That skin on the fruit of the coffee cherry, also known as the coffee husk (‘husk’ or ‘skin’ translated in Spanish is Cascara, hence the name) is usually either a wasted product of coffee production or used as a fertilizer.

However it can actually make quite a tasty beverage.

If you haven’t heard of Kopi Luwak, you might know it by what it’s most commonly called – “that cat poo coffee”.

It’s an Indonesian coffee product that has garnered a lot of attention specifically for the fact that a cat/raccoon like animal, the Asian Palm Civet, eats the coffee berry and digests it. From there the coffee is extracted from the excrement, roasted and brewed. Something that has been defecated ruins all preconceived notions of what should taste good - however it’s garnered the allure and the reputation of being the tastiest coffee available.

If you’re an avid coffee drinker there are a few options to make your joe better suited for the summer weather. You can go the cold brew route or you can make an iced coffee. Cold brewing can takes about 12 – 18 hours, and we don’t always have that much foresight when we want something caffeinated and cold... which is where a fantastic iced coffee comes into play.

So what are your iced coffee options? We have 3 delicious recipes that are a bit more unique than the rest – one from us, one from the gents over at Hale Coffee (which uses ice cream) & one from de Mello Palhetta (which uses peppermint tea!).

Michael King, owner of Bean North, explains the effect “It is basically devastating the coffee harvest in Central America right now where countries like Guatamala are down 60%. Some of the cooperatives we’ve purchased from for years – like one in El Salvador, has 0 coffee to export this year.”

Sharing is caring. We have a package of freshly roasted coffee from artisan roasters around Canada and we'd love to give it to one of you folks reading this!

How can you win?

“It’s so beautiful to see this”

This is the specific bloom he was referring to was this:

It's been just over 3 weeks since we went live at The Roasters Pack and the last 21 days have been absolutely amazing. The response has been fantastic and it's only motivated us to continue to raise the bar for coffee lovers. We're not one to toot our own horn, so what exactly has everyone else been saying about The Roasters Pack? 

• BlogTO said that The Roasters Pack is "the subscription club for coffee geeks".
• Food blogger, Jess of WhereJessAte says "let them do the heavy lifting and every month you’ll be sent a sample of coffee beans you’d never otherwise try."
• Andrew Youderian says on his podcast that "It's really great coffee, I can vouch first hand it's really great quality coffee, I was drinking it this morning, thoroughly enjoyed it. But what's really cool about them is they provide the stories of those independent roasters... so you can get a sense of where that coffee is coming from"
• Meshell in your City writes "I love being introduced to things that are completely new to me, so in that sense The Roasters Pack is perfect."