Tasting Notes:
Cardamom, Blueberry, Coca-Cola Cherry.
Region:
Bensa, Sidama.
Farm:
700 Farms from the Chire Washing Station.
Varietal:
Local Landraces.
Elevation:
1830-1890m.
Process:
Natural.
Importer:
Aleco at Red Fox Merchants.
Notes from Lee at Quietly:
In The Sun always features naturally processed coffees. These are lots in which fresh cherries are harvested from the tree and then set out to dry in the sun. By leaving on those outer fruit and mucilage layers, the seed take on those complex sugars from the pulp. This drying typically takes around two weeks with the next stage being ‘hulling’ in which the outer layers are removed before a final wash.
Natural coffees are ‘the perfect starting point’ for people interested in specialty coffee. The processing lends itself to deep fruit-forward flavours, which are easy to pick up and makes ‘taste notes’ far less ambiguous. The cup will have much bigger body than washed processes, and natural lots can even lend themselves to more earthy and robust sensory profiles.
Simple with heavy sweetness, our natural lots are crowd pleasers that will leave you feeling content. As Nirvana’s All Apologies suggests, “In the sun, In the sun, I feel as one.”
Chire Washing Station collects cherries from roughly 700 farms on the far Eastern edge of Sidama along the outskirts of the Harenna Forest preserve. The station recently joined the Moplaco network, which runs several notable stations in Yirgacheffe, like the revered Chelelectu. The company is headed by Heleanna Georgalis and it helps with education and training with their Farmer’s Coffee Project. This lot traces back to farms by the village of Kumiburita and was dried at Chire for 12-15 days with use of shade covering for hot afternoons and a focus on slow fermentation during the cooler nights.
After loving last year's harvest from Bale Mountain, I asked Aleco at Red Fox if had a recommendation for a similar profile and he suggested trying this lot from Chire. Akin to Bale Mountain, it delivers hallmarks notes of blueberry, fresh strawberry, and a delicate note of black tea. Yet, it also breaks expectations with some surprising spicy notes of cardamon before going full sticky sweet with delicious red cherry notes over caramel, think cherry coke!
