We are so thrilled to welcome both of these incredible roasters back to Narrative.
Back? What do you mean back to Narrative? Slate's new to Narrative, aren't they?
Well. If you didn't have an opportunity to visit our pop-up last summer, Slate Coffee might be a new name to you, as we have yet to feature them here at our brick and mortar space. But we featured them fairly substantially last summer - we launched with their coffees on our bar and we were one of their first wholesale partners for their canned cold brew!
I am thrilled to say that they're back and that their current line up of coffees are *quite* delicious. They were among the more impressive I've seen on a blind cupping table (how we taste and evaluate coffees). Beyond that, Slate Coffee is some of my oldest friends. I've known Keenan and Lisanne Walker for a little over 5 years now. I met them when they held their Roaster's Showcase at La Marzocco's headquarters in Ballard and we've been friends ever since.
We've been rather close - frequently sharing accommodations when traveling to coffee events, helping each other taste coffees and prepare for industry events, and I've even held a few guest shifts at Slate's Ballard location and a pop-up they did for the Specialty Coffee Association in 2014.
Slate Coffee is some of my oldest friends and it is with great joy that I have the honor of welcoming them back and to share their beautiful coffees with you.
Their Kilenso, Ethiopia was the highest scoring naturally processed coffee we've had come across our table yet - we called dense berries and chocolate with substantial cleanliness. Their Adisue Kidane, a washed Ethiopian showed off juicy-fruit like (yes, like the children's gum) qualities that were so pronounced I wasn't positive if it was washed or natural. For the coffee nerds out there, this probably means it underwent a longer under water fermentation period, allowing for dense fruit qualities to develop while keeping the clarity of flavor high. We also tasted a really nice Guatemalan coffee from the El Mirador farm that has a dense, syrupy body (if you find notes on body from me, it's probably pretty special in that regard as I tend not to care too much about body in coffee) with a quick spike of acidity that melts quickly into soft balanced milk chocolate. All three of these coffees are delightful and we're excited to feature them.
We are also so very excited to welcome back for a second time in a row, Huckleberry Coffee! The three coffees we've been featuring, the Gicherori PB, Adado, and Las Brisas all showed *very* well on the cupping table this time. Consistent results like this from a blind table are encouraging as they seem to indicate that we are getting more calibrated and the roasting partners we are working with are maintaining quality over multiple months. Their coffees have been delicious and easy to work with for us, so we are really excited to keep them on for the month of November.
Come try out these delicious coffees for yourself! We'll be seeing the last of coffees from our friends at Verve this week. We look forward to having them on our table again in the future.
See you soon!
- Maxwell Mooney