Hey coffee lovers, when you grab a bag of coffee, do you reach for a single origin or a blend? While single-origin coffees excel at showcasing the unique flavors of a specific place and processing methods, blends bring complementary coffees together to create something entirely new.
In this guide, we’ll explore what coffee blends are and why and how roasters create them. Then we’ll share a selection of our favorite certified organic, Fair Trade blends that we think you might enjoy.
What Is a Coffee Blend?
Blended coffees are created by combining two or more distinct coffee varieties, lots, origins, processing methods, or roast profiles to create an often more complex flavor profile that differs from what each component offers on its own.
Why Do Roasters Create Blends?
Balance
Sometimes coffee from a single origin may not have the right balance of sweetness, body, flavor, or acidity that the roasters are looking for. In that case, they may blend to create a better balance. For instance, a bright, fruit-forward, light-bodied coffee might be paired with a fuller-bodied one with more roast-forward notes like cocoa or toasted nuts if the roaster wants to create a well-rounded cup with a medium body.
Complexity
Roasters also blend to create more complex flavor profiles than you can typically achieve with a single-origin. For instance, a seasonal blend might be created by combining different origins and roasts to create a flavor profile reminiscent of baking spices, cocoa, toasted nuts, and dried fruit all in the same cup.
Consistency Across Seasons
Some roasters also blend to create a consistent profile from one harvest to the next since studies show that seasonal climate variations alter the chemistry of the beans, so the exact same farm can produce different-tasting harvests if growing conditions, processing, or other factors change.
For the Sake of Creativity
Here at Dean’s Beans (and at many other roasteries) we relish in the creative process of creating new blends. Our aim is to bring complementary origins and roast profiles together in ways that best highlight each, so we can offer new flavor profiles to our customers.
Signature Blends
Many roasters also like to create their own signature blend that expresses a recognizable flavor profile. Signature blends often become a familiar part of their lineup and become associated with their brand image.
Cost Effectiveness
Finally, for some roasters, cost is a primary motivator, where they take higher-quality, more expensive beans and blend them with cheaper beans to lower expenses. But at Dean’s Beans, you can count on us to never blend to mask inferior beans because we never compromise on quality.
How Coffee Blends Are Made
While the basic idea of blending is pretty straightforward, building a balanced blend takes careful tasting and refinement.
Selecting the Origins
First, roasters study the acidity, flavor notes, aroma, and body of the different single-origin coffees, varieties, or roasts they want to blend. Understanding the growing conditions and the processing methods is important because it shapes the flavor of green beans and the resulting roast profiles, even when darker roasting occasionally overshadows the more subtle origin characters. Then, roasters can take those profiles and blend them in a way that creates complex flavors, a balanced profile, or accentuates certain characteristics.
Pre-Roast Blending vs. Post-Roast Blending
Another decision for roasters is whether to blend before roasting or after roasting. When coffees are very different in size, density, and other characteristics, it’s often best to roast them separately and then blend them together after.
Post-roast blending also allows roasters to combine distinct roast profiles, like a medium-dark blend that showcases the sweetness and balance of a medium roast but with the roast-forward flavor notes of a dark roast. Or maybe they want to blend a light and a dark roast together to highlight subtle fruity and floral notes of the origin alongside the more robust roasted notes of a dark roast.
However, pre-roast blending can streamline production when the components have compatible densities and roast behavior. And some roasters just prefer how the coffees develop together inside the roaster.
Finding the Right Ratios
Once the blend components are selected, the fun part is figuring out the recipe. Blends are rarely a simple 50/50 split, and roasters rarely get the intended balance they seek on the first try.
Instead, blends are often made from a base coffee that makes up the largest component, and then one to several additional coffees are added in smaller percentages to introduce things like bright acidity, complex florals, baking spices, or other characteristics.
Once blended, it’s time to brew, taste, and refine.
For instance, if one component’s bittersweet dark chocolate notes overpower the blueberry notes the roaster also wants to highlight, they reduce that component and brew, taste, and refine it again until they achieve a flavor profile they are satisfied with.
Our Organic, Fair Trade Coffee Blends
Blends Built on Relationships
At Dean’s Beans, our blends aren’t only about creating exceptional flavor profiles. Every one of our certified organic, Fair Trade, shade-grown coffees, whether single-origin or blends, comes from long-standing partnerships with smallholder farmer cooperatives.
Through our People-Centered Development model, we invest in programs designed and led by our cooperative partners. These initiatives reflect priorities identified by the communities themselves and are part of our long-term partnerships, not charity.
Those relationships shape how we source each coffee that we roast, with the expertise of the farmers always remaining central to the quality in your cup.
A Few Blends to Try
Here is a selection of our certified organic, Fair Trade, shade-grown blends that we recommend trying:
- Our Uprising! Breakfast Blend is a smooth and balanced medium roast trio made from hearty Honduran beans from our partners at the Café Orgánico Marcala Sociedad Anónima (COMSA), sweet Peruvian coffee from our partners at the Pangoa Cooperative, and bold Nicaraguan coffee from our partners at the Promotora de Desarrollo Cooperativo de las Segovias (PRODECOOP).
- Our Moka Java Blend is a nod to one of the world’s oldest coffee blends, but instead of combining coffees from Yemen and Indonesia, our medium-roast blend combines bright, fruit-forward beans from the Sidama Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union in Ethiopia with the full-bodied, smooth, syrupy richness of Sumatran beans from our partners at the Koperasi Gayo Lauser Antara (KGLA).
- Our Italian Espresso Roast blend is a robust, full-bodied dark roast carefully crafted by blending beans from our farmer partners in Honduras, Guatemala, India, and Nicaragua. It delivers a bold, full-bodied, smooth cup with robust, bittersweet, and dark chocolate flavor notes.
- Finally, our South American Half-Caf blend is a medium-dark blend made by combining our Peruvian French Roast Decaf with a classic, easy-drinking medium roast Colombian from our partners at the Cooperativa del Sur del Cauca (CoSurCa) to create a balanced, medium-bodied half-caf blend.
Build Your Own Blend
What if you can’t find the exact combination you’re dreaming about? You can build your own blend.
At Dean’s Beans, we offer a custom coffee blend option where you can combine up to four different origins and roasts in any percentage to create a personalized flavor profile. It even comes with a personalized label so you can use your blend for custom gifts.
Frequently Asked Questions
What’s the Difference Between a Coffee Blend and Single-Origin Coffee?
A single-origin coffee comes from a specific region or cooperative, allowing you to taste the unique flavor characteristics of that origin. A coffee blend combines beans from multiple origins or roast levels to create an entirely unique, balanced, and often complex flavor profile.
How Do I Choose Between a Blend and a Single Origin?
The best way to choose is to try both and see what you like. If you want to experience the distinct flavor notes, acidity, and body of a specific region, try a single origin. Or, try a blend if you prefer highly balanced, complex, and consistent cups where different origins complement each other.
Every Blend Tells a Different Story
Blending is creative, and roasters rarely nail a new blend on the first try. That’s why blending is an art and a craft, as well as a science. We roast small batches of different beans sourced through long-term relationships with our farmer partners. Then our Roastmaster, Brendan, cups each blend to evaluate its body, acidity, sweetness, and flavor notes and adjust the ratios until we create the balance that he envisioned.
If you’re ready to try quality coffees that are grown, processed, roasted, and blended with care and attention, try Dean’s Beans’ certified organic, Fair Trade, shade-grown coffee blends today!
