Methodical Coffee: From a seed in the dirt to a cup in your hand
Colby Craig, Staff Writer
Coffee is one of the most consumed beverages in the United States only second to water itself. A survey held from Sept. 2021 to Oct. 2022 determined that 57 percent of American adults say they consume coffee on a regular basis. To Methodical Coffee, a local coffee roastery with multiple locations in South Carolina, making coffee is a passion and an artform.
Methodical Coffee was not always a roastery but started as a regular coffee shop in downtown Greenville in 2015. They soon realized that they were selling coffee faster than they could buy it, so the owners decided to open their own roastery and make it themselves. Fast forward to the present, and Methodical Coffee has three locations in South Carolina and a fourth in the works in Columbia.
The process starts in the “coffee belt,” where farmers grow their coffee trees in very high altitudes for the best product. Farmers in between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn, particularly in volcanic regions, grow their coffee and distribute it to places like Methodical’s roastery for packaging and distribution.
The plant makes fruit that looks similar to a cranberry with a light green colored bean on the inside. After processing the coffee fruit in various ways, typically being set out to dry or pressure washing the fruit away from the bean, the first stage of the product is formed. The light green dried beans are shipped from all over the world to roasteries where they become the final product.
The green coffee beans are brought to the roastery on pallets where they get funneled into a large roaster. A team member roasts the beans until “first crack,” where the bean has been heated to a degree where it physically cracks and lets out moisture or gas. Once the beans are fully roasted, they are cooled and put into bins for bagging.
After the beans cool, the team gets together and tastes some of the final products to get a feel for the flavor profiles and keep things high quality. This is also where different ideas of blending coffee together can happen.
Blue Boy is a staple blend that Methodical Coffee has made to be smooth, sweet, velvety and soft.
Lourdes P., a customer, said, “I did not know good coffee until I bought Blue Boy! This roast is smooth and flavorful. You may have ruined me for life . . . Thank you!!”
The bins with the cooled beans are wheeled over to a machine that seals the bags after filling bags to their desired weight. After bagging and labeling their bags, they are shipped to Methodical Coffee locations and other local coffee shops who purchase from the roastery.
Finally, the coffee makes it into your cup. For those who want to dive deeper into the process of coffee growing to roasting, Laura Ostendorff created a free self-paced class called Seed to Cup that teaches others the entire process.
Methodical merchandise can be found in any of their locations as well as on their website.
