Coffee guide
Before a bean ever gets roasted, it gets judged. Graders score the cup on a 100-point scale and count the flaws in the green beans. Here is what those numbers mean, in plain language.
The score
Trained graders taste a coffee and score it out of 100. The magic number is 80: hit it and the coffee is "specialty." Miss it and it is commercial-grade.
The 80-point line is where specialty coffee begins. Most of what we review sits in the 80 to 90 range.
The cupping form
That 100-point total is the sum of ten things, each scored out of ten by a panel tasting the same brew side by side.
The green beans
Before tasting, graders weigh out a sample of green beans and count the defects: black beans, broken beans, stones, sticks, and quakers (under-developed beans that will not roast). Fewer flaws means a higher grade.
No primary defects and just a handful of minor ones, with no quakers. This is the only tier that can also score 80+ on the cup.
A few more defects allowed and a couple of quakers. Clean, solid coffee, just short of specialty.
The everyday commercial grade traded on the commodity market. More defects, less consistency.
Heavy defect counts. Usually blended down into cheap, mass-market coffee.
Graders also note bean size (screen size) and moisture, which should sit around 10 to 12 percent for green coffee.
The letters
Those letters are a size grade, not a taste score. Beans are dropped through stacked sieves (screens) with holes measured in 1/64ths of an inch, and the ones caught at each size get a letter. Kenya, Tanzania and much of East Africa use this system, so it is what you will see on a lot of African bags.
Screen 17 to 18 (about 7.2 mm and up). The top size grade and usually the priciest. Big, even beans look premium and often come off healthy high-altitude trees.
A (screen 16) and B (screen 15) beans combined. The bulk of a typical crop: clean and balanced, normally a step cheaper than AA.
When only one seed forms in the cherry instead of two, it grows round instead of flat. Roughly 5 percent of beans. Sorted out and sold on its own.
The giant of the lot: two beans fused into one. Rare, more curiosity than category, and often broken during roasting.
Size is not the same as quality. AA tends to be good because big beans usually mean ripe, well-grown cherries, but a smaller AB or a peaberry can out-taste it. Other countries use their own labels for the same idea: India has Plantation AA, Colombia sorts into Supremo and Excelso.
Why it matters to us
A high grade means clean, well-developed beans with real character to draw out. Cold brew is the gentlest way to taste that character without the harshness hot water can add. We brew specialty-grade single origins cold and tell you how they actually drink. Back to the guides →
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