The Elusiveness of great coffee

I was on holiday last week at Centre Parcs in Normandy. They provide these wonderful cottages, but most importantly they also provide a filter coffee machine in the kitchenette. Knowing this I took my own coffee, some Guatamalan from the Nueva Granada Estate.

Now my first mistake was not to have the coffee ground specifically for a filter coffee machine. Because I have a Cafetiere (French Press) at home I broke one of my cardinal rules, I "multi-ground" the coffee, i.e. it should work in both a Filter coffee machine, and a Cafetiere. But of course as with all compromises that doesn't really work. What it means is that you have to load more coffee in the filter coffee machine than would be ideal in order to get the level of extraction you would get if the coffee had been correctly ground. So first pot of coffee based around my usual measures turned out to be disappointingly weak.

Day 2 - Loaded coffee machine with adjusted quantities of coffee, and hey presto! those wonderful Caramel notes started to surface.

Day 3 - Aaaaaaaagh! Coffee's ok, but not nearly as good as day two, despite being stored in the fridge and a barrier bag. What happened? Has the staling process of the coffee resulted in the finer qualities of the coffee disappearing, is it me?

Day 4 - Different again

I'm not sure what to conclude, clearly the coffee will be staling as oxygen from the atmosphere is absorbed by the grounds - interestingly also Centre Parcs put up a notice to say that the tap water had become unsafe to drink (there had been a lot of rain). Or finally was it me? Like all things we consume there are some days when we can't get enough of a particular food or drink, whilst on others when we really aren't bothered and in fact want something completly different.

As a coffee roaster it highlights just how diificult it is to achieve perfection when so many factors are at play. I guess consistency is the key - keep shooting at perfection and just maybe the coffee will be great more often than not.