Tag: Africa
Stumptown Coffee Roasters Rwanda Kanzu
This coffee was one of the trio that I recently ordered from Stumptown. One of those online ordering moments when I was delirious at the prospect of sampling not one, not two, but three(!) unique, direct-trade coffees from Stumptown Coffee Roasters. I’m still hung up on getting my hands on different coffees from Rwanda, and so the prospect of trying both of Stumptown’s direct-trade Rwandan offerings alongside their one Burundi coffee was simply too enticing for my mouse-finger to resist. Next thing I knew all three were en route to my doorstep.
I think that everyone who gets hooked on a particular gastronomic delicacy can think back to that one item that opened their eyes and initiated their obsession. For instance, I remember distinctly when this “scotch” moment struck. It was a bottle of Caol Ila 12-Year. It was the first bottle that I’d purchased, and it took me a while to warm up to it. But then one day, I had a dram and it tasted different somehow. My mind had rounded the corner, my tastebuds had woken up to what was in the glass. All of a sudden I could taste nuances of scotch that I had never noticed before, and it was so exciting. The rest, as they say, is history.
I can remember that same moment with regards to coffee, and it’s why I’ve been so avidly seeking out Rwandan coffees of late. My coffee moment was a Rwandan coffee that completely woke me up to the possibilities of the flavors and nuances that a cup of joe can embody. It caught my attention in a way that no coffee had before. Several coffees have since, and they’ve come from all over the world and from several different roasters.
But lately I’ve been in this frame of mind where I’ve been interested in really mining a particular vein of coffee, in an effort to learn as much as I can about the many ways that coffee from one particular country can express itself. Specifically in terms of where it was grown in that country, what varietals were grown, at what washing station it was handled, how it was fermented, how it was packaged before being shipped to the roaster, and the choices the roaster made in producing the final roasted coffee. And so my coffee tasting of late has included a smattering of offerings from Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, and Burundi.
The jury is still out on what I’ve found thus far. There have been two consistent elements in all of the coffees tasted thus far: body and acidity. They’ve all featured medium-weight to velvety bodies that came across as creamy and substantial on your palate. Intrinsically related to this has been the level of acidity, which has been consistently soft and subtle, present in enough capacity to brighten up the coffee’s creamy body, but not so much as to distract from the palate of flavors and substance.
Alongside the consistent elements of body and acidity has been a relatively consistent flavor spectrum that includes dark chocolate, red berries and fruits, and earthy tones. These flavors haven’t been present in all of the coffees, but they have all borrowed something from this basic palette. The overall picture, when you combine these three elements together, has been a series of warming, rather plush coffees that have had significant depth, and expressed chocolate and fruit flavors.
The coffee at hand is a Rwanda Kanzu, produced at the Kanzu washing stations in the Nyamasheke province, located in southwestern Rwanda along the shores of Lake Kivu, the biggest body of water in the country. The coffee is grown at very high altitudes, approximately 1900 meters, with the trees perched on the slopes of the surrounding mountains. The coffee is 100% bourbon varietal, and ripens at a slow rate due to the high altitudes. Stumptown’s literature indicates their belief that this contributes notably to its unique flavors and body.
This coffee is no exception from the pattern of flavor and texture elements that I’ve found thus far. In terms of the flavor spectrum, I found this coffee to be more earthy than some of the others that I’ve tasted recently. The nose had contrasting flavors of forest mushrooms, brown sugar, and fresh baked bread. The palate had a soft and delicate body lightened somewhat by a bright acidity. While some roasters prefer a dark-roast for African coffees, Stumptown uses more of a medium-style roast for theirs, and this coffee is a good example. The roast they’ve used here allows the brighter acidity to sit alongside both fruitiness and dark sugars, and heightens the coffee’s earthiness. The palate has flavors of light red wine (think pinot noir as opposed to cabernet), peanuts, and a dry earthiness. While the coffee initially comes across sweet, it finishes very dry and spare with very little sweetness on the finish. Flavors of oak and a prickle of acidity round out the cup.
This was a good cup of coffee, and very distinct from the other African coffees that I’ve tasted recently. I’ve got one more Rwandan coffee to drink from Stumptown, a Rwanda Muyongwe, and it will be very interesting to note how these two compare to one another.
