Region: Guji
Altitude: 1900-2200masl
Coffee varieties: Heirloom
Process: Natural
Drying: Dried over a 10 day period
Cupping notes: Peach, Brown Sugar, Lavender
Cupping score: 86
The majority of Ethiopia’s farmers are smallholders and sustenance farmers, with less than 1 hectare of land apiece. In many cases, it is almost more accurate to describe these farms as “coffee gardens” as the trees do sometimes grow in more of a garden or forest environment than what we imagine fields of farmland to look like.
Local farmers that bring their cherries to the washing station. This has been improving processes at the washing station: installing shade netting to cover drying beds during the hottest hours of the day; instigating cherry selection at the delivery point; tagging day lots in order to keep them separate and monitor moisture content throughout the drying phase, ensuring even drying before the lots are assembled.
Once the coffee cherries are harvested, they are hand-sorted to remove unripe and overripe cherries before they are delivered to the washing station for processing. The cherries are dried in a relatively thin layer at about 3-4 cm the first days. They will build up the layers to 6-10 cm after a few days. The coffees are moved frequently and they will be covered during the hottest hours of the day to protect the cherries from intense sunlight, then again at night to protect against humidity. This will also help improve quality as the coffee is rested and the drying more homogeneous.