Following on from their hugely popular street food venture set up outside Dundee’s V&A, the team behind Heather Street Food (HSF) will soon be launching their very own coffee brand called Brewery Lane.
Named after the Dundee street that the unit housing the new coffee roaster is based on, Chris Heather wanted to bring something new to the city’s coffee offering, inspired by the cafe culture in Australia and New Zealand.
Chris says: “I’m half kiwi and I lived and studied in Wellington for five years at university. That city isn’t much bigger than Dundee but it had nine small independent coffee roasters in it.
“Dundee has never had the type of artisan coffee roaster you’d find in Australia or New Zealand so I’ve always dreamed of building one here.
“By sourcing the most flavoursome coffee beans in the world and roasting them right here in Dundee, we’re aiming to build a coffee roaster the city can be proud of.”
Already award winning
After winning two gold stars at the Great Taste Awards for a Peruvian coffee bean Chris and his team sample roasted earlier this year, he’s delighted to have won an award before officially launching to the public.
He added: “It’s not often you win a big award before you’ve even opened!
“We’re so lucky with how locals have come out and supported what we’ve done at Heather Street Food so building a coffee roaster feels like the next logical step.
“We’re still getting to grips with the big Giesen coffee roaster which was custom made for us in the Netherlands.
“Hopefully in the next few weeks we’ll have our first batch available to taste and we plan to be launching at HSF at the start of next week. We will be producing small pouches of both whole beans and ground coffee for people to enjoy at home. The bags will be available to buy from the HSF trailer outside V&A Dundee.”
Down Brewery Lane
Based on Dundee’s aptly-named Brewery Lane, Chris is delighted to be following in the footsteps of some of the city’s top historical brewers with his new coffee roastery.
He continued: “The coffee roaster is built in a unit on a historic site on Brewery Lane. Traditional breweries that were huge at the time like the Park & Pleasance brewery and Balingall & Son brewery brewed beer on our site as far back as the 18th Century.
“When we’re roasting, we’re standing in the footsteps of Dundee’s finest brewers and entrepreneurs which is pretty amazing.”
First launch
Expecting to launch the first batch of coffee at Heather Street Food from early next week, Chris already has plans for his first single origin roast.
He said: “The first single origin coffee we’ll be producing comes from an organic coffee grower in a mountainous forest region called Chiapas in Mexico.
“It’s in a special biosphere reserve known as the ‘cloud forest’ because it’s at such a high altitude – the tops of the trees are lost in fog.
“We deal with a coffee brokerage who managed to get their hands on some sacks for us. It took a long time to get here via Antwerp and London but we’re so excited that it’s finally here in Dundee.
“We sample roasted it earlier this year and it’s the best coffee I’ve ever tasted. There was zero bitterness and it has beautiful tasting notes of chocolate, hazelnut and caramel.”
It will be available exclusively through Heather Street Food at V&A Dundee. Keep an eye on Brewery Lane Coffee’s Instagram page (instagram.com/brewerylanecoffee/) for updates and more information.