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Stumptown Coffee Roasters Burundi Bwayi
Of the African coffee producing countries Burundi is the one that I believe you are least likely to encounter in your local coffee shop. Kenyan and Ethiopian coffees are commonplace, and in the hands of the right roaster coffees from these countries can be powerful and sublime. Coffees from Rwanda are becoming more common, but whether you come across them depends on what roasters you buy from. Their availability tends to be driven by the harvest season, and it’s less common to find them out-of-season.
But coffees from Burundi remain a rarity. This appears to be the result of two factors. On the one hand, the country’s overall economy is in much worse shape than Rwanda to the north. This in part has led to the second factor, which is the much less developed Burundian coffee industry, relative to other African countries. The combination of these two factors has severely hampered the progress of Burundi’s entry into the specialty coffee market. But, this particular coffee is one of Stumptown’s Direct Trade offerings, and I’ve seen Burundian coffee from Counter Culture as well, which may be an indication that the country’s (coffee) fortune’s may be on the rise.
This particular coffee is from the Kayanza province in Burundi, and was grown at an elevation between 1750-1900 meters. The coffee was produced at the Bwayi washing station, which itself is located close to the Rwandan border. As part of a pilot program in 2007, this washing station was one of four that were given permission by the government to work directly with coffee buyers. The other three were Ngogomo, Teka, and Murambi. Since then, eight more washing stations have been included in this program.
One of the interesting results of Stumptown’s efforts in Rwanda and Burundi was the Bikes To Rwanda program, that has provided hundreds of bicycles to Rwandan coffee farmers. The bikes are specially designed to carry heavy loads, and have helped the farmers ensure that their freshly picked coffee gets to the washing station shortly after picking.
And now, this is the first coffee that Stumptown has sourced as part of their Direct Trade program. The varietals include Bourbon, Jackson, and SL. The coffee is produced similarly to Kenyan coffee, with multiple fermentations. The coffee is also soaked after washing, helping to raise the protein levels and acidity. This has resulted in a very nice cup of coffee, one with substantial body coupled with supple acidity.
The coffee’s nose has wood and earth tones, mingled with spicy roasted red peppers. The palate starts off sweet with lichee nuts and milk chocolate, slowly giving over to flavors of fresh grapes. The body is heavy and velvety, with soft but strong acidity prickling around the edges. The finish is ripe with caramel flavors and a creamy acidity that slowly fades.
This was a nice coffee, but not quite as dynamic as some of the Kenyan or Rwandan coffees I’ve been fortunate enough to try. I look forward to trying other Burundi coffees though, now that more and more specialty roasters are able to get their hands on them. And if the arc of progress is anything like coffee production in Rwanda, we can expect the level of quality to continue to rise.
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Terroir Coffee Ademe Bedane Ethiopia Sidamo
I’ve just finished a bag of Ethiopian coffee from Terroir Coffee, the roasting company founded and owned by George Howell, one of the pioneers of the specialty coffee industry. Terroir Coffee was the first roasting company to really spark my imagination, back a little over a year ago when I first began reading and learning about coffee. Since then, it’s probably been a year since I tried one of their coffees, and so it was fun to get back in touch with their coffees.
What has always interested me about Terroir is the earnestness with which they promote specialty coffee and the farmers that grow it. All of their coffees are identified by the farm/coop that produced the coffee, and on their website most of the coffees that are listed include information about the growers, the region, and specifics about the varietal, geography, and harvesting of the coffee. Alongside this their website has a solid lineup of informational articles about coffee in general. Of particular note is George Howell’s “The Long Road To Coffee Quality”, a series of articles that he has been writing and publishing in the company’s weekly newsletter.
The company’s mission is clearly inspired by equal parts education and evangelism, and after looking at Howell’s coffee-industry history this is no surprise. After discovering high-quality coffee in northern California in the 1970′s, Howell moved to Boston and started the Coffee Connection, a series of coffee shops throughout New England. At the time (this is pre-Starbucks) the product that Coffee Connection was offering was wholly unique, and the company gradually became pretty successful. In fact, I remember a Coffee Connection in the town I went to college in, and distinctly remember that the coffee it served was easily the best in town.
In the mid-1990′s Howell sold the Coffee Connection to the green giant, Starbucks. Part of the sale included a no-complete clause that Howell had to abide by for several years, and so his role in the specialty-coffee industry changed at this point. He worked as a consultant to coffee growers and governments, and established the Cup of Excellence, a series of annual award competitions for coffee industries in Latin America, South America, and Africa.
