The culture in your morning cup

A burgeoning coffee culture is flourishing on the North Coast.
Local coffee roaster Michelle Hendrikz met with the Courier to discuss the kind of specialised coffees that have people begging for more.
Hendrikz runs Beanstruk, a boutique roastery in the Litchi Orchard, and has seen an increase in interest from locals since she took over the shop in February last year.
“More and more people are starting to want good quality coffee instead of the mass produced stuff you get on the shelves,” she said.
Hendrikz, who has travelled extensively, sampling coffee beans from as far as Bali, gets her beans from South American and numerous African countries, preferring the arabica bean grown in those countries at high altitudes, to the lower-grown robusta bean.
“The arabica is of a much higher quality than the robusta.”
According to Hendrikz, coffee beans are very sensitive to their environment.
“In poorer African countries, the beans are laid out in fields to dry, this gives them an earthier taste than the South American beans, which are washed.”
The roasting process also has a huge effect on the final flavour of the beans.
Hendrikz favours a medium roast, giving the beans, originally a grey-green, a dark brown hue.
“Bringing them out at 216 degrees creates a completely different taste than if I were to bring them out at 218 degrees,” said Hendriks.
“With some of the Columbian bean I like to change the roast slightly every now and then to bring out different flavours.”
“A good cappuccino is 50 percent about the bean and 50 percent about how the coffee is made,” she said.
Hendrikz offered some simple tips on how to make a good cup of coffee.
“You always have to look at what the grind of the coffee is. If you use a plunger at home you need to use a coarse grind, while you would use a fine grind for a drip machine and a very fine grind for an espresso.”
“Some say you should keep coffee in the fridge, but coffee is very porous and will absorb flavours from the food in the fridge, which can ruin it. I would suggest keeping it in a cool cupboard.”