A last minute holiday shopping guide to help navigate our growing origin list, plus an overview of what to expect before 2025.
While we may only be three weeks away from ringing in the quarter century, we still have to get through Christmas! Those looking for last minute gifts or coffees to roast for holiday gatherings will be happy to know it’s a great time of year to shop green coffee.
We have perhaps our broadest selection of coffee origins in December, so there’s no shortage of interesting options. But so many options can also be overwhelming, so we’ve put together a crib sheet with recommendations of some in-house favorites, as well as an overview of our special holiday products.
The end of the year is also an exciting time for us as coffee buyers, as we are entering some of the busiest months for buying. We secure more than half of our annual volume in the first three months of the year! This means getting back to coffee lands, visiting with friendly folks we don’t see often enough, and of course lots and lots of cupping. I’ll spend the last part of this Outlook touching a little on year end transit updates, and how things are looking for 2025.
Coffees to Please the Crowd
For many, the holidays are a time when you get to share your home roasting passion. You’ve probably talked your relatives ears off about roasting coffee at home (*gasp*), now you get to show them why. But choosing the right “after-dinner” coffee for a big group can be a bit like choosing the music. Not everyone wants to digest their food to free jazz, but that doesn’t mean you need to settle for Kenny G.
My family tends to be acidity averse (“this coffee tastes sour!”), and have a hard time recognizing anything without roast tone as ‘coffee’. I look for balanced bittersweet options from Latin America, those I can put a little roast on without sacrificing sweetness. Guatemalan coffees are great for this, and our Xinabajul Producers lot in particular gives you a lot of latitude with roast level. Mexico Organic Chiapas Tulijá is another great option – bittersweet, nutty, and bodied – and if your guests like coffee with cream, it’s one that will stand up to milk.
Rwandan coffees might sound like surprising contenders, but the high grown Bourbon cultivar from this under-appreciated origin can provide the perfect balance of bittersweet flavors that will please a crowd. Rwanda Nyamasheke Gitwe is one we’ve really enjoyed in the medium-dark roast territories, and a top candidate.
On the other hand, if you’re looking to punctuate the occasion with more of a statement coffee that stands out, we have plenty of those too. For me, Ethiopia Dry Process Dambi Uddo tops the list. The potent aroma is mouthwatering, and a fruit-forward cup of blueberries and fruit spreads is delicious. It’s the type of coffee that brings an “aha” moment to almost anyone who tastes it, where the realization is made that not all coffees taste the same.
Burundi Dry Process Kibingo is another “natural” process coffee worth a mention, and is more versatile than Dambi Uddo in terms of roast range. Roasting it light highlights vibrant fruits and malty sweetness, whereas deeper development brings out a deeply bittersweet, low acidity brew. From the high toned category, Kenya Nyeri Gatugi AA knocks it out of the park with pristine citrus notes that sparkle, and an aromatic finish.
Finally, Yemen Moka Sanani is about as complex a cup as they come. It has a potent aromatic profile of woody whole spices, rustic bittersweetness, and hints of cooked fruits. Take a moment to read the review before committing, as Yemeni coffees are just about as polarizing as Christmas!
Coffee Gifts & Sample Sets
If you’re looking for a gift for that home roaster in your life (or maybe for yourself?!), we’ve put together some coffee sets to help take the stress off of picking the perfect green. They are generally priced much lower than if you were to buy the coffees separately, sweetening the deal! The themes are flavor, origin variety, and volume, which I’ll cover in that order below.
While all of our sets shine the spotlight on flavor, we curate two longstanding flavor-specific sets highlighting coffees that express fruit, and chocolate themes. Our Fruit Basket Flavor Set comes with four different 1 lb bags of coffees that all have “fruit” at the front of the cup. This set skews heavily toward dry process coffees, and at the moment consists of coffees from Africa and Central America. Our Box of Chocolates Flavor Set is all about deep-toned, chocolatey coffees, that come from the confluence of roast bittering and sweetness found in coffee. Also four different 1 lb bags of coffee, this one doubles nicely as a set for fans of espresso too!
For those looking for more of an “Around the World” experience, we have a few origin-based options. Our standard 8 lb. and 4 lb. green sets are built with variety in mind, and depending on the season, include coffees from Africa, Latin America, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia. We offer this set as a subscription too that can be be purchased as a gifted duration, or indefinitely. We also offer a mini 1/2 pound set, espresso sample set that includes both single-origins and blends, and a decaf set of coffees we have processed ourselves!
If roasting for gifts is your goal, or you’re just hoping to stock up and stay in, our “XL” sets are a good way to go. These extra large 10 pound sets are split between two different coffees (5 pounds each), so there’s plenty of each selection to go around. Our current themes include Ethiopia Process Methods flavor set (wet and dry process), and origin-based sets from East Africa, and Latin America.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention our limited Santa Sack 30 Pack, the crown jewel of coffee sets, and only available through Christmas. This set includes a cross-section of our current inventory in the form of thirty different 1 lb bags of coffee, and comes packed in one of our blue canvas “coffee print” totes. It doesn’t get more “variety” than that!