And then in 2004, after the no-compete clause had expired and Cup of Excellence was finding success, he founded Terroir Coffee with the mission of recognizing the “fundamental role and identity [of coffee growers] in the production of high quality coffees”. Today, the company offers coffees from 10 different countries, each identified with a specific producer.
Last Spring and Summer I tried a number of their coffees, and enjoyed them all to some extent. But the reality is that I wasn’t ready for these coffees. They were all generally light-to-medium roasts, and given that most of the coffees I drank at that time were dark roasts, I wasn’t prepared for the bright acidity that was such a feature of the Terroir coffees. It really wasn’t until I began drinking coffees such as this consistently that I got the hang of them and could both relate to and enjoy what was in the cup.
And so when I recently ran out of coffee at home, it seemed like the perfect time to give Terroir Coffee a chance once again. Luckily, a coffee shop near our house is supplied by Terroir and sells some of their coffees in 12oz. bags. So, while the coffee is not the freshest (this bag was roasted in late March), I at least know that it’s been taken care of since having been roasted.
Ademe Bedane is a privately-owned washing station in the Sidamo region of Ethiopia, adjacent to the more famous Yirgacheffe region. The washing station buys coffee cherries from the local farmers and processes them using the washed method. The cherries, which were harvested in December and January, are all grown between 5000-6000 feet above sea level and are made up of a number of local varieties.
The nose has light scents of red fruits layered over a deep base of creamy milk chocolate. The palate is intriguingly earthy, with almonds, walnuts, and maple syrup. As the coffee cooled the palate became more expressive, with melons and berries coming into the mix. The texture is very soft and velvety, with lightly prickling acidity. The finish has a distinctly nutty acidity and an intriguing grapey sweet note crops up, almost cognac-like.
This coffee certainly confirmed my past experiences with Terroir in that it was delicate and complex, and definitely took some time to get to know. I was probably halfway through the bag before I really felt like I was able to fully enjoy the coffee. But it was fun wrapping my head, and taste buds, around this coffee. I’d like to go back and taste other coffees from Terroir, especially now that I am firmly in the grip of an African-coffee extravaganza*. Next time I will definitely order direct, just to ensure that I’m getting a chance to try them at their freshest best.
*Stay tuned, three bags of coffee from Stumptown just arrived on my doorstep, two from Rwandan and one from Burundi. I can’t wait!
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Stumptown Coffee Roasters Kenya Gaturiri Reserve
Kenyan coffee represents a difficult and sad contradiction. The country is renowned for producing some of the finest coffees in the world. Roasters across the spectrum cite Kenyan coffee as embodying the perfect confluence of geography, varietals, and well-honed and effective processing methods. Yet the country’s auction system which can effectively pay top dollars to well-deserving, quality coffees is also renowned for the poor management and corruption that frequently result in the actual producers – the farmers themselves – receiving little of this money. As a result, while the country’s coffees can be excellent, the farmers struggle to make a living and maintain their communities.
So it is notable that this is Stumptown’s first ever East African Direct Trade coffee. Their website explains that “to be able to guarantee such a phenomenal price to the association members of Gaturiri…is the first step towards transparent coffee business in Kenya.” This direct relationship is the result of the opening of what is called the “Second Window”. In November of 2006 the Kenyan government authorized legislation which allowed farmers to pursue relationships with agents outside of the auction system. While this “Second Window” legislation has raised many questions about its efficacy in improving farmers’ options for selling their coffee, roasters such as Stumptown and Intelligentsia have begun introducing new Kenyan coffees that are indeed the result of more direct relationships with farmers than they had been able to before. As part of these relationships the roasters are guaranteeing premium prices to the cooperatives and farmers they are working with, striving to achieve optimal financial transparency and to ensure that the farmers receive their due share of the prices paid, and working closely with both farmers and cooperatives to promote and enable ideal and sustainable agriculture and processing methods. Two years after the passing of the new legislation, these relationships forged by prominent roasters may be the first steps in improving both the quality of Kenyan coffee (which was already very good) and the economic life of the farmers who produce it.
Check out this article for more information on the “Second Window” legislation.
