UPDATE 11/19/04 : Well, a sample of the latest shipment from St. Helena has come in, and the news is not good. The broker warned “it’s baggy” – but having tasted it, that was putting it nicely. The coffee is just bad – which just goes to show that good trees, soil, and weather, and proven ability to produce great coffee in the past is no guarantee of even passable coffee. It is a real disappointment considering that we were waiting on the coffee all year, since the 60#s we received last year about this time, and had committed to 6 bags of it. Future shipments are very iffy as we have basically written them off, and who knows when they will be able to produce the kind of coffee they are capable of once again. At this point, we don’t have a lot of faith in their quality control. If they will ship us old baggy
The 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... coffee and think we would accept it just to stock this limited coffee, they underestimate us. Cup quality comes first – the rest is incidental. I will warn you away from this coffee as, even on a small scale, you are risking similar results. – Tom
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St. Helena:
The Forgotten Coffee
BY NEIL RUSCH
The most exclusive coffee in the world comes from the South Atlantic Ocean island of St. Helena situated just above the Tropic of Capricorn, midway between Africa and America. Production is low (only about 12 tons a year), demand is high and the quality exceptional.
If Napoleon Bonaparte had not been exiled to the island in 1816, St. Helena’s existence and the island coffeeIsland Coffee is our term for coffees from various islands (Hawaii, Jamaica, Australia, etc.). Island coffees typically have a mild profile. They are typically wet-processed and grown at... would probably have remained almost unknown. Because of the Emperor, St. Helena coffee gained attention in Paris where it enjoyed a brief vogue due to Napoleon’s praise during his incarceration. Four days before his death, Napoleon’s loyal aid, Marshal Bertrand, reported, Tears came to my eyes at the sight of this man, who had inspired such awe…pleading now for a little spoonful of coffee.
The English East India
S-795 is a variety based on the " S-Line" coffees of India, and stands for Selection 795, It has a very fine cup, one of the best in... Company’s records indicate that coffee was introduced to the island in 1732 from YemenYemen has a coffee culture like no other place, and perhaps some of what we enjoy in this cup is due to their old style of trade...: Technically,.... The first seed came from the Red Sea port of Mocha, aboard the fully-laden East India Company’s ship Houghton, which was returning under sail along the South Easterly trade wind route to Europe after taking on cargo in the East Indies.
Other than Napoleon’s endorsement, St. Helena coffee did receive intermittent recognition. In 1839, the London coffee merchants Wm Burnie & Co. stated, We have submitted the sample of coffee received from St. Helena to the trade, who have tested it and pronounced it to be of very superior quality and flavor.
St. Helena coffee then proceeded to top the London market, and in 1845 was securing prices above any other coffee, thus making it the most expensive and exclusive in the world. All of this did little to prevent the island coffee from fading from view, and, for many years, it appears to have grown wild on the tiny volcanic island.
Only within the last 15 years has St. Helena coffee re-emerged on the world market – except for once. Coffee from the island estates, then known as Coffee Ground EstateA "coffee estate" is used to imply a farm that has its own processing facility, a wet-mill. In Spanish this is called an Hacienda. A Finca (farm) does... and the GW Alexander Estate, was sent to the Great Exhibition of 1851 in London and received an honorable mention. Thereafter, the records grow vague and the coffee seems to have been forgotten to the world. Inaccessibility, caused by the demise of the sailing ship era, had a lot to do with it. Even today the only way to reach the island is by ship.
David Henry, chief executive of The Island of St. Helena Coffee Company says, When we began working on what was the Alexander Estate, it was almost a jungle. Today some of the original trees stand 30 to 40 feet tall! Much of the older coffee grows in an area of the island known as Sandy Bay, which is surrounded by the remaining one-third of a spectacular volcanic crater rising 2,000 feet above sea level.
Henry spent several years delving into the East India records and researching the archive accounts. I came across records stating where coffee had been planted here 250 years ago. So we went off into the valleys. We discovered patches of wild coffee. It took us ages to secure the land and rejuvenate the wild trees.
