Archive for the ‘News’ Category

Christmas and New Year Delivery Times

We’re sure you all appreciate how hard Glenfinlas Coffee try to ensure your orders are sent out to you as quickly as possible but we’re also sure that you all remember the snowy December weather last year! So with that in mind, if you want an order to arrive in plenty of time for Christmas then we’d recommend that you place it sooner rather than later!

The dates for our last online and phone orders are as follows:

Tue 20th December (Highlands and Islands)
Wed 21st December (UK Mainland)

We will be ready to dispatch orders again from Tuesday 3rd of January.

Merry Christmas and a happy New Year from everyone on the Glenfinlas Coffee team!

Glenfinlas Coffee visits the Alpen Sierra roastery in Nevada.

At the end of October, Glenfinlas Coffee packed its bags and headed off to Nevada to see Alpen Sierra Coffee Roasters at their new roastery in the small town of Minden, Nevada. Located in the Carson Valley, close to the Californian border, Alpen Sierra moved here from their original roastery in Lake Tahoe in 2007.

Founder and roastmaster Christian Waskiewicz gave us a tour of the building in which the entire roasting and packaging process takes place. It’s quite a remarkable place. Large sacks of green coffee beans from Guatemala sat on pallets in the middle of the floor, glass jars, tasting charts and barometers adorned the walls. At one end of the building were packaging tables and at the other end sat two fabulous 25lb continuous ‘San Franciscan’ coffee roasters.

Next to one of the coffee roasters, Christian had arranged for us to try six coffees, including an Indian, a Guatemalan and two Ethiopian varietals (Nekisse and Tchembe). This is where Alpen Sierra’s ‘tasting team’ evaluate each of the new coffees as they come in and from where many of Christian’s recommendations to Glenfinlas Coffee come.

It’s always such a pleasure to see where amazing coffees like these are roasted and for us, it was so exciting to experience Christian’s knowledge and passion first hand. It was also great to meet his dedicated and talented team for whom the pursuit of producing speciality-roasted, sustainable coffee is so much more than a day-job!

George Howell Coffees are back in stock!

It’s been a long time in waiting but Glenfinlas Coffee are delighted to have a selection of fantastic George Howell coffees back in the web shop!

Glenfinlas Coffee have only recently returned from a trip to the George Howell roastery near Boston where we were shown round the amazing facilities, treated to some really interesting cuppings and got to meet some of the passionate staff, including the man himself!

We decided to bring in two coffee selections each from the Terroir and GHH Select ranges which you will find in the shop section.George Howell has become a bit of a legend on the coffee scene and constantly travels across the world searching for the highest quality beans to produce some of the finest coffees in the world.

We think they are truly delicious and would urge those of you who are passionate about great coffee to have a taste for yourself!

A great weekend at the BBC Good Food Show Scotland!

It involved a lot of travelling, heavy lifting and long hours on our feet but Glenfinlas Coffee had a rare old time at the BBC Good Food Show at the SECC in Glasgow last weekend! It was really great to see some of our customers in person and answer some of their questions and we were so pleased by how well our new coffees were received!

There was a lot of interest in the Italian Roast espresso from Alpen Sierra Coffee which we were sampling and using for espresso drinks, so much so in fact, that we had almost completely sold out by the end of the second day! There was also a bit of a buzz around the new range of flavoured coffees from New England Coffee that we were sampling. At one point we had a bit of a battle just to find people at the back of the scrum!

So all in all it was a great weekend and thanks to everyone that came to see us. I think it’s safe to say now though that we are all definitely in need of a bit of a rest!

Glenfinlas Coffee will be at the BBC Good Food Show Scotland!

We’re delighted to announce that Glenfinlas Coffee will be exhibiting at this year’s BBC Good Food Show Scotland at the SECC in Glasgow! The show is on from the 21st to the 23rd of October and promises to be a real treat for the food and drink lover. There are appearances and demonstrations from celebrity chefs like Tom Kitchin and James Martin as well as the best food and drink that Scotland has to offer.

Glenfinlas Coffee will be at stand C90 and we’d love it if you were able to come along and see us! We’ll be offering samples of some of our award-winning coffees as well as selling a range of our favourite coffees (plus one or two that you may not have seen before!) It would be a great chance to meet some of customers, answer their questions and tell them all about what’s happening at Glenfinlas Coffee!

Hopefully we’ll see you there!

Two Alpen Sierra coffees win 2011 Great Taste Awards!

Glenfinlas Coffee are proud to announce that once again, two coffees from Alpen Sierra Coffee Roasters have been awarded Great Taste awards from the Guild of Fine Food! Italian Roast and Alpenglow Mountain Blend both received a one star Gold Great Taste award at this years event. The Alpen Sierra coffees we entered were recognised by the judges for the quality of the beans and the expertise with which they were roasted.

Rumour had it that this year the judging was to be particularly harsh, and so it proved to be with no coffees receiving three stars. In fact, very few coffees received any Gold Awards so we feel even more proud! So now there’s no excuse not to order some for yourself and experience yet more award winning coffees sourced by Glenfinlas Coffee!

Worldwide Shortage of Fair Trade and Organic Beans

The end of 2010 saw a near thirteen year high in coffee prices which was caused mainly by an unprecedented global shortage of Arabica coffee beans. Various environmental factors in the main coffee producing countries of Central America, Brazil and Colombia coupled with land pressures on coffee farmers in Kenya have all contributed to poor coffee harvests in the last couple of years. But one of the main factors in the shortage, despite rising prices, has been a continuous rise in demand for high-quality coffee across the world and, in particular, a huge rise in the consumption of gourmet coffee in India and China. The shortage in Arabica beans has also meant a current worldwide shortage of both Fair Trade and Organic green beans which have also seen a significant rise in demand. At Glenfinlas Coffee we will stay in contact with our coffee roasters and aim to keep you informed of any changes in the future and, of course, try our best to keep your favourite coffees in stock!