Worries you might pick the wrong thing? You can always give the gift of autonomy in a Sweet Maria’s Virtual Gift Card too, where satisfaction is guaranteed!
But I need a roaster too!
We have a few all-in-one roaster bundles that have everything to get you started roasting coffee. On the entry-level end of the spectrum, our Air Roaster Starter Kits are an incredible value. But don’t let that their small footprint and simplicity fool you. I’ve met countless people who say they’ve been roasting on air poppers for decades, and it’s easy to understand why! The Behmor Starter Kit (drum roaster) is also a big seller for us. The combination of affordability, and 1 lb. batch size make it another option that you may never grow out of. All of our starter kits come with coffee, and other roasting accessories so that you can start roasting coffee right out of the box. You can see our whole line of roasters here.
Shop all of our Holiday Products
End of Year Transit Updates
Between container shortages and congestion, shipping coffee continues to be a challenge. Thankfully, the delays have been kept to a minimum thanks in large part to our partners at origin who are working hard to make sure our coffees ship in a timely manner.
It’s been particularly difficult finding 20 foot containers in Brazil, which has made booking space on vessels a bit of a moving target. Last week we received some good news that one of our newer Brazilian partners, Agrorigem, were able to find a container for our coffee and successfully made their booking appointment with the ocean freight company. Agrorigem are a women-led export company in Santa Rita do Sapucaí who work with smaller-scale farmers in their area, giving them access to markets in the US and abroad.
When I say “smaller-scale”, I mean some with as little as 1 hectare. When we visited this past August, we were pretty taken a back by the production in this region which looked a lot more like farms in Colombia or Peru, rather than the massive Fazendas of Brazil. (You can learn a little more about Agrorigem and see some of the farms in our previous coffee outlook, Bom Día Brazil).
Our most recent arrival from Colombia was unfortunately pulled for customs exam upon arriving in Oakland. For whatever reason, Colombian containers are pulled for examinations more than any other origin! At least in our experience. Whatever the case, we expect these coffees to be available in the next few days, and will do our best to get something on the site before Christmas!
We also have containers on the water from Rwanda, Burundi, Indonsia (Java, Sulawesi, and Flores), and Honduras, and hope to have more firm ETA’s in our January edition of the Coffee Outlook.
Upcoming Coffees December/January
Below is a list of upcoming green coffees currently on the schedule to be added to our website for Augus. This list is still being updated, and will see our first Ethiopian and Kenyan coffees by the end of the month.
December/January Outlook (so far – lots more to come!):
| Coffee | Bags |
| Bali Wet Hulled Bangli Kintamani | 15 |
| Brazil Dry Process Alex Sandro | 62 |
| Burundi Kayanza Kibingo Station | 17 |
| Colombia Urrao – Inzá Chiroso | 10 |
| Colombia Inzá Veredas Vecinas | 49 |
| Colombia Honey Aponte El Páramo | 16 |
| Colombia Tolima China Alta | 34 |
| Colombia Edward Sandoval Gesha | 5 |
| El Salvador Finca Miravalles Castillo | 35 |
| Ethiopia Agaro Geta Bore | 100 |
| Ethiopia Guji Hambela Dabaye | 60 |
| Ethiopia Dry Process Hambela Goro | 100 |
| Flores Om David Washed | 10 |
| Flores Turelelo Anaerobic Honey | 20 |
| Guatemala Xinabajul Jose Villatoro | 37 |
| Kenya Nyeri Mahiga Peaberry | 30 |
| Nicaragua Ojo de Agua | 20 |
| Nya-Nye East Africa SWP Decaf | 116 |
| Peru Jaen Alianza Mikan | 31 |
| Rwanda Dry Process Macuba | 40 |
Incoming coffees currently on the water: December onward
Please keep in mind that names may change when we list the coffee on our website. Location status of “In Transit” are also a bit of a wild card, as logistical disruptions are out of our control! You also may notice some of the coffees from last month’s list have disappeared. These have likely arrived in the US, and await being added to our launch schedule. Thanks for your patience!
