Riddhi Doshi
Coffeemakers Blue Tokai in partnership with winemakers Sula have made a new blend; coffee aged in wine barrels. Blue Tokai picked two of their most popular single-estate coffees – Attikan Estate and Bibi Plantation and stored them in Sula wine barrels for two months, rotating them fortnightly.
Sula Vinyards’ COO, Chaitanya Rathi, highlights the significance of this brew.
What is the USP of this coffee?
The USP of this coffee is that it is aged in Sula wine barrels for a few months and that helps the beans to absorb the aroma and oaky flavor of the barrel. This innovative process makes for a perfect cold brew, which has subtle hints of fruity grapes, dark chocolate and oak.
Blue Tokai has used a blend of two coffees for their intense chocolate and red fruit notes – Attikan Estate and Bibi Estate. The beans are washed and poured into barrels used for fermenting Sula’s red wine and left for a few months to absorb the remnants of the last batch. They are monitored closely for moisture retention and rotated fortnightly to ensure that the all the beans are equally exposed to the wine-soaked wooden barrels.
What does the wine barrel ageing process do to the flavours of coffee?
The barrel-ageing process adds an extra character of subtle hints of fruity grapes, which gives it a beautiful lingering flavour of the wine.
What kind of coffees are best aged in wine barrels?
We decided to store the beans in the wine barrels that had nutty and chocolatey notes.
How did this collaboration between Blue Tokai and Sula take shape?
The quest to create fresh, new experiences drove the project. After a series of experiments, the perfect brew was launched exclusively at SulaFest 2020. The flavours in this barrel-aged process are unique, when enjoyed as a cold coffee. The intensely sweet, bright red cherry and chocolate notes in the coffee beans are amplified when fermented in Sula’s award-winning red wine barrels.
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