Catalog entry: Wonderstate Coffee
Thoughts
While I'm likely not to the point where I could consider myself a weird coffee person (link goes to the YouTube channel of James Hoffmann, self proclaimed weird coffee person), I do enjoy seeking out the finer roasts available in the US, especially in and around the Midwest. Wonderstate Coffee is one such roaster. I would go so far as to say that Wonderstate is one of the primary reasons I seek out truly good coffee at this point in my life.
On a whim, I bought a bag of Ethiopia Idido beans from a local café that carried Wonderstate back in ~2018, and I was floored by the complexity and depth of the brew. It was the first time that I was truly able to pull tasting notes out of a coffee, and it made sense why it was so easy - taking a sip of this roast tasted like drinking straight watermelon juice. It was a wild experience, and one of the "highs" of quality coffee that I've been chasing ever since. While very few of Wonderstate's roasts rise to the level that their elusive Idido did so many years ago, they are still a consistently great roaster and I've never been disappointed by a bag of their coffee.
Highlights
- Any and all of their single origin roasts, particularly anything South American (though per my post, their typical Ethiopian roasts are consistently solid as well).
- Their Icebreaker cold brew blend is surprisingly good. I usually don't find it worth spending extra money on cold brew-specific blends, but Icebreaker is the rare exception if it's the summer and I find myself wanting to splurge on higher-quality cold brew.