Category: Blog

Coffee Christmas cocktails

Posted on by Sara Walker
Release your festive spirit with our coffee cocktails
Release your festive spirit with our coffee cocktails

Deck the halls with boughs of holly, tra la la la……it’s only six weeks until Christmas, and we’re getting in the mood with these festive coffee cocktails. Don’t forget to order your coffee beans from us in plenty of time to make sure your Christmas (and that of your customers) goes with a swing.

Alcoholic cappuccino

Lovely creamy indulgent cappuccino – but with a decidedly adult twist. Here’s what you need:

  • Cream liqueur
  • 100ml whipping cream
  • Freshly brewed strong black coffee
  • Chocolate shavings or powder

You’ll also need a heatproof measuring jug, a heatproof glass per person and a spoon.

Whip the cream until it stands up in soft peaks, and set aside. Heat the measuring jug by filling it with hot water then emptying it. Brew your favourite coffee by your preferred method, and for each person, measure out 120ml and pour it into a heatproof glass. Add 50ml of cream liqueur, and mix thoroughly. Top with a spoon of whipped cream and a sprinkle of chocolate. Serve with a mince pie on the side.

Espresso martini

With the new James Bond film hitting our screens, here’s our take on 007’s favourite drink.

You’ll need:

  • 25ml gin
  • 25ml cream liqueur
  • 25ml freshly brewed coffee, cold
  • teaspoon of sugar per person
  • coffee bean, to serve

If you want to do things properly, you’ll also need a martini glass, a cocktail shaker, some ice cubes and a sports car…

Fill the cocktail shaker with the ice, and add the other ingredients except the coffee bean. Shake everything together, pour into the glass and garnish with the bean. Lean back and enjoy after you’ve saved the world.

For coffee beans and a wide range of coffee accessories all at great whole sale prices, take a look at our main website, www.wholesalecoffeecompany.co.uk.

The importance of coffee roasting

Posted on by Sara Walker

Coffee LocationUnless you’re a dedicated coffee geek and like to roast your own beans, chances are that by the time you see your coffee beans they’ve been roasted and packaged. Home roasting coffee beans is an inexact science, as to produce a consistent result a whole range of factors need to be the same every time. This really requires commercial machinery, and although it’s perfectly possible to home roast your own coffee and get a good result, it generally involves too much messing around for most of us.

The first factor affecting coffee tastes is the location in which it’s grown. As a general rule of thumb, South American coffees have a nutty or citrussy note and African coffees tend more towards a berry taste. Other flavour notes include chocolate, caramel, pepper and spice, which is affected by the growing region, weather and variety of plant.

Once the beans are picked and process, the single most important thing that happens to them in their journey from plant to cup is roasting. A skilled roaster can bring out the flavour of the beans, highlighting their natural characteristics. A dark roast will result in an almost smoky taste, whereas with a lighter roast more of the subtle flavours will be kept. It can be fun to roast and blend your own coffees, but it takes a trained professional to match different flavour profiles together for a result that’s both delicious and consistent. Experiment by buying blends that have broadly similar compositions but are roasted differently to find out just what a difference roasting makes. Everyone will have their own personal preference, but trying the occasional new blend or roast can result in a greater understanding of the process involved and how it affects the flavour.

Here at the Wholesale Coffee Company, we’ve got a range of expertly-blended and roasted coffee beans for sale, all at great wholesale prices. To find out more, take a look at our main website.

 

More reasons to love coffee

Posted on by Sara Walker
It's official - coffee can be good for you!
It’s official – coffee can be good for you!

Here at the Wholesale Coffee Company, you’d expect us to be big fans of coffee. Until recently, though there was a bit of a perception that coffee was incompatible with a healthy lifestyle and was on many people’s list of ‘thing to give up for Lent’.

A number of recent scientific research studies, though, reveals that current thinking is in favour of drinking coffee to support a healthy lifestyle. Some of the studies showed links between coffee and a decreased risk of type 2 diabetes, some kinds of cancer and overall, a lessened risk of premature death.

While this is great news for coffee lovers, it’s obviously not a free pass to drink 30 cups of coffee a day – experts recommend two to four cups to reap the health benefits.

