Ethiopia
Single Origin | Omni

Mulberry. Blueberry. Pineapple. Rose Apple

This exceptional natural coffee was dry milled and exported by Primrose PLC and Mr Abreham Mengiste, a family crop grown by by smallholder farmers living around the kabele (town) in Koke, Yirgacheffe region. Most contributing farmers own less than a hectare of land, and they grow coffee simply as a backyard cash crop. Coffee will usually be interspersed with other subsistence crops, such as sweet potato, mangos and avocados, but there are no other primary cash crops grown in the region.

Our exporter and the mill in Koke paid more than the market price for a kilogram of red cherry, and those farmers that bring quality red cherry are paid a cash incentive, ensuring higher-than-average overall quality. Coffee is selectively handpicked before being delivered to the mill collection points, this is roughly an 8km journey for producers, and is normally done on foot, by donkey, or motorbike. Upon arrival, the cherries are immediately sorted to remove under and overripe cherries. The cherries are then evenly dispersed on raised beds to dry in the open sun until the ideal moisture content is reached, which can take 15-20 days. Once dried, the cherries are trucked to the dry mill, located near the capital city, Addis Ababa. At the dry mill, a pre-cleaning machine removes foreign matter, metal, and stones. A huller removes the dried exterior fruit and a polisher removes the parchment, and silver skin. Once perfectly polished, the coffee is graded based on screen size and placed in a gravity separator to remove lightweight and broken coffee beans. Colour sorters provide another layer of quality control, by removing defected beans.

Every year, Dutch Colony strives to source, cup and purchase the best tasting Ethiopian coffees out there - mainly for the purpose of meeting our requirements in ensuring we have enough of our award-winning Dutch blend to supply to Singapore and beyond. One of the cleanest Ethiopian naturals by far, packed with loads of spiced and candied citrus tones and definitely one of the sweetest ever that we have purchased and roasted. We can see this quickly in every home-barista brew table and in the menu offering of many of our wholesale partners.