially, and 2nd wave being: the defining and enjoyment of specialty coffee.)

Chapter 3 - Electric Fountain Brewing Coffee Bar & Roastery - How are we different?
With all that being said and how Electric Fountain Brewing is different than any other coffee shop in Quincy (including all name brand big coffee chains) is that EFB will be the home of Quincy IL's only roastery! We will roast all of our own coffee beans in house at our location at 6th and Maine! 

All restaurants have to source their coffee somewhere. Majority of the businesses around the area are having to purchase roasted coffee  from roasteries in St. Louis, MO.  Electric Fountain Brewing is unique to Quincy because we will be the only local roastery within a 110mile radius of Quincy! The closest ones being in St. Louis, MO, Columbia, MO, and Springfield IL. 

Chapter 4 - How do we find the farmers and the best green beans all over the world? 
I am thrilled to have a small team that I collaborate with located on both east and west coasts that do the traveling for me! They travel around the world finding the best organically grown coffee beans that DO NOT use pesticides or chemicals when growing their beans. We pride ourselves in paying those farmers a fair wage and sometimes as much as three times the amount of "fair trade" prices and other coffee companies. We primarily focus on finding "single origin" coffee farms where it is coffee grown within a single known geographic origin. Sometimes this is a single farm, or a specific collection of beans from a single country. The name of the coffee is then usually the place it was grown to whatever degree available. Single-origins are viewed by some as a way to get a specific taste, and some independent coffee shops have found that this gives them a way to add value over large chains.

Once we find a quality bean the team works out the details of getting those beans into the US and shipped to Quincy. From there I take the green coffee beans and roast them to different flavor profiles ( with our 2 small commercial drum roasters) based on where they are grown to bring out the best taste for that region.

Life is too short to drink bad coffee especially coffee that is mass produced with the help of chemicals and pesticides.

So support your local organic roaster, support the work that goes into farming chemical free, support our effort of bringing the best chemical free beans from around the world to downtown Quincy for a tastier, healthier, cleaner cup of coffee. Our mission is to provide you with "a cup of coffee that you can feel good about. "

Vocab List
​ 1. Roastery
2. Antidisestablishmentarianism
3. Third Wave Coffee Shops
4. Single Origin
5. Organically grown

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