Stories

Seasonal espresso Blend HONEYBADGERESPRESSO By The Coffee Department | February 27, 2025 The Variety Seasonal Espresso Honey Badger joins Sugar Glider (spring), Fruit Bat (summer), and Sapsucker (fall) as part of the sugar-seeking foursome that makes up our seasonal espresso lineup. Each season's blend is named after a creature known for its relentless search for sweetness, which is closely aligned with our approach to coffee generally and to developing these blends specifically. Selecting for Sweetness When evaluating coffee, it takes intention to step back from the big picture of "tastes good" and assess the individual parts that make up the...

New special selection KENYAMUHATHIAA By Intelligentsia Sourcing | October 24, 2024 New special selection KENYAMUHATHIAA By Intelligentsia Sourcing | October 24, 2024 New single origin COLOMBIASTRIPED RED BOURBON COLOMBIASTRIPED RED BOURBON By Intelligentsia Sourcing | January 26, 2024 New special selection KENYAMUHATHIAA By Intelligentsia Sourcing | October 24, 2024 New special selection KENYAMUHATHIAA By Intelligentsia Sourcing | October 24, 2024 New single origin COLOMBIASTRIPED RED BOURBON COLOMBIASTRIPED RED BOURBON By Intelligentsia Sourcing | January 26, 2024 The Variety Estate Grown Like the Nyamatu lot that is currently on our menu as a Single Origin, this lot also comes from a...

Single origin espresso ETHIOPIAGUJI JIGESASINGLE ORIGIN ESPRESSO By The Coffee Department | May 02, 2025 The Variety Jigesa Our first release of fresh Ethiopia arrivals, this washed lot comes from the Jigesa [Jee-geh-sah] village washing station in Shakisso, Guji, where around 600 smallholder farmers deliver hand-picked coffee cherries each day. These farmers cultivate small, organically managed plots (averaging just 1 hectare) where coffee grows as the main cash crop alongside food staples, such as corn, grain, and bananas. Coffee grows under a canopy of shade trees native to the region. Farms sit at elevations of 1,800–2,050 meters and benefit from...

Seasonal Blend PERSEPHONEBLEND 2025 By The Coffee Department | March 21, 2025 The Variety Spring Yesterday marked the first day of spring—the vernal equinox—in the Northern Hemisphere. The tension of the transition was on full display here in Chicago. We woke to a thick blanket of wet snow, only for the sun to break through in the early afternoon and melt away any traces of winter's lasting grasp on the early morning hours. If you were up too late the night before cutting all your pants into shorts and slept through noon, you might not have known it snowed at...