Riverbend Malt House and Asheville’s Coffee Library Partner On Pallet Coffee Program
Because most brewhouses are fueled by coffee and not nut rolls, we partnered up with Asheville’s Coffee Library to give our full pallet orders a boost!
Meet Grain & Glory Coffee
Inspired by some of our favorite specialty malts, the first blend we created with the Coffee Library delivered a creamy, sweet cup with rich notes of bakers chocolate, dark fruit, and just a hint of smoke in the finish. The mouthfeel really shines on this one— it’s full and satisfying without being overpowering.
Southern Hops Murrells Inlet liked this coffee blend so much that they incorporated the coffee into a seasonal-infused version of their flagship Goldilocks Golden Ale. This beer is brewed exclusively with Riverbend malts: Southern Select for the base malt, with Light Munich and a touch of Great Chit to provide the perfect clean blonde canvas for pumpkin spice, vanilla bean, and Grain & Glory coffee additions. “We see Goldilocks as the “Crust”,if you will, for this delicious fall inspired pumpkin ale, which married perfectly with Coffee Library’s Grain & Glory selection,” says the Southern Hops team.
What’s Brewing: Mash In Blend
The initial idea for this blend was to start with something more robust and bold. Cold winter mornings will be here soon enough and I was looking for something with a bit more “campfire” character to get things going. Not necessarily smokey, but like the flavor and body you get from using that old moka pot on your grandpa’s Coleman stove. Walking the line between espresso and drip production methods.
We tasted through six different coffee varietals utilizing the traditional cupping process in the “red” room at Coffee Library in Asheville. This light setting is meant to remove any bias on roast color. As with beer, drinkers think very dark colors (incorrectly) correspond to stronger, bitter flavors. In addition to removing the color assessment component, we found that it helped narrow my focus by softening the other stimuli in the room.
The traditional coffee cupping process involves unfiltered grounds that form a crust on the top of the tasting vessel. This crust is punctured after steeping takes place, allowing the taster to experience the freshest aromas at high concentrations. The Narino roast from Columbia displayed some creamy, sweet notes with a touch of vanilla bean in the finish. A top contender by itself, but ultimately didn’t mesh well with the Cuban base. The Mexican roast profile surprised me with an assertive, oaky finish… which we knew my bourbon aficionados would appreciate.
After the initial round we experimented with a few different blends of our favorites until we arrived at the perfect mix. These included a light roast from Guatemala that offered some excellent fruit and milk chocolate notes and some other interesting offerings from Indonesia.
The varietals below complemented each other to create a robust, multi-layered cup of java that will kick start your brew day!
Mash in Blend 2025
Cuban – Bakers chocolate, brownie crust, with a touch of pipe tobacco
Mexican – Citrus zest, baking spices, with an oaky finish
Sulawesi – Dark Chocolate, toasted hazelnuts, and molasses
If you were wondering, Sulawesi is an Indonesian Island located to the west of Papua New Guinea and north of Australia. Read more here. (We had to look it up.)
Look for bags of this to go out on your next full pallet order. And please, please someone brew a coffee-infused Porter for us (mostly Brent) to enjoy this holiday season.
Be sure to follow The Coffee Library at @coffeelibraryroastery and use their website coffeelibrary.com to create your own custom blend.