 

Among other positive coffee news, recent studies reveal that coffee drinkers live longer. A study involving almost 1 million people linked those who regularly drank two to four cups of coffee a day to a 14 per cent lower risk of dying prematurely from any cause whatsoever. Drinking one or two cups a day had a proportionately beneficial effect, with an 8 per cent lower risk. Caffeine didn’t seem to be a factor in the study, with regular decaff drinkers enjoying the same lowered risk.

Coffee also has a positive effect on your risk of developing certain kinds of cancer, including liver cancer and prostate cancer. Coffee contains naturally occurring compounds which have anti-inflammatory properties which can be useful in protecting the body from toxins and carcinogenics.

 

 

Drinking coffee can also help to protect you against the risk of developing type 2 diabetes, with those who drink more than three cups a day enjoying a 21 per cent lower risk. Again, the type of coffee (caffeinated or decaffeinated) didn’t seem to affect the results. Chlorogenic acid which occurs naturally in coffee can improve your body’s ability to metabolise glucose as well as have an anti-inflammatory effect.

 

 

If we’re inspired you to go on loving coffee, take a look at our range of wholesale, top quality coffee beans and accessories available to buy online.

Coffee tasting notes

Posted on by Sara Walker

coffee-beans-healthMost large commercial coffee companies employer a professional ‘cupper’, or taster, or even a team of people. As coffee is an organic product and subject to variation caused by a number of factors including weather, the taster’s job is to evaluate and assess each batch for consistency, and also to assess new blends. Tasters have very sophisticated, sensitive palates, and they can differentiate between acidity, bitterness, sweetness, aroma and aftertaste to get a complete sense of the coffee flavour. As just as much of the flavour of coffee is perceived via the olfactory membranes as via the taste buds, they also need an excellent sense of smell!

To be objective, tasters have to work in surroundings that are free of any odours that might interfere with the tasting process. They’re always served with freshly-ground and freshly-brewed coffee, as this offers the maximum of fragrance, and they evaluate every part of the drink from the aroma to the crema, the fine layer of foam that sits on top, caused by the release of the natural oils in the beans. When it comes to actually tasting, the process is rather like wine tasting with the cupper swirling the drink round to release the flavours then swilling it round their mouths before finally evaluating the aftertaste.

When the process is finished, the result is the ‘tasting notes’ that appear on a retail bag of coffee – for example, a strength factor, then notes such as ‘rich, toffee notes’ or ‘well-balanced, smooth and chocolaty’. Other descriptions you might see include ‘butterscotch notes’, ‘red wine’, ‘fruity’ (especially berry or citrus notes) or ‘mellow’. There may also be more complex and delicate top notes, all of which help to give coffee its rounded flavour.

 

 

 

Here at the Wholesale Coffee Company, we’ve got a range of top quality beans for you to discover, all at great wholesale prices. To find out more, visit our main website.

Our favourite coffee quotes

Posted on by Sara Walker

beans and groundsHere at the Wholesale Coffee Company, we live, work and …er…drink coffee. A lot. In fact, it pretty much fuels our working day. It’s not just us who find it inspirational, though – here are some quotes that underline just how important coffee is to almost everyone.

 

“If it weren’t for the coffee, I’d have no identifiable personality whatsoever.”
(David Letterman, American former television host, writer, producer, comedian and actor)

 

 

 

“I judge a restaurant by the bread and the coffee.”
(Burt Lancaster, 1913 to 1994, American film actor)

“I would rather suffer with coffee than be senseless.”
(Napoleon Bonaparte, 1769 to 1821)

 

“Coffee makes us severe and grave and philosophical.”
(Jonathan Swift, 1667 to 1745, Anglo-Irish satirical author whose works included Gulliver’s Travels)

“This coffee falls into your stomach, and straightway there is a general commotion. Ideas begin to move like the battalions of the Grand Army of the battlefield, and the battle takes place. Things remembered arrive at full gallop, ensuing to the wind. The light cavalry of comparisons deliver a magnificent deploying charge, the artillery of logic hurry up with their train and ammunition, the shafts of with start up like sharpshooters. Similes arise, the paper is covered with ink; for the struggle commences and is concluded with torrents of black water, just as a battle with powder.”

(Honoré de Balzac, 1799 to 1850, French author and playwright, who supposedly drank 50 cups a day and wrote about it in a work entitled ‘The Pleasures and Pains of Coffee‘.)

