Yvan's Coffee Backstory: For many years we were HasBean subscribers, and it was HasBean and HasBean Steve who really led us down the path of lighter roasts and filter/pour-over coffees. I was originally a medium-ish roast non-natural drinker, liking small tight espressos (ristrettos one could say)… with my favourite being the original Sir Toby's in Woolloomooloo, Sydney (I walked past it every day on the way to work, the smell of roasting beans lured me in). Upon moving to the UK in 2006 I quickly realised that the English don't know how to make coffee… all the highly lauded places even in London pulled every shot long and watery, barring perhaps a couple of places run by Kiwis, which were still not to my standard really due to the beans mainly. I did in time manage to “tutor” the odd place to tailor things to my desires. What a bore, lol, but those that did won my loyalty and sold me a lot of espresso… but it was only going to be “good enough” owing to fundamentally the beans, and also where their grinds were dialled in to (I was never presumptuous enough to tell anyone what I thought they should be ordering and how they should run their café, just tried to steer them to pack tighter, pull shorter, etc.)

Thankfully I was mostly based at a workplace where someone had brought in a Rancillo Silvia, a machine I came to adore. I made my own coffee using the better beans I could find, mainly the most medium looking beans from Monmouth, and was content. I did, especially between workplaces, resort to putting up with Costa and even Nero, just for that fix, when living in Rickmansworth and Hitchin where there were simply no other options at the time… thankfully after a period of working from home I found myself at another workplace with a coffee machine… it wasn't the best, it was one of those automated jobbies, but you could coax a better espresso out of it than at the average Cambridge café (there was simply no good espresso in Cambridge circa 2009.)

Thankfully due to a broad love of good coffee fostered (mainly) amongst the development team we got the budget to order a proper espresso machine and I got a La Spaziale Mini Vivaldi II. It was a great machine - I am told that sadly it passed away due to lack of maintenance not long after I left, the only other person who regularly maintained it left before me. Prior to this it was this workplace that introduced me to HasBean, there was an office “coffee club” and we banded together to get different coffees regularly. HasBean provided great range of single origin coffees, often with a lighter roast profile. Something I adapted to and learnt to love, and learnt to coax great espressos out of. It wasn't long after that a café opened in Cambridge called Massaros. They had a beaut lever-pull espresso machine and used HasBean beans and were just amazing whilst they lasted… sadly they didn't last. (I don't really think anything has quite reached their peak since, but good coffee in Cambridge is now days a whole other thing - and in the UK in general. So much better, borrowing more from the Australian and Kiwi modern movement than hardcore Italian, and thankfully a world away from the watery efforts I found the norm in 2006.)

Anyway - this is where the HasBean addiction started, I've been a HasBean subscriber ever since about 2008 I guess. Sadly HasBean changed… Steve sold it and eventually moved on (to another country, so no luck in trying to follow-the-Steve for my bean supply lol)… and whether or not co-incidence or new-direction the beans changed, fewer naturals, more consistently medium roasts, less brightness, generally a much more homogenised product. Sure, we still got our different beans every week but were dissatisfied. When they change the name to Ozone we were spurred on to find something new. Unfortunately we have yet to find a single replacement for what HasBean used to be… offering a subscription with both lighter and brighter coffee AND a different coffee every week. What we have settled on for the moment (towards latter 2024, this written Jan 2025) is monthly 'filter' subscription from Coaltown Coffee and Clifton Coffee combined with approx monthly purchase of 2 bags from Rave coffee filtered for the lower end (one or two beans) of their roast profile. It's more effort, and still not quite what we used to enjoy, but it is good and varied.

Note that these days (and pretty much since 2013) I pretty much only drink coffee at home, because I live rural and there are no other options. And we mostly do Chemex pour-over.

I still daydream about buying a decent espresso machine for home mind.

Rave Coffee Log