There’s been a lot of chatter lately around the SCA’s shiny new toy on the cupping block—the Coffee Value Assessment (CVA) and how it compares to our tried-and-true 2004 Q cupping protocol. Let me be honest, friends: cupping is like a high school sweetheart; you can’t quit. You cling to it, swear it’s the best,[…]
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From 2004 to CVA: Same Spoon, Different Dance
By Kurtis-Michael Kearby Business, Coffee Roasting, green coffee, green coffee beans, Papua New Guinea Green Coffee, specialty coffee, Specialty Green Coffee, Uncategorized Oct 16, 2025
What Are Peaberries?
By Kurtis-Michael Kearby green coffee, green coffee beans, Papua New Guinea Green Coffee, PNG Green Coffee, specialty coffee, Specialty Green Coffee Apr 30, 2021
What’s the deal with peaberries? They’re not peas and they’re not berries. They do not look like an average coffee bean. Are they a defect or delicacy? What are these mysterious beans? Coffee grows on trees – shrubs, to be more precise. Buds blossom into cherries and inside the cherry are the coffee beans. These[…]
How Do I Explain These Grades to My Parents?
By Kurtis-Michael Kearby Papua New Guinea Green Coffee Mar 12, 2021
Looking at the Benchmark list of green coffees is like singing the Jackson five-song ABC. The letters AA, C, PB, PSC AX, and Y are situated next to the coffee farm name. It looks like some secret code, but these letters provide useful information for green coffee traders, roasters, and green buyers: They are the “grade”[…]
Love
By Kurtis-Michael Kearby Specialty Green Coffee Feb 05, 2021
Over the last two decades, awareness of specialty coffee has taken the world by storm. Once a casual beverage consumed with very little thought, it has developed into a drink that stands for more than just a vehicle for caffeine. From the days of seafoam cappuccinos, through the slow movement, and back to an instant[…]