At a singular coffee tasting, Henry prepared what he calls his breakfast and evening roast. These he cupped for me as both espressoA small coffee beverage, about 20 ml, prepared on an espresso machine where pressurized hot water extracted through compressed coffee.: In its most stripped-down, basic form, this is... and filter. The coffee has a full and complexThe co-presence of many aroma and flavor attributes, with multiple layers. A general impression of a coffee, similar to judgments such as "balanced" or "structured" aroma
Aroma refers to sensations perceived by the olfactory bulb and conveyed to the brain; whether through the nose or "retro-nasally": The aromatics of a coffee greatly influence its... with a balanceSuggests a harmony and proportion of qualities, and implies mildness since no one quality dominates.: Balance is both an obvious and slippery taste term. It implies a harmony... of ripe fruit including blueberries and dark chocolate
A general flavor or aroma term reminiscent of chocolate. But what type? Usually described with more specifics.: Chocolate is a broad, general flavor or aroma term reminiscent of.... Its acidity
Acidity is a positive flavor attribute in coffee, also referred to as brightness or liveliness. It adds a brilliance to the cup, whereas low acid coffees can seem... is medium to high, with a full bodyAssociated with and sensed by mouthfeel, body is sense of weight and thickness of the brew, caused by the percentage of soluble solids in the cup, including all.... I would say St. Helena cups exactly where it is situated geographically, in between Africa and the New World. There are definite hints of its Yemeni origins, but with a new world brightnessA euphemistic term we use often to describe acidity in coffee. A bright coffee has more high, acidic notes. : A euphemistic term to describe acidity in coffee.... and cleanliness. Overall it is a full and complex coffee with amazing blends of fruit chocolate and spices.
To discover and enjoy St. Helena coffee, as I did that memorable evening sitting on the verandah overlooking the vast Atlantic Ocean, was really to have stumbled on an anachronism, given the extraordinary background of the island coffee. It was only as recently as 1994 that any new trees were planted, mainly self-same seedlings, or small soldiers taken off the wild trees.
The discovery, resurrection, and intrinsic quality of this coffee owes almost everything to the fact that the trees all descend from a single source – the old cultivarCultivar is a term used interchangeably with Varietal in the coffee trade to indicate plant material, although there are distinctions.: The naming of a cultivar should conform to... of Green Tipped 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,... ArabicaArabica refers to Coffea Arabica, the taxonomic species name of the genus responsible for around 75% of the worlds commercial coffee crop.: Arabica refers to Coffea Arabica, the... imported to the island 269 years ago. Isolated on this island stronghold, from which not even Napoleon could escape, has kept the heritage pure. Generally today, world coffee production would typically consist of several Arabica types, many of which are new cultivars developed for greater wind and pest resistance and larger yields.
An unexpected surprise has been just how well St. Helena coffee performs as an espresso. Most gourmet coffees do not lend themselves well to espresso and, as a consequence, most espresso coffee is a blend. St. Helena coffee, to the contrary, has received positive feedback from Italian roasters and cuppers extolling its performance as an espresso. No one seems to be 100% certain why this is so. However, the supposition is that, because the coffee derives from a single strain, the bean cell structure is extremely even – so it reacts well under pressure (in the espresso process).
The uninitiated should know, too, that St. Helena coffee has another quirk. It is an extremely subtle bean, which makes it susceptible to damage. For instance, it is an awkward bean to roast, developing late in the roast and then very, very quickly.
Just how good is St. Helena coffee? In terms of cash paid for the St. Helena bean, there is nothing to surpass it – even JamaicaJamaica coffee can be excellent mild, lush coffee... sometimes. Like Kona and Puerto Rican coffee, it is soft, mild, clean and well balanced when it is good.: Ah... Blue Mountain, which for 70-odd years has dominated the gourmet coffee scene. A 17 gram-shot of St. Helena Green Tipped Bourbon Arabica at Harrods last year would have set you back £4.74. St. Helena coffee retails at $22 per half-pound, shipping included. Kenyan, Hawaiian, Jamaican – and more recently – Galapagos-grown coffee all occupy the rarefied landscape of true gourmet coffee, and now St. Helena coffee is standing there amongst the best of them.
You could ask 1,000 people if they had heard of St. Helena coffee and they would say no. If you ask 10,000 you might find one who says yes, Henry says.
The overall scale of coffee production that is produced by the St. Helena Coffee Company, which is 98% of the island output, is minuscule. The company now has six estates. Henry said that when he started in 1994, the annual production was 1.5 tons. It’s four times that now. I’m looking to increase production by about 20% each year for the next six to seven years, eventually hoping to produce around 25 to 30 tons. My nearest competitor, Jamaica Blue Mountain, is producing close to 1,000 tons!
Neil Rusch, a freelance writer, and publisher, first traveled to St Helena as the editor of SA Yachting magazine in 1998 and has since visited the island on four occasions, the most recent was in his capacity as the webmaster for www.thegovernorscup.com – the web site promoting the yacht race from Cape Town to St Helena.
