Coffee Glossary
Coffee has a language of its own, and it's easy to feel like you need a barista certificate just to order a bag. You don't. Here's a plain-English guide to the terms you'll come across on our site, on our bags, and in what we write about coffee.
- Origin & Sourcing
- Process
- Roasting
- Brewing & Equipment
- Rabbit Island Products
- Coffee Drinks
- Ethics & Business Terms
- Quiz & Blend Lab Terms
- About Rabbit Island Coffee Co.
Origin & Sourcing
Single Origin
Coffee from one specific farm, region, or country, rather than blended with beans from elsewhere. A single origin lets you taste the character of a particular place: its soil, altitude, and processing method, in a way blends are designed to smooth over.
Blend
Two or more coffees, roasted separately and combined afterwards to build a flavour profile no single origin can achieve on its own. Our Seasonal Blend and Black Rabbit Blend are both built this way, each origin roasted to its own profile first, then blended (referred to as Post Blended).
Terroir
The combination of soil, climate, altitude, and local growing conditions that gives a coffee its distinct character. Two farms next to each other can taste noticeably different because of terroir alone.
Varietal
The specific plant variety a coffee is grown from, the way grape varietals shape a wine. Bourbon, Typica, Caturra, and Castillo are common examples. Varietal affects flavour, yield, and how resistant the plant is to disease.
Pink Bourbon
A rare varietal, a natural cross of Red and Yellow Bourbon, known for vivid, complex flavour and cherry-pink fruit at harvest. Sought after by specialty roasters for how distinctive and limited it is.
Direct Trade
A sourcing relationship where a roaster buys directly from a farm, cooperative, or exporter partner, rather than through a long chain of intermediaries. Usually means better traceability and a fairer return to the farmer than buying on the open commodity market.
Green Coffee
Unroasted coffee beans, as they arrive from origin. This is what roasters actually buy and store. Green coffee holds well for months when kept properly, which is why we can carry stock without it going stale before it's even roasted.
Micro-lot
A small, separately processed batch of coffee, often from a single field or a specific day's harvest, kept apart from a farm's main crop because of its exceptional quality or unique character. Our Ethiopia Konga is a micro-lot.
Timor-Leste
A small country on the eastern half of the island of Timor, north of Australia, formerly known as East Timor. It gained independence in 2002 after a long and difficult path, and coffee has been central to rebuilding the country's economy ever since. It's not a well-known origin for a lot of coffee drinkers, but the highland regions produce genuinely excellent coffee, and it's one of our key sourcing partners: it's the backbone of Black Rabbit Blend and the origin behind our Timor-Leste Organic and Timor-Leste Anaerobic Natural single origins.
Process
Co-ferment / Co-fermentation
An experimental processing method where coffee cherries are fermented alongside another ingredient, fruit, herbs, or spices, before drying. Produces distinct, often intense flavour notes you won't get from standard processing. You can add a seasonal co-ferment to a custom blend through Blend Lab, changing roughly every couple of months, but if you're after our latest co-ferment as a standalone bag, check Buy Coffee for what's currently in stock rather than this page.
Washed Process
The skin and pulp are removed from the cherry, then the bean is fermented briefly to break down the sticky mucilage still clinging to it, then washed clean before drying. This produces a cleaner, brighter cup that lets the bean's own character come through, with less influence from the fruit than natural or honey processing.
Natural Process
The whole cherry is dried with the fruit still intact around the bean, before the dried fruit is removed. Typically produces heavier body and bolder, often fruitier flavour than washed coffee, since the bean spends its drying time in direct contact with the fruit.
Honey Process
Sits between washed and natural: the skin is removed, but some or all of the sticky mucilage is left on the bean during drying. Named for the honey-like texture of that mucilage, not for any honey flavour, though it often does add extra sweetness to the cup.
Swiss Water Process
A chemical-free way of decaffeinating green coffee, using only water, temperature, and time to remove about 99.9% of the caffeine while leaving the bean's flavour intact. Most decaffeination methods rely on chemical solvents; this doesn't. It's what we use for Decaf Brazil.
