00:00So how often do you do this? Do you do this multiple times a day?
00:03I spend most of my day here.
00:06Mornings would be so hard without my coffee.
00:09Hi there, can I please get a small regular double cup?
00:17So good. For so many Canadians, Tim Hortons is a part of their daily routine.
00:21It's cheap, it tastes good, and you can find one in basically every corner of the country.
00:25But did you know that all Tim Hortons coffee in Canada is produced in a small town just outside of Toronto?
00:31I was recently invited to take a tour of Tim Hortons Roastery in Ancaster, Ontario.
00:36The warehouse stores and ships 1.5 million pounds of coffee a week
00:40and produces enough coffee to make 270,000 cups an hour.
00:44When I first stepped into the warehouse, I got a big waft of that familiar Tim's coffee smell.
00:48The plant manager started the tour and showed us how Tim Hortons coffee goes from bean to brew.
00:53They really have their process down to a T. Their beans are shipped in from Central and South America
00:58from countries like Guatemala, Brazil, and Colombia. Tim Hortons is a blend of five bean types.
01:03Side note, did you know coffee beans are green in color and only turn brown before they get roasted?
01:08I'd never seen a raw coffee bean before.
01:11So the process starts with inspecting beans for defects and cleaning them to remove any sticks,
01:15stones, and metal. Then they move to the blending and roasting process.
01:19Tim's uses the Neptune 3000 roasters, which according to them are the world's most advanced roasters.
01:2410,000 pounds of coffee is roasted per hour and it takes approximately 12 minutes to roast a batch.
01:29After being cooled for two hours, the beans head to the grinders and then move to the degassing
01:33stage to keep them fresh. Finally, it's on to packing. The equivalent of 975 pots of Tim Hortons
01:39coffee are packaged every minute. And then you can see here where it's flickering, it's adding 16
01:45pouches on a layer to 144 pouches in a case. So we're doing about seven and a half cases per minute.
01:53Then a very cool looking robot automatically stacks 64 boxes on each pallet. The plant manager called it
01:59one of the best employees because it works 24 hours a day, it doesn't go for a break. Then the boxes are
02:04put in storage and shipped within two days. The plant manager says they rarely have any issues with
02:09their process. And if they do, they're easily able to backtrack to which bag it came from.
02:14Which brings me to my next point. Something else that really amazed me about the roastery
02:17was quality control. They go through such great lengths to get that signature coffee taste profile.
02:23How would you describe the flavor notes of Tim Hortons coffee?
02:26Medium or dark? Medium. Medium. Medium coffee is for everyone. It's for the whole mass. It's kind of
02:34medium-range. It's sweet, acidity, garlic. You don't think it's medium-range. It's sweet,
02:41caramel, nadinos, citrus, a touch of it's spicy. It's nothing. It's all-powering.
02:49While on tour, I learned this new term called cupping. Basically, it's another word for sampling coffee.
02:54Tim's taste their coffee multiple times throughout the process to ensure it maintains the same taste
02:59and quality. Some employees that work at the plant actually cup coffee all day long. It's wild.
03:04So how often do you do this? Do you do this multiple times a day?
03:07Uh, yes, actually, this is, um, I spend my, most of my day here. In the morning, I roast
03:15coke and then a cup for five tables. It's full of cups. So we cup 250, 300 cups a day.
03:25As I mentioned, Tim Hortons coffee beans come from Central and South America. By the time we reach
03:30the warehouse, they've already been sampled three times to ensure their quality has remained
03:34uncompromised throughout their journey. Then the coffee is tested again after it's roasted and packed.
03:48Every hour, we keep three pouches of the finished goods. Every fifth batch, which is every hour on
03:56each roaster, we take a sample and we cup that to make sure that it's our standard. The other two
04:01pouches are kept in storage until their expiration date, so the team can go back if there's ever an
04:05issue at store level. Does everyone work here have, like, the exact smell memorized? Like, how do you
04:11know what a bad batch is? You sip Tim Hortons coffee long enough, you get to find the fine notes, right?
04:19And you get to know them. And you can pick out defects very quickly. Now, how do you cup? Well,
04:24Tim's gave us a chance to blend our own coffee, then taught us how to cup properly, starting with
04:28smelling the coffee. I bring my nose close to the cup, break the crust, stir coffee grounds, inhale the aroma.
04:39Then you go in for a taste.
04:40I made my own blend mixing the five types of beans available from Guatemala, Nicaragua, Brazil,
04:58Indonesia and Colombia. Guatemalan coffee is known to have more nuttier notes, whereas Indonesian coffee
05:03is stronger and has notes of chocolate. Okay, moment of truth. Let's taste my coffee.
05:10Let's just say I will not be working at Tim Hortons anytime soon. My coffee tasted so bad. But I
05:20couldn't believe how meticulous the team at Tim Hortons was at ensuring that every cup of coffee
05:24that came out of that plant tasted just right. So it got me thinking. Now we know where Tim Hortons
05:29coffee beans come from. We know how the process works. But what actually goes into the blend that
05:36makes the recipe so unique? I've been here for 11 and a half years. I don't know the recipe.
05:41So the commodity group will be cupping the green beans and then they put in the formula. The formula
05:49will go into it in the background in the computer system. Then they'll send me an email saying here's
05:55here's the number that you're going to use today to use recipe 419. We put in 419 in the background
06:01to start drawing the amounts of coffee for the roast.
06:04Do you want to apply to the regular blend in the mix of those five?
06:07Um, you know, I don't know what is in the blend. There's only a select few of us that can tell you
06:16what that is. No one on the tour could actually tell me what goes into the Tim Hortons recipe because no one
06:22actually knows. Clearly a highly guarded company secret. I have to say the Tim Hortons roastery
06:27tour was exceptional. It really gave me insight into everything that goes into making this beloved
06:33Canadian drink. What surprised you most about the tour? Let us know in the comments.
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