Buying coffee 20 years ago was an easy task. You picked up a can of a national brand ground coffee from the supermarket, or, if you were slightly more gourmet, you ground your own bright red bag of whole bean Eight O’Clock Coffee in the equally bright red grinder at the end of the cashier’s station. Your choices were regular or decaffeinated; French Roast was a treat; and latte was just the Italian word for milk.

If it all tasted pretty much the same—hot, strong, and bitter—well, that’s just how coffee was supposed to taste. Not anymore.

In this article, we introduce you to a handful of local micro-roasters, folks who roast small quantities of coffee in their basements, their garages, or compact business spaces. You may see them or their coffee at your local farmers market, café, or restaurant. Or you may have ordered their gourmet roasts online. Nonetheless, their ability to offer fresh, limited quantities of high-quality roasted beans is changing the local coffee landscape.

Good Dog Coffee Micro Roasters
West River, Maryland
571-748-7519, http://www.gooddogcoffee.com

Even though it’s not his full-time job, Leo Miranda knew he had to do something with coffee. “It’s in my DNA,” he says with a laugh. “I love the product, all the culture, and the history—the whole package.”

Miranda, a biologist and supervisor of the Chesapeake Bay Field Office of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, grew up in the coffee-growing region of Puerto Rico and even owns a small coffee plantation there. Since he couldn’t plant coffee after he moved to the area, he decided to roast it, and began selling his beans under the West Indian Treasure Brand, adopting the name Good Dog Coffee as an homage to his three Labradors in 2005.

Miranda’s business is small but growing. He roasts shade grown and organic beans to order out of his garage nearly every day in 1 kilo amounts, and sells his coffee though the Internet and by word of mouth.

Miranda is fortunate to be able to buy much of his coffee directly from farmers in Puerto Rico, Nicaragua, Colombia, and through a Bolivian family in Massachusetts who import coffee from their own estate.

“I go the extra mile and make contact with the farmers,” says Miranda, who often finds coffee growers through friends and by word of mouth. “I like to sit down and talk to them because I learn so much,” he says. Plus, growers value the relationship and often boast about having their own private roaster, says Miranda.

“For me, coffee is my life,” he explains. “For my clients, I try to get them to have a coffee experience and not just drink coffee. It’s not like going to McDonald’s just to have the caffeine shot. I like to talk to people about my coffee and why they got it and how it got there. I try to get my passion out to my clients.”

Caffe Pronto
Roastery and cafe: 90 Russell St., Suite 500, Annapolis, 410-626-0011;
Cafe: 2329 Forest Drive, Suite G, Annapolis, 410-266-5776,
http://www.caffepronto.com

“We see ourselves as stewards of the bean,” says Vince Iatesta, owner of Annapolis’ Caffe Pronto. “Our job is to do everything the best we can to showcase coffee, to bring out everything that coffee has to offer.” This means Caffe Pronto does not offer flavored coffees or roasts so dark that they obliterate the character of any given bean.

Iatesta’s stewardship of quality coffee (and coffee’s qualities) is reflected in every aspect of Caffe Pronto. He sources beans directly from farmers in Central America and Ethiopia with whom he also works to improve quality control and farm sustainability.

Back in Annapolis, the beans arrive in burlap or sisal bags, ready for roasting, which occurs frequently and in small batches. In order to maintain absolute freshness for the consumer, Caffe Pronto beans have a very short in-store shelf life: No coffee is sold after three weeks of roasting. Even Caffe Pronto’s name, “coffee now,” is a reference to the freshness of the product.

Iatesta gained his appreciation for coffee in Europe, where he was studying as part of his graduate program in international marketing. Not long after his return to the States, he was ready to make a move from corporate America to opening his own café in 2002. 

Every day at 2 p.m., the roastery offers free public cuppings (tastings) that explore different qualities of coffee—body, acidity, and roast profiles. The café also offers product demonstrations of new coffee-making equipment and is offering classes in coffee brewing in conjunction with the local Whole Foods.

“Coffee has more flavor [and] aromatic compounds than wine does, and more complexity,” notes Iatesta. It’s more than just a morning pick-me-up or “caffeine delivery system.” For Iatesta, it’s a consuming passion.

Chesapeake Bay Roasting Co.
Crofton, Maryland
410-454-0102, http://www.cbayroasting.com

Rick Erber and his partners at Chesapeake Bay Roasting Co.are fanatical about their coffee and the environment—so much so that five years ago they founded a coffee company designed around the concept of being eco-responsible. Here, blends have names like Oyster Reef and Boater’s Brew and are sold in 100 percent recyclable and reusable steel cans. Beans are organic, fair trade, and rainforest certified. Even their Sirocco roaster is green: It re-uses the chaff from roasted beans (as much as 3,500 pounds a week) as fuel and releases fewer emissions into the atmosphere.