“Coffee, which makes the politicians wise, And see through all things with his half-shut eyes.”
(Alexander Pope, 1688 to 1744, English poet.)

“I never drink coffee at lunch. I find it keeps me awake for the afternoon.”

(Ronald Reagan, 1911 to 2004, American commentator and actor, best known as the 40th President of the United States between 1981 and 1989)

If all this talk of coffee is making those caffeine cravings kick in, visit our main website now to browse our range of everything you need for your coffee business, including beans, accessories and cups.

What should your coffee cup be made of?

Posted on by Sara Walker

coffee-691464_640Paper, polystyrene, china, pottery, glass, metal….it seems you can made a coffee cup out of more or less anything, but what’s it doing to the taste of the drink? We take a look at what to use and when to use it.

Paper
Paper cups are often seen at events and in situations where breakable cups aren’t an option. For the cafe owner, the advantages are that they’re lightweight to transport and cheap to use. For the consumer, they’re discardable and great for taking drinks away, but don’t insulate very well and can be uncomfortable to hold as a result. Some paper cups are fitted with corrugated outer insulating layers or cardboard slip covers to reduce this problem.
Polystyrene
Polystyrene cups are lightweight and non-breakable, and as they have much thicker walls they have better insulation qualities. However, they’re not very ‘green’ as they can’t be made from recycled materials or recycled themselves, and they can make the coffee taste a bit funny and plasticky.
Glass
Using glass cups for coffee is a fairly modern institution, and was introduced to showcase drinks such as latte which has distinct layers. Like ceramic materials, glass doesn’t affect the flavour of the coffee but doesn’t hold heat as well as china and pottery.
Metal
Metal mugs are normally used for camping and brewing up your coffee outdoors. Look for mugs coated with enamel or made from stainless steel, as aluminium mugs can taint coffee. Hot drinks in metal cups lose heat quickly.
Ceramic
Ceramic cups are probably the oldest type of manmade drinking vessel, and are what most of us still drink our coffee from now. Ceramic ranges from fine bone china to thick, chunky pottery, but all ceramic cups have the advantage that they hold heat well and don’t taint the drink.
Take a look at our range of paper coffee ups here.

Can coffee help fight bowel cancer?

Posted on by Sara Walker

beans and groundsHere at the Wholesale Coffee Company, we love to hear good things about our favourite drink. It seems that the scientific world agree with us too, as a new study has revealed how coffee could help in the fight against bowel cancer.

The study, carried out by the Dana Farber Cancer Institute in Boston,  is the first to examine the relationship between bowel cancer recurrence and caffeinated coffee. It followed the progress of 1000 men and women who had already suffered from the disease. They found that drinking four or five mugs of caffeinated coffee a day meant that the disease was around half as likely to reoccur, and reducing the amount of coffee consumed lowered the health benefits. Scientists aren’t yet clear about exactly how the caffeine works in these cases, but think that it may help to reduce inflammation by reducing the body’s need to produce insulin, which is a risk factor for cancer.

One of the researchers, Dr Charles Fuchs, said, “If you are a coffee drinker and are being treated for colon cancer, don’t stop,” before going on to add that if you didn’t already drink coffee you should discuss it with your doctor before taking it up.

As well as bowel cancel, the research appear to show that drinking around 460mg (the amount found in four to five standard mugs, depending on strength) of caffeinated coffee a day could cut the risks of several other types of cancer including postmenopausal breast cancer, cancer of the liver, melanoma and advanced prostate cancer. There’s also believed to be a link between caffeinated coffee and a reduction in the risk of type 2 diabetes.

In addition to caffeinated coffee, health professionals also recommend maintaning a healthy bod weight and diet and regular exercise to lower cancer risks.

Stock up on wholesale coffee supplies for your office or catering business at our main website, www.wholesalecoffeecompany.co.uk.

Coffee and health facts

Posted on by Sara Walker

coffee-beans-healthFrom the highlands of Ethiopia to the smart coffee shops of London, mankind has a relationship with coffee stretching back for hundreds of years. In that time, coffee has accumulated a lot of myth and mystery. To help you separate fact from fiction, here are some health-related coffee facts about our favourite drink that you might not have known.

