Saint Helena Coffee Overview

The isolation of the island and the early coffee plantings meant that these are old BourbonA coffee cultivar; a cross between Typica and Bourbon, originally grown in Brazil: Mundo Novo is a commercial coffee cultivar; a natural hybrid between “Sumatra” and Red Bourbon,… or Typica plants, and are quite genetically pure. The altitude is better than most island coffees, and colder climates at this latitude and altitude mean the coffee ripens more slowly on the tree. There are many challenges though, and largest among them is a chronic labor shortage of willing workers.

The last time we cupped samples of Saint Helena coffee it was awful, baggyThe flavor of coffee that has been stored for too long, it has absorbed the flavor of whatever it has been stored in. : Coffees that are held…, damaged by time and humidity. It has potential; I remember a bright, sweet cup with floralFloral notes in coffee exemplify the connection between taste and smell. Describing the taste of a specific flower is near impossible…we always default to “it tastes like it… hints. But this matters little when you can’t process the coffee and transport it without damaging the flavors. At this point we don’t have a lot of faith in their quality control. If they will ship us old baggy coffee and think we would accept it just to stock this limited coffee, they underestimate us. Cup quality comes first, the rest is incidental. The coffee is available online in the UK sometimes, but I will warn you away from this coffee as, even on a small scale, you are risking similar poor cup quality at very high prices.

In 2004, we weren’t expecting much from this Saint Helena shipment.