There is one four letter word...
that can get many modern-day, third wave baristas all up in their feelings, and that is dark. The lowly dark roast, although it has been the historical standard in coffee for decades, and considering there is a good chance it was the first kind of coffee you and most likely everyone you have ever known tasted, it has found itself with a bit of a public relations fiasco in the current state of coffee. The current state being known as the third wave. Which, for the sake of brevity has moved roasting trends into much, much lighter areas.
The third wave was in full swing when I came into coffee in 2015, and the feelings towards the dark roast had already turned sour. Enjoying, or god forbid roasting a specialty grade coffee dark was, and unfortunately is in a lot of cases seen as blasphemy. This viewpoint was imbedded in me from those who trained me, all the way to coffee memes and other cultural avenues. It wasn't until I began roasting and experimenting with development (a fancy word for how a roast changes from light to dark) that I started to question these feelings.
So in this video I'll share some interesting polls on the topic, as well as my opinion on how the dark roast could and should make a resurgence into the specialty scene. So enough with the preamble, hit play on the video and let's brew this.