When Is an Arabica Coffee Not an Arabica? A Robusta Not a Robusta?

It sounds like a Zen koan, but there’s a method behind the madness of the question. People typically associate arabica beans with specialty (i.e., good) coffee and Robusta beans with commodity (i.e., bad) coffee. But the specialty coffee craze of the last twenty years has had an effect on the coffee market, an effect that challenges the usual notions of what good and bad coffee is.

Many coffee consumers wouldn’t be surprised to know that the largest coffee-producing country in the world is Brazil. But what they may not know is that Brazil is also the leading producer of low-grown, “junk” arabica–coffee plants that are grown near sea level in non-volcanic, non-forested soil. The crops are more volatile than Robustas grown in the same soil, but the arabica name commands enough of a higher price that growers find it worth the risk, and employ pesticides and other non-organic methods to preserve the crop. Most if not all the “100% arabica” blends offered by the usual store brands such as Maxwell House, Folger’s, etc. consist of this “junk” arabica. The beans are technically arabica, but the beans were produced without care in bad soil and can’t carry the same flavor notes or terroir of quality, high-grown arabica. You may recall that purines from the soil and sucrose production are responsible for the flavor of coffee, and while arabica is more capable of this production than Robusta, growing it at a low altitude in comparatively dry grassland soil prevents this production. So just because something says “arabica” on the package doesn’t mean you’re getting quality coffee.

Perhaps more surprising is the notion that just because a coffee is Robusta doesn’t automatically mean you’re getting bad coffee. One of the most exciting things to happen in the coffee industry in the past ten years has been the arrival of quality Robusta coffees from India. India started experimenting with high-grown Robustas some time ago, presumably to weather the typical volatility of the specialty coffee market, and the Coffee Board of India has started pushing these Robustas into the market–facing initial resistance right up to the moment they’re tasted.

Probably the best single-origin coffee I have ever cupped that wasn’t a Wallingford Blue Mountain was a 2004 Kaapi Royale from Josuma Coffee, which is a high-grown Robusta. It was an endlessly complex coffee, with intense notes of blueberry and vanilla bean giving way to milk chocolate, then honey, then dark chocolate and rich tobacco, cedar, and cardamom. You could pretty much throw a dart at the entire flavor wheel and hit something this coffee had in spades. It’s hard to sell without holding tastings, however, because the moment someone reads “Robusta” on the bag they’ll naturally wonder why you’re selling them “cheap” coffee. Once they taste a true quality Robusta, however, their minds always change.

Quality Robustas are hard to find; many shops won’t carry them because of the expense and the name’s negative connotations. I’ve seen several shops carry it as a kind of “back-door” thing where you have to specially ask for it, as if you were in a speakeasy. But if you can find a shop that carries an Indian Robusta, give it a try. You’ll almost certainly be surprised.