Volta's Brewed Coffee Menu
Great brewed coffee has lived in the shadows of espresso for way too long. There are so many ways to destroy a perfectly good cup of coffee: the carafe left on the burner, the nasty air-pot with the stale brew left festering for an hour, the miserly dose of coffee that results in a thin, bitter cup. There's a zen simplicity to the perfect cup of coffee: freshly ground coffee, hot water, and a measure of time are all that you need. Of course, a little technology doesn't hurt-- especially if it helps to ensure that the time and temperature can be precisely controlled. At Volta we use the Clover brewer to craft your coffee the moment you place your order. The fresh coffee is ground after you make your selection, and using parameters that we adjust on a daily basis, we brew each cup to order while you wait. The result can be revelatory: we're still surprised at how many customers comment that they've never taken their coffee without cream or sugar until they tried the brewed coffee at Volta.
In Season Coffee
If you are going to take the time to brew coffee for people one cup at a time (uno alla volta, if you will...), why not use the best coffees available? Volta chose Intelligentsia as our roaster because we value the incredible care that they place in the selection of the best small-lot coffees from around the world. And we were extremely please when Intelligentsia announced their "In Season" coffee initiative: Intelligentsia will no longer roast coffee that is longer than 10 months from the date of harvest. In the same spirit, Volta only brews coffee or espresso from beans that were roasted within the previous two weeks. Here's how Intelligentsia describes its In Season program:
Coffee is just like great fruit and vegetables. Most coffee-producing countries have only one specific harvest season each year, and once the coffee is picked from the tree, it begins the inevitable process of slow decline, losing quality with the passage of time. The result is that no matter how great a coffee tastes while in its prime, the day will always come when it loses the very things that made it so tasty in the first place.
What then does Intelligentsia In Season mean? It means that our coffees are offered only while they are fresh and retain the vibrancy that both nature and the fastidious coffee farmer intended. It means that the coffee offers the same kind of compelling traits it did when we first selected it and brought it to our Roasting Works
The coffee industry has long perpetuated the idea that coffee is a year-round crop without recognizing publicly that the harvest cycles do not allow for this. So you really need to know when a coffee was actually harvested. Selecting your coffees in this way ensures that you are getting them while they are their most delicious. The Intelligentsia In Season initiative is our commitment that every coffee encompassed by this effort has no more than 10 calendar months between its sale and the completion of harvest.
Because of the in-season approach of our roaster, Volta typically offers a choice of only three or four single origin coffees at any moment. Our selections will change with the seasons; you won't find a single origin coffee in stock through the entire year, but you'll be surprised by the differences as new coffees come into season. Chocolate-smooth Central Americans yield to spicy African selections, followed by classic South American origins.
Special Offerings
Geoff Watts and the buyers from Intelligentsia are always on the look-out for the best coffees, either directly from the farm or from auction. When the opportunity presents itself, Volta will feature one of these amazing coffees on our special offerings menu. Offerings will range from a one-off pulp natural from Brazil to a micro-lot version of Intelligentsia's venerable Tres Santos, from Colombia. Pricing on the limited offerings will vary depending on the cost of the bean paid to the farmer or paid at auction-- generally between $3 and $5 per cup.
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