The lab buzzed under fluorescent lights. Outside, the city had gone still, but in here, time moved differently.
We were surrounded by half-empty mugs of coffee, open notebooks, and rows of tins, each marked with careful notes - just a few degrees hotter, a few seconds longer.
Every batch we cupped raised more questions than it answered. Was that sharpness clarity, or underdevelopment? Were those citrus notes a feature, or a flaw? The more we tweaked, the less certain we became. It felt like trying to tune an instrument in the dark.
We were exhausted. Stressed. The work was quiet and repetitive, the kind of thing most people wouldn’t notice or remember. But it mattered to us. We weren’t chasing perfection - we were just trying to understand something we didn’t yet have words for. And if we could find it - that sweet spot - maybe we could build everything else around it.
In the beginning, we liked dark roasts.
That was what good coffee was supposed to taste like to us - rich, strong, full-bodied. But as we got deeper into the world of specialty coffee, we kept hearing that light roasts were better. More complex. More “true” to the bean. We were told that light roasts were where the real flavor lived - what real coffee lovers drank. That only light roasts could unlock all the things that made coffee “special.” And so we leaned in. We trained ourselves to taste everything we were told to look for. Acidity. Clarity. Terroir.
We got good at it. Cupping, scoring - we learned the language and the standards. We could taste the notes. We could describe them. We could replicate them. But the more we refined our skills, the more we realized something uncomfortable: we didn’t actually like the flavors we were chasing.
They were interesting. They were technically impressive. But they didn’t move us. And they didn’t feel like something we’d want to drink every day.
That was hard to admit. Because there’s a kind of silent hierarchy in specialty coffee - the idea that the more you know, the more your preferences should evolve in a certain direction. We felt that pressure. And for a while, we let it override our own instincts. But in the back of our minds, something kept nagging at us: What if knowing more didn’t mean wanting something different? What if we just liked coffee that tasted… good?
Before they’re roasted, coffee beans are pale green - dense, grassy, and totally unrecognizable as bean most of us know and love.
The process is intense. As the beans are exposed to heat, they begin to dry out. Sugars caramelize. Moisture evaporates. Trapped oils and gases shift and expand inside the bean, eventually pushing their way to the surface. Dozens of chemical reactions take place, unlocking the compounds that shape everything from aroma to flavor to texture.
A light roast, pulled early in the process, holds on to more of its origin character - the distinct traits that reflect where and how the coffee was grown. These coffees tend to be brighter, more acidic, and lighter in flavor. But if not developed properly, those same traits can turn harsh: grassy, astringent, thin.
A dark roast, on the other end of the spectrum, spends more time in the roaster and takes on more of the character of the roast itself - bolder, richer, often with notes of toasted nuts or chocolate. Go too far, though, and you can burn the beans, losing flavor in the process.
Thinking back to those early days in the lab, we didn’t know exactly what we were looking for - only that we’d know it when we tasted it.
So we kept going. Hour after hour on the sample roaster, changing one variable at a time. Each roast was a controlled experiment, tracked by hand in notebooks and spreadsheets, with small cups lined up for side-by-side cupping the next morning.
To stay consistent, we ground each sample to the same size and measured the degree of roast using an Agtron - a machine that shines light into a dish of ground coffee to determine its color. The darker the grind, the lower the Agtron score. It gave us a number we could reference later, a way to catalog the roast level of each test.
Sometimes the difference between batches was so small we had to go back and re-cup them blind, just to be sure. Sometimes we convinced ourselves we tasted something that wasn’t there.
It wasn’t glamorous - it was method, iteration, and repetition, along with a lot of second-guessing. And a deep sense that somewhere in the middle of it all, we’d land on something that struck the balance we knew we had to find.
We were stuck between two truths. On one hand, we knew what we liked. On the other hand, we couldn’t shake the pressure we felt from the industry. Every voice around us pointed toward a certain kind of coffee. Lighter. Brighter. More acidic.
But the more we tried to meet that standard, the more disconnected we felt from what was actually good. Not technically good. Just good - in the way that makes someone take a second sip without thinking.
The answer came, as it always does, from the people on the other side of the bar.
When we finally landed on the roast that would become Cardinal, we didn’t say much about it. We just started serving it. And right away, people noticed.
“Whatever you changed,” one customer said, holding up their cup, “this is it.”
That moment cut through everything. The endless sample roasting. The flavor wheels. The idea that only certain experts were qualified to decide what coffee should taste like.
Our customers weren’t looking for the same things that coffee professionals like to talk about as being “technically correct”. And they weren’t looking for tasting notes that you need a dictionary to figure out. They just wanted something that tasted great - something that felt familiar made them feel good. And when we started delivering on that, they came back. Again and again.
That was the shift. We stopped trying to impress the people writing the rules. And we started paying attention to the people actually drinking the coffee.
The first version of Cardinal was roasted one batch at a time on a small sample machine, tucked into the back of our first cafe on 7th st - a converted laundromat! The setup was simple - just a few pounds of coffee per roast, with every variable adjusted manually. We haven’t changed the recipe. And our customers still love Cardinal.
Today, we roast on a state-of-the-art system in Ivy City.
It’s bigger. Faster. Smarter. But the process is still the same. We track every batch, check every roast curve, and cup every production run. The profile we landed on back then still holds up today - not because it’s trendy, but because it tastes good.
And that’s the point.
Because this isn’t just a story about dark roasts or light roasts. It’s a story about letting go of the idea that there’s a right answer - and learning to trust what you like. We still roast light coffees. In fact, our Breakfast Blend might be the best light we’ve ever had - bright, clean, and clear, like a light roast should be. We’re proud of it. And we’re proud of the dark roasts, too. And the blends that live in between.
What matters isn’t which one you drink. It’s how it makes you feel. Coffee is personal. It reflects where you are, what you need, and what you’re in the mood for. That’s not something a flavor wheel can capture.
Everyone’s on their own coffee journey. We’re just here to make sure you enjoy the ride.