Roasting
Roast Profile
The specific temperature curve a roaster builds for a coffee, covering charge temperature, how fast the beans heat up, and when the roast ends. Every coffee behaves differently on the roaster, so a good profile is developed and refined for that specific bean, not applied blanket-style across everything. We build ours on a Diedrich IR12, refining each profile through a simple loop: measure, interpret, refine, repeat.
Medium Roast
Taken further into development than a light roast, generally further past first crack, which builds more caramelisation, body, and sweetness at some cost to the brighter acidity a lighter roast preserves. Most of our blends are roasted medium, on a profile built to work well as both espresso and filter.
Light Roast
A lower degree of roast development, generally stopped soon after first crack with a lower finish temperature. It's not really about roasting for less time: charge temperature and rate of rise shape the whole trajectory, so two light roasts can take quite different amounts of time to reach the same result. What matters is the degree of development reached, not the clock. Light roasts preserve more of the bean's original acidity and origin character, which is why we roast our single origins this way.
First Crack / Second Crack
Audible cracking sounds the beans make as heat builds pressure inside them. First crack marks the start of drinkable roast levels and is where most light roasts finish. Second crack, quieter and higher pitched, signals a much darker roast. Roasters use both as reference points while they work, not just to listen for, but to time everything that happens next.
Roast Date
The day a coffee was roasted, printed on every Rabbit Island bag. Most of our coffee is best somewhere between 7 and 30 days after roasting, though some single origins keep improving past the three-week mark. After a couple of months the flavour drops off noticeably, which is why roast date matters far more than a generic best-before date.
Resting (Degassing)
The period after roasting where coffee releases the CO2 built up during roasting. How long it needs depends on how you're brewing it: espresso generally wants a longer rest, often a week or more, while filter methods come good sooner. Fresh-off-the-roaster coffee isn't always the best tasting coffee, and that's normal.
Brewing & Equipment
Pour Over
A manual brewing method where hot water is poured over grounds in a filter, by hand, in a controlled way. Produces a clean, bright cup and hands the brewer full control over time and extraction.
Moccamaster
A well-known Dutch-made automatic filter coffee machine, prized for holding a consistent water temperature and brew time. A solid option if you want pour-over quality without doing the pour-over by hand.
Espresso
Coffee brewed by forcing hot water through finely-ground coffee under pressure. A typical shot runs an 18 to 20g dose over 25 to 30 seconds, producing a concentrated result with crema on top. It's the base for a flat white, latte, or long black, and the starting point most cafés build everything else from.
Filter Coffee
Coffee brewed by letting water pass through grounds via gravity rather than pressure, covering pour over, drip machines, and batch brew. Generally lighter in body than espresso.
Crema
The reddish-brown foam sitting on top of a properly pulled espresso shot, made of oils and CO2 released during roasting. At its best it's dark, smooth, and thick, and it's a decent sign of fresh beans and a correct extraction, though not proof on its own.
Extraction
The process of dissolving flavour compounds out of ground coffee using water. Under-extraction tastes sour and thin. Over-extraction tastes bitter and harsh. Dialling in a shot or a pour over is really just chasing the point in between.
Grind Size
How fine or coarse the coffee is ground before brewing. Espresso needs a fine grind, French press needs coarse, and pour over sits in between. Grinding on demand rather than in advance matters too: ground coffee starts losing flavour within minutes. Matching grind size to your brew method is one of the biggest levers for improving your cup at home.
French Press (Plunger / Cafetiere)
A full-immersion brewing method where coarse grounds steep directly in hot water before being separated by a metal plunger filter. Same thing, different names: Kiwis mostly say plunger, the Brits say cafetiere, and French press covers both. Produces a fuller-bodied cup than paper-filtered methods.
AeroPress
A compact manual brewer that uses pressure from a plunger to push water through grounds and a paper filter. Fast, portable, and forgiving, which makes it a good travel and camping option.
