Ethiopian coffees
Yesterday I had the pleasure of cupping four of the Ecafe Gold auction coffees from Ethiopia. Though the auction lots were a bit too large for Victrola (20 bag lots), registering for auctions gives us the opportunity to sample roast and cup some of the most extraordinary coffees in the world. The auction was a success, giving farmers great prices for their coffees and encouraging the continued development of these unique premium lots of coffee into the future. Time permitting, we’ll roast small batches of each of the 26 lots and invite our customers to join us in a tasting.
This morning I am enjoying a french press of the Unwashed Yirgacheffe from the Koke cooperative. It has an amazing berry quality that reminds me instantly of Starburst fruit chews candy.
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July 5th, 2005 at 2:14 pm
What’s the deal with Yirgacheffe? I am obviously not getting it. I thought that Yirg was a region within the state of Sidamo and that coffees from yirg were mostly washed. Can you gimme some info on that region, or at least what you know.
July 5th, 2005 at 5:56 pm
I’ve heard Yirgacheffe refered to as a subregion of Sidamo but I suspect the coffee map and political map are different creatures, much like in Sumatra. Maybe someone else reading this can enlighten us…
July 7th, 2005 at 2:32 pm
The following is my understanding of the term Yirgacheffe–
In Ethiopia, Yirgacheffe refers to:
1) a region
2) a coffee variety i.e. yirgacheffe, sidamo, nekempte, harrar, limu, jimma, etc.
3) a city: Yirga Cheffe
4) a Coffee Union: Yirgacheffe, Sidama, Oromia, Kaffa
Many of the coffees are washed, however, some cooperatives do produce unwashed, “sundried,” coffees. For the ECAFE competition, some coops that had never experimented with sundried coffees did so with particular care and attention, producing some amazing results.
While in Ethiopia for the competition, I had the oportunity to visit several coffee cooperatives in various regions and fell in love not only with the beautiful coffees of Ethiopia, but also with the country and its people.
July 10th, 2005 at 7:21 am
i believe yirgacheffe is among the best coffee in the world. i would LOVE to try it. i have tried sidamo, and its floral is so amazing. all this claim given that i’ve not really tried a lot yet.
tonx,
i believe you roast pretty fast on the deidrich and still get so even color, do you always roast full drum?
July 10th, 2005 at 11:07 am
Thanks Sarah. Ethiopia is at the top of my travel-to-origin wish list.
default,
typical batch sizes on our IR-12 range from 12-20 lbs. There is a loss of performance if you go much above 20. Typical roast times are 12-15 mins depending on the bean/profile.
July 13th, 2005 at 7:30 am
Sarah’s on the right track… there’s a multiplicity of meaning in the word Yirgacheffe.
For purposes of coffee nomenclature (or better still, appelation), it’s easiest to think of Sidamo as a province of Ethiopia… though it hasn’t been a single political entity since a new constution was written in 1995 which divided Sidamo (by ethnicity) into Oromia and Southern Peoples.
The historical Sidamo, then, is a vast swath of mountains and plateaus in the south of the country (which is roughly twice the size of Texas.) Within this region lays the town of Yirgacheffe, and growers from all round that town make claim to the Yirgacheffe name… which is generally fair, as probably every one of those growers belongs to a handful of coffee cooperatives organized in and around Yirgacheffe proper.
So, by geography, all Yirgacheffe coffees are Sidamos… by politics, none of them are. ;)
July 13th, 2005 at 9:57 am
Whoops. Make that, “Sarah’s got you on the right track.”
Don’t want to suggest that she’s still on the road to discovery, herself… I think she’s altogether arrived ;)