  • Coffee is a great source of antioxidants. Antioxidants can help protect your cells from premature aging of the skin, as well as fighting heart disease and other age-related problems. A daily coffee intake can boost natural antioxidant levels, helping reduce the signs of ageing.
  • If antioxidants is what you want from your coffee, you can choose either caffeinated or decaffeinated as both contain the same health benefits.
  • Coffee is a low calorie choice – in fact, a cup of black coffee contains almost no calories. Adding sugar, milk or syrup is what boosts the calorie content, so if you’re dieting switching to black coffee will help you maintain weight without any hidden calories.
  • Coffee boosts mental performance, helping kickstart alertness in the morning and maintain it throughout the day.
  • It also helps physical performance, helping endurance athletes to maintain peak performance for longer. It’s not clearly understood exactly what role caffeine plays, but it’s thought that it may help to inhibit fatigue signals from the brain.
  • If you’ve got a headache brewing, taking one paracetamol tablet, one ibuprofen tablet and drinking a cup of caffeinated coffee can help to stave it off as caffeine helps constrict blood vessels in your brain and reduce tension.

Drinking two cups of caffeinated coffee and a cup of decaf a day is a great way to get the health benefits. To take a look at our range of coffee beans and blends, visit our main website at www.wholesalecoffeecompany.co.uk.

 

Coffee goes into the space age

Posted on by Sara Walker

coffee-international-space-stationTwinkle, twinkle, little star; how I wonder what you are. Next time you look up into the night sky and see a bright star, it could be the International Space Station, where astronauts have just succeeded in making coffee that’s literally out of this world. The problem with space coffee up to now has been that a normal coffee machine can’t function in zero gravity. There’s also been the danger of rogue coffee grounds finding their way into sensitive, expensive equipment and also boiling water being spilled and wreaking havoc in the cabin. The problem has been solved by a specially designed machine that’s a collaboration between engineers Argotec, the Italian Space Agency and coffee company Lavazza. The machine’s been named the ‘ISSpresso’, and has proved a big hit with caffeine-starved astronauts. Italy’s first female astronaut, Samantha Cristoforetti, took pictures of herself with the world’s first space coffee, alongside the new machine, and posted them on Twitter.

We can’t blame her for being excited – the coffee machine was delayed for months after the rocket carrying it from earth exploded. Unfortunately coffee was deemed to be ‘non-essential’, so its arrival was delayed until a replacement ship could be sent. The astronauts aren’t home and dry, though – they currently only have a starter pack of 20 capsules for the machine, so we’re imagining squabbles over the space breakfast table! NASA is still working on how to dispose of the used capsules ecologically.

Now the espresso machine’s up and running, NASA hopes to develop the same technology for other applications, such as consuming medicine.

Here at the Wholesale Coffee Company, we can’t promise space age coffee – but we do have some great tasting, high quality beans at wholesale prices. For more information about our products or to shop online, just visit our main website at www.wholesalecoffeecompany.co.uk.

What time of day is coffee time?

Posted on by Sara Walker

beans and groundsAt the Wholesale Coffee Company, we think any time of the day is a good time to drink coffee. From kicking off with a cappuccino to unwinding with a decaff at the end of the day, coffee’s a big part of our everyday routine. It turns out, though, that drinking coffee first thing in the morning might not be the best way to enjoy it. Getting the first caffeine kick of the day too early could mean you start to build up a tolerance, so subsequent cups won’t have as much of an effect.

Naturally, we produce a hormone called steroid hormone called cortisol, which helps regulate many of the body’s processes such as the immune response. It also helps the body respond to stress, appearing when we’re either under pressure or afraid. In addition, though, it also helps regular our natural hormonal cycle known as the circadian clock. That’s what tells us to wake up in the morning, and to start winding down at night, so we feel more awake when our cortisol levels are higher first thing in the morning.

Scientists believe that we shouldn’t drink coffee when our cortisol levels are at their highest, partly as caffeine can interfere with the production of the hormone and partly as it’s the time of day when we need the caffeine least. Drinking coffee early can also help you build up a long term tolerance, which is why caffeine fiends have to drink more and more to get their buzz.

The other peak cortisol production times are mid-day and in the evening. Avoiding drinking coffee during these times, and instead focusing on the periods of low cortisol production will help you get the most from the energising effects. Try a cup between 10am and 12pm or 2pm and 5pm for the best results.

For great quality coffee beans and coffee accessories all at wholesale prices, take a look at our coffee beans page.