What I am drinking today - Katch Belle

What I am drinking now – Klatch Belle espresso.


This is one of my favorite espressos (or should I say espressi?)  It is just an amazingly pleasant easy to drink shot of espresso.  Some would call it a comfort food espresso because of the big chocolate and carmel notes in it.  I do like to pull it with an edge and I think this is where Klatch describes it as “pungent” where one might think this is a negative in food, but here it is a strength.


The shot works very well in a cappuccino or in a macchiato.  (I had one straight shot of it today and one macchiato.)   I think it would work well in a big milk drink, too, if you like milkier drinks because it is a fairly strong powerful shot so it will not disappear.  I usually opt for straight shots most of the time and a cappuccino or a macchiato at some point in the day, but rarely drink the more milky drinks so I cannot be certain how it would fare.


I pull the shots with a high dose, but an average grind and temperature – probably 20 grams, middle of the road in terms of fineness, and roughly 200 degrees.  I have not weighed the output of these shots in a while, but I would guess that I produce 30 grams of espresso out of it and pull it slightly on the slow side – around thirty seconds.  


Klatch suggests pulling it ever so slightly hotter (201) and slightly faster (24 to 26 seconds).  


All in all, it is a great espresso that I can fall back on when I want a big shot (meanign flavor not volume) and other blends are not keeping me happy.


It also probably ranks as a good beginner blend in the sense that you do not have to get it exactly right to have a pleasant shot of espresso  Stumptown, for example, is another of my favorite blends, but it took me much longer to figure it out because if you do not get it just right the taste suffers more. 

Here it is on Roaste...

http://www.roaste.com/product/Klatch-Coffee/Klatch-Belle-Espresso