The world of coffee has begun to pay more attention to where in the world its coffee comes from. The origin of beans and blends is marked, even a selling point, and aficionados talk about the different regions where coffee is grown with the same intensity as wine snobs discussing French and Italian Pinots.
It’s a welcome change from the days when ‘where is this coffee from?’ would be answered by pointing to the Foster’s or Maxwell’s tin it came from. The global coffee era has made space for the unique qualities of coffees from different places to come to the fore. This benefits both coffee drinkers and those growing the beans.
Nguyen Coffee Supply is a newcomer to the specialty coffee scene. It was founded in 2018 and devoted to raising the profile of Vietnamese coffee. They import beans from just one farm to the United States, and their product line is just as focused.
In this review, we’ll look at Nguyen Coffee Supply’s one of a kind coffee, the ways you can enjoy it, and the company’s message.
Long Story Short
Nguyen Coffee Supply aims to showcase Vietnamese Coffee beans to the world. They offer three different blends of coffee all of which are grown on a single farm. If you love tasting coffee from different regions give Nguyen Coffee Supply a go!
What is Nguyen Coffee Supply?
Nguyen Coffee Supply focuses on providing quality coffee from a single farm in the area surrounding Da Lat, Vietnam. Their coffee is available for order on the internet, which is incredibly convenient in these socially distanced days.
Although the size of Vietnam’s profile as a coffee producer isn’t as large as Ethiopia or Brazil, this new importer is betting that can change. Nguyen Coffee Supply was founded by a young Vietnamese-American entrepreneur named Sahra Nguyen.
Sahra Nguyen already had a career as a filmmaker and journalist. Still, Nguyen felt a desire to branch out precisely to address the perception that high-quality coffee doesn’t come out of Vietnam.
Nguyen Coffee Supply is trying to break those preconceptions through the incredibly focused products they offer. The three blends they offer are all single-origin, and they are distinct enough to justify putting Vietnam and coffee in the same sentence.
In addition to one-off purchases, there’s also a subscription option that brings coffee to your doorstep every week, every two weeks, or every month (depending on your caffeine needs).
You can buy more than just coffee on their site. Nguyen Coffee Supply also sells the ‘phin’ filters used for brewing coffee in the Vietnamese style. These offerings are another way that Nguyen Coffee Supply is bringing Vietnamese Coffee Culture to the mainstream.
Coffee Blends
There is an unsurprising consistency to the coffees from Nguyen Coffee Supply, given that they all come from a single producer. Below are their three different blends of coffee available or if you want to try them all they have the option of buying a Tripack.
loyalty
Loyalty is the Nguyen Coffee Supply signature blend. It is made from a mix of arabica and robusta beans, which delivers bold flavors up front, followed by a smooth finish. The blend has a strong nutty flavor that’s hard to miss. The blend is designed to be an everyday coffee and can be brewed as espresso, drip, french press or phin filter.
Moxy
‘Moxy’ is made up of 100% arabica beans, which brings it a soft and subtle quality. A well-brewed cup will have a sweetness to it and hints of fruit as well. Interestingly, arabica beans are not commonly grown in Vietnam, making up only 10 percent of the countries’ total output (the remaining 90% is all robusta). The Moxy blend is a lighter and fruitier coffee ideal for brewing with french press, pour over, drip or espresso.
truegrit
The final type of coffee Nguyen Coffee Supply offers is called ‘True Grit.’ This is the 100% peaberry robusta option, so be prepared for intensity and strength. There are notes of fruit here too, but a little more on the bitter side—think grapefruit and bitter melon. True Grit packs a punch, containing twice as much caffeine as the Moxy blend. This blend is recommended to be brewed with a french press, drip or phin filter.
Of course, your experience of the coffee will depend on how you brew it. You can enjoy these coffees whether put through an espresso machine or a french press. Still, there’s something appropriate about using a phin filter (also available from Nguyen Coffee Supply) to make authentic Vietnamese style coffee.
A phin filter is like a cross between a V60 pour-over and French press, with a metal mesh bottom that doesn’t allow grinds through. You just pour water over the top and don’t press anything down.
You can use a phin filter to brew pure coffee or put it over the top of condensed milk to make a traditional Vietnamese coffee.
Quality
The fact that Nguyen Coffee Supply sources its beans from just one farm gives them a remarkable degree of control over the quality of the product they put out. There are several aspects of coffee production that they can carefully monitor which play into the quality and consistency of the beans.
To start from the source, the farm that grows the beans is entirely organic—keeping the growing process natural means that pesticides and growing agents don’t influence how the beans taste, resulting in a more authentic taste.
The beans are still green (i.e., unroasted) when they send them to the US. The fact that they roast them stateside (in Brooklyn, specifically) means that there’s less time between roasting and brewing. The fresher the roast, the better a cup will taste.
Finally, when they’re roasted (again, a stage of the process that Nguyen Coffee Supply controls directly), there aren’t any flavors, preservatives, or other chemicals added to the beans. It all remains natural.
The care that goes into the process ensures a high-quality cup of coffee, and it’s clear that the effort is motivated by a desire to show what Vietnamese coffee can be.
Fairtrade/Keto/Vegan
The intimate relationship between the company and the single source of beans proves that Nguyen Coffee Supply more than meets the standards for fair trade. Nguyen Coffee Supply’s products don’t contain sugars, so they fit into a Keto diet. They don’t contain animal products, meaning they are consistent with a vegan lifestyle.
Nguyen Coffee Review
Coffee enthusiasts will love the new flavors that Nguyen Coffee Supply is bringing to America. It’s not every day that one can try coffee from a new part of the world and find out what’s new and exceptional in the coffee that grows there.
There’s something to appreciate about a company trying to do one thing and do it really well. Everything that Nguyen Coffee Supply does is in the service of bringing a bean from Vietnam with as little interference as possible.
If you like the sounds of these new and exciting coffee beans, give them a try.