V60
A cone-shaped pour over dripper made by Hario, named for its 60 degree angle. The most common size for home brewing is the 02, which suits two cups; the 01 is a smaller single-cup option. The spiral ridges inside let air escape as water flows through, which is part of what gives V60 pour overs their clean, bright cup.
Fellow Aiden
An automatic brewer we use in-store for filter batch brew coffee. It's built to replicate a manual pour over at scale, with more control over temperature and flow than a standard drip machine, which is why we chose it for the shop rather than a basic filter machine.
Moka Pot (Stovetop)
A stovetop brewer that pushes water up through grounds using steam pressure, most famously made by Bialetti. It's often called a "stovetop espresso maker," but that's not quite accurate: a moka pot runs at roughly 1 to 2 bar of pressure, well under the 9 bar a proper espresso machine uses, so the result is strong and concentrated but not technically espresso.
Syphon
A brewing method using two chambers and vapour pressure: heated water is pushed up into a top chamber holding the grounds, brews there, then drops back down through a filter once the heat source is removed. More theatre than most methods, and a genuinely clean, tea-like cup when done well.
Rabbit Island Products
Our signature blend and most popular coffee: Brazil, Colombia, and Ethiopia, rebuilt as origin coffees change through the year to hold a consistent flavour profile of caramel, dark cocoa, and a pop of fruit, even as the beans behind it shift with the seasons.
A darker, bolder house blend built from Timor-Leste and two Colombian origins, all washed process, with dark chocolate, roasted nuts, and a long, smooth finish. The Timor-Leste component comes through Cooperativa Café Timor, a direct trade cooperative of over 20,000 smallholder farms that also runs Timor-Leste's largest private health service.
A 50/50 mix of our Decaf Brazil and Seasonal Blend, built for anyone who wants the full flavour of Rabbit Island coffee with a lower caffeine hit, rather than going fully decaf.
A single origin from the Konga Kebele in Ethiopia's Gedeo Zone, Yirgacheffe, grown by around 800 smallholder farmers and naturally processed, sun-dried on raised beds for two to three weeks. Roasted light. Tasting notes of red apple, orange, grape, and cocoa powder.
A washed, organic single origin from Maulau, in the Maubisse sub-district of Ainaro district, Timor-Leste. Grown without synthetic inputs and reaches us direct trade through Wayne and Aydee at the Wholemeal Cafe in Takaka, who buy straight from the smallholder farming families that grow it. Tasting notes of dark chocolate, ripe plum, and molasses, with a full, syrupy body.
An anaerobic natural from the Ermera district, sealed in oxygen-limited tanks for 48 to 72 hours before a slow dry on raised beds. Tasting notes of tropical fruit, toffee, baking spice, tobacco leaf, and caramel, closer to a fruit mince pie or buttered fruit toast than a typical washed cup.
A washed single origin from Inzá, Cauca in Colombia, grown by smallholder Páez (Nasa) indigenous community farmers. Tasting notes of plum, tangerine, caramel, and nutmeg.
A single origin decaffeinated using the Swiss Water Process. Tasting notes of malt, nutty biscuit, and chocolate. Full flavour, without the caffeine.
Seasonal Blend and Decaf, packed into council-recyclable capsules designed to fit Nespresso-compatible machines. Not affiliated with or endorsed by Nespresso.
Subscription (Brew Method & Delivery Frequency)
Our recurring coffee delivery. You choose a brew method, so we can recommend the right grind, and a delivery frequency, and your coffee ships automatically, freshly roasted each time.
Coffee Drinks
Flat White
Espresso with steamed milk and a thin layer of microfoam, giving a smoother, less airy result than a latte. Widely credited as a New Zealand and Australian invention, and still the drink most Kiwis order without a second thought.
Long Black
Hot water with espresso poured over the top, the reverse order of an Americano. Pouring espresso onto water rather than water onto espresso preserves more of the crema, giving a slightly different result even though the ingredients are the same.