African Incoming Coffees
| Coffees | Bags | ETA |
| Burundi Kayanza Kibingo Station | 50 | ETD 12/10 |
| Burundi Kayanza Gakenke | 50 | ETD 12/10 |
| Burundi Kabarore Commune Yandaro | 50 | ETD 12/10 |
| Burundi Dry Process Gakenke | 20 | ETD 12/10 |
| Burundi Dry Process Masha | 20 | ETD 12/10 |
| Burundi Honey Process Gakenke | 15 | ETD 12/10 |
| Burundi Honey Process Masha | 30 | ETD 12/10 |
| Burundi Gatara Masha | 85 | ETD 12/10 |
| Burundi Peaberry | 30 | ETD 12/10 |
| Burundi Kiganda Murambi | 60 | TBD |
| Burundi Dry Process Murambi | 31 | TBD |
| Burundi Masenga | 45 | TBD |
| Burundi Rugembe | 17 | TBD |
| Burundi Dry Process Kinama | 41 | TBD |
| Burundi Dry Process Kigina 23 | 11 | TBD |
| Burundi Dry Process Kigina 25 | 24 | TBD |
| Burundi Migoti | 47 | TBD |
| Burundi Monge Murambi Hill | 45 | TBD |
| Rwanda Dry Process Nyamiyaga | 30 | ETA 12/10 |
| Rwanda Dry Process Macuba | 40 | ETA 12/10 |
| Rwanda Honey Process Kibirizi | 40 | ETA 12/10 |
| Rwanda Rutsiro Mushonyi | 30 | ETA 12/10 |
| Rwanda Nyamasheke Karambi | 30 | ETA 12/10 |
| Rwanda Buliza | 30 | ETA 12/10 |
| Rwanda Nkora | 30 | ETA 12/10 |
| Rwanda Anaerobic Karambi | 20 | ETA 12/10 |
| Rwanda Honey Process Karambi | 40 | ETA 12/10 |
| Tanzania Mbozi Lukululu Peaberry | 20 | TBD |
| Yemen Moka Matari | 150 | ETD Jan |
| Yemen Sharqui Haraz | 75 | ETD Jan |
| Yemen Moka Sanani | 75 | ETD Jan |
| Yemen Moka Haimi | 50 | ETD Jan |
| Yemen Al Qafr Hawari | 50 | ETD Jan |
| Yemen Moka Peaberry | 50 | ETD Jan |
| Yemen Special Selections | 50 | ETD Jan |
| Zambia Selections | 20 | TBD |
| Zambia Kateshi Estate AA | 15 | TBD |
South America Incoming Coffees
| Coffees | Bags | ETA |
| Brazil Sítio da Pedra | 59 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Sítio Três Barras | 24 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Condado São José | 37 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Fazenda Doña Maria Christina | 10 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Stio Serra dos Borges | 24 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Doña Maria Dorotéia | 33 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil São José Farm | 58 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Carlos Henrique Santa Rita de Cássia | 35 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil São Joaquim Farm | 40 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Winicius Baquião Dutra | 10 | ETD 12/20 |
| Brazil Dalila Vasconcelos | 7 | ETD 12/20 |
| Brazil Flávio Caixeta Nunes | 32 | ETD 12/20 |
| Brazil Amarildo José Borges | 32 | ETD 12/20 |
| Brazil Reinaldo Gomes da Cunha | 35 | ETD 12/20 |
| Brazil Canastra Luis Otavio | 35 | ETD 12/20 |
| Brazil Carmo de Minas Santa Lucia | 63 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Dry Process Fazenda Sertao | 20 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Dry Process Santa Ines | 49 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Dry Process Fazenda IP | 100 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Pulp Natural Fazenda IP | 50 | ETA 1/15 |
| Brazil Pedra Branca Furnas | 43 | ETA 1/15 |
| Peru Rosalina Perez | 24 | ETD 1/8 |
| Peru Las Delicias | 34 | ETD 1/8 |
| Peru Ihuamaca | 48 | ETD 1/8 |
| Peru El Hauco | 26 | ETD 1/8 |
| Peru San Pablo | 23 | ETD 1/8 |
| Peru Luz Mely | 12 | ETD 1/8 |
| Peru Perlamayo | 14 | ETD 1/8 |
| Peru Mario Rafael | 18 | ETD 1/8 |
Indonesia & SE Asia & Oceania Incoming Coffees
| Coffees | Bags | ETA |
| Java Sunda Puncak Sirna Anaerobic Honey | 50 | ETA 12/29 |
| Java Sunda Siki Alit Washed | 40 | ETA 12/29 |
| Flores Om David Washed | 10 | ETA 12/29 |
| Flores Tanta Reti Washed | 10 | ETA 12/29 |
| Java Sunda Garut Honey Robusta | 10 | ETA 12/29 |
| Java Sunda Bukit Paniisan Anaerobic Honey | 50 | ETA 12/29 |
| Java Sunda Siki Alit Wet Hulled | 40 | ETA 12/29 |
| Flores Wolo Wio Washed | 15 | ETA 12/29 |
| Flores Turelelo Wet Hulled | 15 | ETA 12/29 |
| Flores Turelelo Anaerobic Honey | 20 | ETA 12/29 |
| Sulawesi Seko Wet Hulled | 20 | ETA 12/29 |
| Sulawesi Kahayya Washed | 30 | ETA 12/29 |
| Sulawesi Topidi Natural | 10 | ETA 12/29 |
One Response
Funny, I just asked Dan about the December outlook and he gracefully pointed out that it was posted a few days ago, LOL. How did I miss it?🤪
Wow, the 2025 Yemen haul seems quite extensive! I’m working through this year’s Mokha Sanani (my first year trying this coffee) and am really liking it. Blended with Ethiopia Kabele Keramo, it is spectacular! It makes a fine holiday blend.
You all have really managed the shipping challenges well. Thanks again for finding and delivering such top notch coffee beans!