News

We've got a whole heap of our most popular flavoured coffees now back in stock! French Vanilla, Cinnamon Hazelnut, Blueberry Cobbler and more - they're all there! Click through to the web shop and see what's available.

It has served us faithfully for the last few years but all good things must come to an end. In the next few weeks we hope to have our new, updated and easier-to-use website up and running. We have updated the look but most importantly improved the functionality and the customer experience of the website, based on the feedback we have received from you. We will still have the same payment option of Google Checkout (as well as reinstating Paypal) and a much-improved checkout stage. There will also be lots of cool extra little features but we wouldn't want to spoil the surprise too much! We'll keep you posted...

You will now find a fantastic range of thermal cafetieres, insulated travel mugs and French press mugs available to purchase in the shop. Produced by Planetary Design in the USA, this is a fantastic collection of innovative accessories for the coffee-lover who wants their coffee to stay hotter for longer! Brilliantly designed and manufactured from double walled 18/8 stainless steel and with scratch-resistant high gloss finishes, these robust yet stylish cafetieres and tumblers will make the ideal addition to any discerning coffee-lover's kitchen. Browse through our accessories and gifts sections for a closer look.

You'll be pleased to hear that we have now added the option of paying for your coffee through Paypal in addition to using Google Checkout. We are in the process of improving some of the features of the website and, thanks to your feedback, including additional payment options was one of the first things that we have addressed. So now as well as paying with Google Checkout you can choose to use Paypal. Now there's no excuse not to order your favourite coffee!

Last month, we told you about the new Fair Trade Peru: La Florida from Alpen Sierra Coffee Roasters that arrived recently. A few days ago, we received an email from their founder and head roaster, Christian Waskiewicz which included some more information about the Co-operative and the benefits to them of Fair Trade certification. We thought we'd share it with you too!

A group of 100 small-scale family coffee farmers from Peru’s Chanchamayo region came together in 1965 to form the La Florida cooperative. Their efforts have brought vitally needed education, infrastructure, credit, and environmental restoration to their remote corner of the Peruvian jungle. Today, the cooperative has grown to include more than 1,200 farmers who work together to improve the quality of the cooperative’s coffee.

La Florida has enjoyed dramatic benefits since it began selling to the Fair Trade market. The co-op has used revenue from Fair Trade sales to fund the following initiatives:

• A technical school. The Occupational Learning Centre for Sustainable Agriculture offers in-depth training in environmentally
responsible farming techniques.
• A micro-credit programme. A portion of the Fair Trade price funds a village banking project that lends money to women who run household businesses.
• Healthcare services. La Florida finances medical training and supplies in rural areas.
• Training in crop diversification. La Florida's technical assistance teams teach farmers how to grow non-traditional fruit varieties for sustenance and extra income.
• Community infrastructure. La Florida has contributed to the completion and maintenance of five roads, three portable water systems, three schools, a bridge, and a health clinic.
• Improved coffee processing capabilities. La Florida has purchased electronic coffee-sorting equipment and additional acreage for coffee drying patios.

“Fair Trade helps all of La Florida’s members
and their families. Now our members
get a better price. With the income from
Fair Trade, we can invest in social programmes
for the development of our communities.”
César Rivas Peña,
La Florida General Manager

This great coffee should hopefully be available for the next few months so have a look in the web shop and try it for yourself.

Continuing our efforts to increase the range of  organic coffees we offer in the shop, we are pleased to say that we have added a great new coffee from the La Florida Co-operative in Peru. According to Inter-American Coffee, the La Florida co-operative was established in 1966 and does a lot of work to improve life for the local community, providing schools with new equipment, maintaining the roads and providing jobs for local people. As for the coffee, the beans are from the Norte growing region of Peru and Alpen Sierra dark roast them for an intense but sweet, malty and dark chocolate flavour. The coffee has a mild acidity, round body and a clean after taste. Why not try it with something sweet and chocolatey as an afternoon treat?!

As part of our aim to increase our range of Certified Organic coffees, we are pleased to bring in this delicious new single origin coffee from Alpen Sierra Coffee Roasting Company. Most of our coffees are blends which we feel offer more of a complex flavour in the cup but we do try to carry one or two single origins at any one time. Many Mexican coffees are certified organic, less expensive in comparison to some other South American coffees and are generally considered to be mild and lighter bodied. Consensus seems to be that the best come from the Chiapas region in the far south of Mexico, as Alpen Sierra themselves say: 'Mexico's coffees are best described as light to medium in body with delicate and sparkling characters of sweetness and fine acidity. She boasts production across twelve states, but we find the finest, sustainable speciality coffees to come from the Oaxaca Pluma and Chiapas regions.'

They describe their Mexico Chiapas as a 'medium/dark roast with delicate aromas of honey and spicy notes. Notes of honey and cedar are present in the flavour with a mild acidity and a light body and a sweet, clean after taste.'

Buy a bag today and let us know what you think. If you need the coffee ground for you, then give us a call and we can grind it to suit whatever brewing method you use. Enjoy!

Congratulations to Tania Orde who has won a year's supply of speciality coffee! Her name was pulled out of the hat (well, cardboard box actually!) this afternoon. Her first delivery of gourmet coffee will be sent out next week!

We have collected all the cards that were filled out on the two Friday sessions of Taste of Edinburgh and will be drawing a name this afternoon. We'll announce the lucky winner tomorrow (13th) afternoon on the website as well as our Facebook page and our Twitter feed! Good luck everyone!

A huge thank you to everyone that came to see us at Taste of Edinburgh on Friday. It was shaping up to be a great weekend with Saturday afternoon completely sold out so it was a real shame that it had to be called off. However, one look at the pools of water and the partially submerged tents on the Saturday morning and you knew it was the right decision! Despite the mud, Friday was still a busy day and there was a great atmosphere around the site. Our samples of flavoured coffee were flying out all day and we got some really positive feedback from everyone that we spoke to. We also got a great response to our competition judging by the huge stack of contact cards sitting in the office! We'll announce the winner on our website, Facebook page and Twitter account later on this week so good luck if you filled out your details!