Cold Brew
Coffee steeped in cold water for 12 to 24 hours, rather than brewed hot. Not the same thing as iced coffee, which is just hot-brewed coffee cooled down. Cold brew tends to be smoother and less acidic, since the lower temperature extracts differently than hot water does.
Ethics & Business Terms
Specialty Coffee
Coffee scoring 80 or above on the 100-point scale used by professional coffee graders, the SCA scale, reflecting quality in flavour, aroma, and processing. It's a quality classification, not just a marketing term, though it does get used loosely.
Ethically Sourced
Coffee bought through supply relationships that prioritise fair pay and sustainable practice for farmers, rather than buying purely on lowest price through the commodity market.
Fair Trade vs Direct Trade
Fair Trade is a certification with set minimum pricing, run by a third-party body. Direct trade is an uncertified relationship where a roaster buys straight from the farm or exporter, often paying above Fair Trade minimums but without the formal certification attached. We work through direct, trusted supply relationships like Cofinet, Opal Coffee, and Burtons, rather than certification schemes.
Artisan
Made in small batches using hands-on skill, rather than large-scale automated production. Used to describe both our roasting and the goods we stock alongside it in the Pantry.
Wholesale vs Retail
Wholesale is coffee we supply in bulk to cafés and businesses for resale. Retail is coffee sold directly to individual customers, through our online store or the Pantry.
Quiz & Blend Lab Terms
New Zealand's first interactive coffee blend builder, at blend.rabbitislandcoffee.co.nz. You adjust three sliders, fruit and brightness, body, and acidity, to build a personalised blend, roasted to order and dispatched within 48 hours with your own custom label.
Flavour Notes / Tasting Notes
The words used to describe what a coffee actually tastes like, caramel, cherry, citrus, and so on. Nothing's added to get these. They're the coffee's own naturally occurring characteristics, shaped by origin, varietal, and processing.
Body
The weight and texture of coffee in your mouth, from light and tea-like through to heavy and syrupy. Natural-processed coffees tend toward fuller body. Washed coffees tend lighter.
Acidity
A positive term in coffee tasting, describing brightness and liveliness in the cup, think the crispness of a green apple, not sourness or anything to do with stomach acidity. Higher altitude coffees typically show more of it.
Balance
How well a coffee's acidity, body, and sweetness work together, with no single element pushing the others out of the way. A core goal in both blending and roasting.
Brew Ratio
The ratio of coffee to water used when brewing. For filter coffee, most people land somewhere between 1:15 and 1:17 (1g coffee to 15 to 17g water), and the right number for you comes down to the coffee and your own taste, not a single fixed rule. Getting your ratio dialled in is one of the simplest ways to improve a cup at home.
About Rabbit Island Coffee Co.
Rabbit Island
The question we get asked most in person: we're not actually on Rabbit Island. We're roasting out of Māpua Wharf, looking straight across the water at it. Moturoa / Rabbit Island is the real island sitting in the Waimea Estuary opposite the wharf, reachable by a short passenger ferry across the channel or over the causeway from Redwood Road. It's named Rabbit Island because rabbits were introduced there by early European settlers in the 1840s, and the name stuck long before we came along. Rabbit island Coffee Co. first started on Rabbit Island in 2013 in a shipping container. The business then moved to Māpua when the wharf development finished in 2015.
Māpua Wharf
Home base. Māpua Wharf sits on the Waimea Estuary in the Nelson Tasman region, at the top of New Zealand's South Island, looking out across the water to Moturoa / Rabbit Island. Our roastery and the Pantry are both here, at Shed 4. Read more about how we got here on our About Us page.
Small Batch
Roasting in smaller quantities on purpose, rather than running large volumes through the roaster for efficiency. Smaller batches mean more control over the roast, and coffee that gets to you closer to its actual roast date instead of sitting in a warehouse. It costs more in time than roasting big, but it's the trade-off we've chosen to make.
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