Getting the Lowdown on Monkey Coffee

Four coffees, two cupcakes, one large bowl of chips with garlic aioli & tomato relish, and a large kuay teow.

This was all that we had, prior to our attendance at a Monkey Coffee session ($15.00 pre-booked) last Friday night. We were tired, full of lactose, and hungry. Although very good, the coffee session did not help with our predicament!

The session was carried out at Lowdown Espresso, the latest coffee addition to Perth’s CBD. Fiori Coffee’s Kamran conducted the one hour session, taking us through four different coffees, made in Lowdown’s Fetco CBS 2021 temperature calibrated coffee brewer.

Upon arrival I realised that had I completely forgot my camera. So I had to make do with my iPhone 3GS! I managed to improve some of the photo quality (with little touch ups here and there in Photoshop and ACDSee)…but only very slightly.

As you all know, I am a lover of coffee. I am no expert, and never will be. Attending coffee sessions like these helps to give me an understanding of what I am drinking. Appreciating coffee is like appreciating wine. You have a slight interest in finding out where the coffee comes from, and why it tastes the way it is. Tapping into your imagination and creativity in order to describe its similarity to a particular type of food, fruit, bodily excrement, etc makes it all the more enjoyable. That’s my view, not an expert’s one. And that’s where I like to draw the line in the sand – my interest stops there

Kamran and the gang at Lowdown Espresso

Kamran giving us the lowdown of what was to happen that night

And now onto the night…

First up on the tasting block was the Doka Estate Costa Rican coffee, a fully washed bean, farmed on the fertile slopes of the Alajuela Poas Volcano, in rich soil, high altitude, and ideal climate. The coffee had a smooth clean taste, much like cognac with a hint of tartness. It had a nice clarity, and the flavour was strong.

Doca Estate Costa Rican Coffee

The second coffee was an Ethiopian Harrar, an arabica species that was unwashed. It smelt floral and fruity like dried berries. Initially the coffee tasted like dried wood and cigarettes. A few minutes later this was less so, with the flavour being less toasty, more nutty, and like raisins.

The Sumatran Aceh was our third coffee. It was semi washed and was therefore sweeter than the previous two. It had less acidity and tasted very earthy like soil. The body was gelatinous-like. A few minutes later the flavour was more of a dark chocolate, with an aftertaste of liquorice.

You will notice in the picture below that the clarity of each coffee gets darker and darker.

Doca Estate Costa Rican with milk, Harrar Ethiopian, Sumatran, and Devon Monkey

Our last coffee was the Devon Monkey. (No, not the Devan Monkey, the Devon Monkey – I do look like a monkey though )

The idea behind Monkey Coffee is that monkeys will find and select the ripest coffee berries, based on natural instinct. This is where behavioural patterns come into play. A common pattern is a monkey moving from bush to bush, tasting and spitting one or two fruits from these bushes until it finds one that it likes (one that bears the tastiest of fruits). Another pattern is that monkeys do not move too far into open spaces. They search for food under the canopies of big trees for safety, meaning that the fruits selected are from spots under shade. These behavioural patterns indicate a very special selection process is involved. This is much different to workers harvesting ripe crops – only the fully-ripe fruits are harvested based on observation.

Monkey Coffee

Monkeys do not simply chew and spit the coffee fruits. They gather as much fruit as possible in their oral sacks, and then move to a safe place before sucking on the sweet and juicy mucilage. In this process the fruit stays in the oral cavity of the monkey for a considerable time. This gives the coffee fruits/beans a few unique properties.

1. The coffee fruits / beans are retained at a higher temperature because it is in the oral cavity.

2. The beans are in contact with monkey saliva for a long period of time. The enzyme Amylase present in the saliva acts on the sugars present in the mucilage.

3. The oral cavity of every organism houses numerous microorganisms which play a vital role in breaking down simple sugars and in pre-digestive modification of the coffee fruit.

After a long period of time the coffee parchments (wet-processed coffee with the dried parchment skin still covering the bean) are harvested, which at this stage, have dried to a 10.5-11.0% moisture level. As a result of this, the salivary components continue to remain on the parchment for a long duration of approximately 2 – 3 weeks. The pre-cleaning, washing and flash-fermentation are then carried out to improve the quality of the beans for storage.

So, with some monkey coffee trivia fully explained, we moved onto the monkey coffee tasting. One was made with the Fetco, and the other through an espresso coffee machine.

The Fetco brewed Devon Monkey Coffee initially smelt like jasmine flowers. Its taste was nutty and smokey, and the body quite thick and creamy. It was like drinking a coffee with the consistency of spit from the monkeys themselves. Yum! (note the sarcasm.) After a few minutes, the smell of jasmine flowers was literally non-existent, and the coffee still creamy, nutty, and smokey.

Devon Monkey Coffee

Our last coffee for the night was the same monkey coffee made with an espresso machine. We got to choose the type of coffee (espresso, latte, etc), so I chose a long macchiato, and for my mate, a short macchiato. To accompany our coffees we picked up slices of chocolate cake and coconut bites made at Lowdown. The coffees and sweets were great. It was good to end the night with a bit of sugar on the palate, and some lactose.

Devon Monkey Long Macchiato

Devon Monkey Short Macchiato

Chocolate cake and Coconut bite

Of all the coffees presented to us tonight, I very much liked the unwashed Ethiopian Harrar as it was very flavourful – distinctly fruity, and berry-like; very similar to a wine flavour. The monkey coffee was “better” than I expected but I wouldn’t pay $28.00 for a 250 gram bag of that stuff, as I know that there are better, much cheaper coffees out there.

The coffee appreciation session took us through four coffees from different countries. This allowed attendees to taste, think, describe, and compare between all four types. Kamran wanted us to understand the difference between each of the normally harvested beans. We could therefore wholly appreciate the process involved in the production of monkey coffee.   In conclusion, the distinct comparisons between the coffees were:

• Doka Estate – fully washed, resulting in a smooth, clean, yet strong flavour
• Ethiopian Harrar – unwashed, and therefore dry, giving it an intense flavour
• Sumatran Aceh – semi-washed, with the sweetness from the berry creeping into the bean
• Devon Monkey – naturally selected, not as sweet as the above three coffees, and a strong nutty smokey flavour

Our small class of 10 had an enjoyable night. The 8 other attendees looked hyped up and ready to being their night, whereas my mate and I were buggered, and in need of some decent food and quality rest.

And as a last note, Mark, Adam, Sarah, and Claire seem to have brought something unique to Perth with their new funky cafe, Lowdown Espresso. It looks more small bar than cafe with its warm lighting, and stark contrasting colours. The offering of brewed coffee, gourmet flatbreads, and Hungarian cherry cakes make this a worthwhile place to look out for next time you’re in the city.

Lowdown Espresso Bar
Address: Shop 16a, Cloisters Arcade, Hay Street, Perth
Tel: +61 8 9226 3041
Web: www.lowdownespresso.com.au

Opening Hours:
Monday – Friday (7:00am – 5:00pm)

Fiori Coffee
Address: 42a Hasler Road, Osborne Park
Tel: +61 8 9328 4988
Web: www.fioricoffee.com

Related posts:

1. Coffee Cupping at Ristretto
2. Ristretto Coffee Tasting/Cupping – Eat Drink Perth 2010
3. My Top 5 Coffee Places
4. Coffee Tasting at Yahava KoffeeWorks
5. Dimattina Coffee