Reflections with George
May 2025
Coffee Reflections
A well-crafted coffee commands my attention. I always drink it black. Why? To enjoy the natural, inherent flavors. There’s nothing like it.
Issue No. 10
May 21, 2025
Historic High Coffee Prices Are Arriving — And Tariffs Are Making It Worse
Back in March, I wrote about the looming rise in coffee prices for this year’s harvest. The primary drivers behind this increase are climate change and a steady rise in global coffee consumption — which has now outpaced production for several consecutive years...
Issue No. 9
March 26, 2025
Green Coffee Prices At Record Highs
Commodity-grade coffee prices have reached historic highs, currently hovering around double what they were a year ago. This surge has affected prices across all coffee qualities. The primary drivers are the rapid growth in global coffee consumption—led by China—and climate change...
Issue No. 8
July 19, 2023
A Global Cause and Effect of Increased Prices
Costs across all industries have risen, and coffee is no exception. In 2022, prices roasters paid to coffee farmers reached an all-time high. Simultaneously, demand for coffee was also breaking records...
Issue No. 7
October 7, 2022
Coffee Pricing Update
Coffee prices for green coffee have risen dramatically over the past year, and not only due to the high inflation the world has been facing...
Q&A with George
Did you have another career in mind before coffee?
I did have another career in mind. Murky vision may be a better way to express what was in mind at the time. Back in the sixties, many of us “kids” were not thinking so much about careers as we were about changing the world...
Issue No. 6
May 3, 2020
Greetings from George Howell!
I finally have time to write for our newsletter, something I used to do but found ever more difficult as the complexity of running George Howell Coffee grew. Life has simplified for the time being and this has enabled me to change some of my priorities...
Issue No. 5
November 12, 2018
Roast Dates and the Right Time to Brew
Back in the 1980s, and even 1990’s, the answer to “when is the right time to brew?” seemed simple: immediately after roast! Indeed, my Coffee Connection was the first in the US to post roast dates on our barrels (we were scooping back then!) and on our bags...
Issue No. 4
August 24, 2018
Mamuto Returns!
Kenya SL28 varietals are one of the great coffees of the world; there are no other varietals or origins, in my opinion, that can claim to be superior...
Issue No. 3
August 3, 2018
Discover genuine iced coffee for the first time. You’ve probably never had a good one!
The window for enjoying a properly brewed great coffee is fleeting. A great cup has a life span of 20 to 30 minutes before its complex chemistry begins to disassemble into murkier realms. To make a great Iced Coffee, that magic moment must be captured on the spot...
Issue No. 2
June 28, 2018
Freezing Roasted Coffee
It is striking how many specialty coffee companies recommend NOT freezing your roasted coffee. They are wrong.
I have found that just one day after I have opened a bag of coffee, thereby exposing it to oxygen, it has lost much of its dimensionality; it is a shadow of that first glorious day – assuming it was a great coffee, perfectly roasted to begin with...
Issue No. 1
June 11, 2018
Northern Hemisphere Harvest Arriving Now
New crop coffees are beginning to pour in from all the Northern Hemisphere producing countries. These harvests have taken place over the months of November to March. The higher the elevation the later the harvest.
Expect the new Kenya Mamuto to be in at the end of the month and available in early July. The good news: the AA are extraordinary – intense and very sweet. However, the amount of AA (slightly larger beans than ABs and more perfectly mature) will be even less than last year. We will also have some other Kenyas that struck us as exceptional...