Erber, an Annapolis resident and avid boater, is also serious about Bay restoration. Motivated by what he characterizes as “a great passion for the region and the Bay,” the company regularly provides free catered coffee service to events promoting watershed restoration. Plus, a percentage of all profits from their coffee are donated to efforts to save the Bay.

Chesapeake Bay Roasting Co. coffee is sold primarily through wholesale accounts, online, Graul’s supermarkets, and at coffee shops listed on its website.

Eastern Shore Coastal Roasting Co.
Willis Wharf, Virginia
757-414-0105, http://www.coastalroast.com

Kristin and Jamie Willis have their hands in many connected pies. Among other endeavors, the couple own and run the Eastern Shore Coastal Roasting Co., a wholesale business they started in 2006 that roasts both coffee and peanuts (in separate roasters).

Nearly everything about Eastern Shore Coastal Roasting is connected to the narrow strip of Virginia’s Eastern Shore, from the roasting facility in Willis Wharf to the marketing of the coffee itself. “We wanted to provide a local niche and promote local places [through the naming of the coffee blends],” says Kristin Willis. Blends boast names like Hog Island Sunrise, Oyster Roast, and Machipongo Morning. Mockhorn Bay Birders Blend, a shade-grown, bird-friendly mix, is a nod to the migratory pathway along Mockhorn Bay. Zoe’s Decaf takes on a more personal significance: It’s named for the Willises’ three-legged dog, the company mascot.

Through a green broker, the Willises buy ethically grown coffee from 14 different origins, as well as maintaining several direct relationships with growers. “I’m particular,” says Kristin. “I want to know where [the coffee] comes from.” The couple roasts approximately 400 pounds of coffee a week to order for small businesses, cafés, and bakeries on Virginia’s Eastern Shore.

Kristin feels strongly that people be particular in seeking out local coffee whether it’s hers or a roaster’s in another community. “When a customer goes on vacation and seeks out a local coffee roasting company, that, to me, is massive, that I helped to get them to appreciate supporting a local business. It’s not in our business plan to have our coffee beans sold in Arizona.”

Rise Up Coffee
Multiple locations including
1216 S. Talbot St., St. Michaels, 410-430-8144;
529 Riverside Drive,, Salisbury, 410-219-1150; 
Tred avon shopping center, Easton, 877-474-7387,
http://www.drinkorganiccoffee.com

Call Rise Up Coffee and you’re liable to hear Bob Marley urging you to “rise up this mornin’ [and] smile with the risin’ sun.” It’s that kind of sunny optimism that pervades Tim and Abigail Cureton’s funky chain of drive-through coffee stands.

Tim’s fascination with coffee began during a Peace Corps stint in Micronesia between 1999 and 2001 when an Australian friend “opened his eyes to coffee.” (Today, Rise Up sends coffee to Peace Corps volunteers who contact the company through e-mail or Facebook.) Soon he was a self-proclaimed “coffee head,” and by 2005, Rise Up had its first drive-through in St. Michaels, followed by a location in Salisbury, and most recently, Easton.

Rise Up is “all about creating community around coffee,” says Noah Kegley, the company’s general manager, a task accomplished through a number of relationships, both local and international, which give rise to the company motto: “Grown by friends. Roasted by friends. Enjoyed by friends.” Organic beans are purchased from small farms through fair trade agreements, and roasted by a Pacific Northwest-based pal of Cureton’s. The drive-throughs use milk from Nice Farms Creamery in Federalsburg, and Rise Up Coffee is a component in EVO Rise Up Stout from Delmar’s Evolution Craft Brewing Co.

Come June 2011, the company hopes to have its own roasting operation. “We take what we do very seriously,” says Kegley, who recently completed a course of study at the American Barista and Coffee School in Portland, Ore. “Roasting coffee ourselves is going to give us more flexibility, and space for classes and demos.

It’s going to be great.” Coffee heads on the Eastern Shore can hardly wait.

WHAT’S IN A BEAN?
Organic, fair trade? How to decipher what’s in your cup.

Organic, perhaps the most familiar term to consumers, indicates that the beans have been grown under organic production methods, including no use of pesticides, fertilizers, or herbicides. Shade grown means that coffee farms maintain a shade canopy that not only allows for a longer growing season that results in a bean with a more intense flavor, but also creates a rich habitat for birds and other animals. To be labeled bird friendly, a certification developed by the Smithsonian’s Migratory Bird Center, coffee must be both organic and shade grown and create an environment conducive to migratory birds. The Rainforest Alliance designation certifies sustainable, eco-friendly coffee production. On the economic side of coffee trade, roasters who engage in Direct Trade practices travel to the source of their beans to purchase directly from growers, while coffee that is Fair Trade, a certification developed by Fairtrade Labeling Organizations International and licensed in the United States by Transfair USA coffee, is sold through co-ops that regulate coffee pricing and promote sustainable methods of farming.