This Gaturiri Reserve was produced in East Africa by the members of the Gaturiri washing station that is part of the Barichu Cooperative in the Central Kenyan Highlands. The coffee was raised at an altitude of 1700-1800 meters, and features the two common Kenyan varietals SL28 and SL34. The “SL” stands for Scot Laboratories where the varietals were first developed. In the 1930′s this lab conducted cross-breeding of a number of different varieties in search of high-quality, high-yield, and disease resistant strains. SL28 and SL34 were both results of this work. SL28 is known for high-quality but fairly small yields, and producing an intensely citric, sweet, and balanced cup. SL34 is best known for producing high-quality coffee at medium-to-high altitudes, complex citric acidity, heavy mouthfeel and clean, sweet finish. The coffee is wet-processed, and after being washed the beans are transferred to drying tables.
The roast is fairly light, yet again disproving the persistent myth that all West coast coffees are darkly roasted. The nose gives off scents of milk chocolate, hazelnuts, and salted caramel. The palate has pine nuts, malted milk balls, ancho peppers, caramel, cedar, and blackberries. The texture is plush and rich with an easy-drinking soft acidity. The finish is dry, minty and nutty and medium-length.
A very nice coffee from Stumptown. Not as compelling as the Ethiopian coffee that I had from them recently, or some of the other Kenyan coffees, but very enjoyable and easy to drink. The lush texture and low acidity make this a good cup of coffee for anytime of day, and I suspect that it’d be appealing to a broad range of palates.
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Gimme! Coffee Rwanda Bourbon Bufcafe
Recently I’ve been strongly drawn to coffees from Rwanda. It all started last summer when I tried a Rwandan coffee from Barrington Coffee that exhibited a remarkable depth of flavor and nuance along with such a supple texture that it made for just wonderfully easy drinking. I later had the opportunity to try another Rwandan coffee from Counter Culture, and while not being as impressed as with the one from Barrington Coffee, I certainly found it to be a great cup of coffee. What ultimately intrigued me the most was the general scarcity of Rwandan coffee from specialty coffee roasters. Most roasters simply weren’t offering Rwandan coffees at the time I was looking for them.
It turns out that the reason for this was twofold. First, coffee is harvested in Rwanda in the fall, meaning that the coffees will ideally be arriving at roasters’ doorsteps in November or December. So my timing was bad, as this was early fall that I was looking. Secondly, the specialty coffee industry in Rwanda is still in its nascent form as farmers slowly improve their agricultural and processing methods, and trade-routes are gradually worked out that will allow the coffee to reach specialty roasters in the US. Thus, the available quantity of the better coffees is pretty limited.
So in sum, this all adds up to limited availability of some very fine coffees. Naturally, when Gimme! began selling the Rwanda Bourbon Bufcafe, I jumped at the chance to pick up a pound. The combination of one of my favorite roasters and the coffee that won the recent Golden Cup Award in Rwanda seemed like a match made in heaven.
The Bufcafe Cooperative is made up of about 3000 farmers who each tend roughly 200 trees on average. Very small-scale coffee growing that places a huge emphasis on the role of the cooperative in enabling the coffee to achieve excellence. Recent years’ coffee premiums paid by specialty roasters enabled the Bufcafe’s mill owner to reinvest in the facilities, improving the quality of the coffee they were producing as well as their environmental impact. The result of the improvements there and in the field resulted in the cooperative winning the coveted Golden Cup, the country’s annual coffee competition.
This pound of coffee came from the same lot that the cooperative’s Golden Cup-winning entry came from. By the time I got my hands on it, it had been roasted about 1.5 weeks earlier. The beans are wet-processed using fully-washed method and are 100% grade AA bourbon varietal. The trees are all grown between 5500-6200 feet in 30% volcanic soil in the Nyamasabe District in the Butare region of Rwanda.
The nose is a unique mix of compelling aromas: cedar, cocoa, apple orchards, orange peel, unripe pears, and toasted bread. The palate conveys strong notes of caramel and dark chocolate, interestingly without the sweetness these flavors would normally carry. Faint traces of red fruit, roasted nuts, and menthol skirt around the edges. The palate is very dry, with a warming, silky texture. On the finish there are flavors of anise and blueberries that rise to the top alongside hints of fresh mint and menthol.
This was definitely another stellar Rwandan coffee. I struggled with it initially though, and it took me several cups to get the amount of grounds and steeping time right. The normal amount of grounds that I use produced a too-strong coffee, so I had to dial back to get everything just right. In the end, it was well worth the tinkering…I’ll be a bit sad when I drink the last cup from this pound of beans.
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