OR Coffee Roasters began when Tom Janssen, whose grandfather and uncle had been roasters, and Katrien Pauwels rented a small shop in Aalst, installed a shop roaster and started roasting with “no knowledge, no experience and no real business plan”. Their first coffee bar opened in Ghent, followed by one in Brussels; after 11 years of running four espresso bars, the couple handed them to a new owner to concentrate on sourcing and roasting. OR now has more than 25 years of roasting experience and runs a training centre with barista and latte art workshops.

Around 98% of its coffee is bought directly. OR works with eleven producing countries and buys directly in nine of them, among them the Dutra brothers in Brazil since 2010, where a section of their farm called Pedra Bonita is kept for OR, Carlos Méndez in El Salvador, Heleph Coffee’s washing stations in Sidama, Ephrem’s Munkaze station in Burundi and Abdoul’s washing station in Rwanda’s Huye District. Kenya and Guatemala come through long-standing importers. The team roasts by hand on 22 kg and 60 kg Probats, with a 1 kg Probatino for small batches and training, roasting light and labelling each coffee for filter or espresso. The XPL range is roasted omni, for both. The Houseblend, roasted for espresso, is its most popular coffee.

The OR Coffee Lab in Ghent is a bright, open room where the baristas brew V60, Chemex, AeroPress, espresso and cappuccinos with the roaster’s latest single origins. The kitchen makes all-day breakfast and lunch from scratch, from focaccia and soup to granola, salads and bowls. A second Coffee Lab is planned for Antwerp.

Partner cafés

Coffee on the shelf

Photograph: OR Coffee Roasters