Get ready for some bushwhacking in a Land Rover, goats, and even some scenes of the current Kenya coffee harvest.
I stitched together some footage he shot during his recent trip to KenyaKenya is the East African powerhouse of the coffee world. Both in the cup, and the way they run their trade, everything is topnotch.: Kenya is the East.... coffee cherryOriginally coffee literature referred to the fruit of the tree as a "berry" but in time it became a cherry. It is of course neither. Nor is the... harvesting, lessons of the washing channel and the cupping
Cupping is a method of tasting coffee by steeping grounds in separate cups for discrete amounts of ground coffee, to reveal good flavors and defects to their fullest.... lab.
It was a pleasure to see Kenya in harvest, although in some places it was a little early. There’s nothing wrong with early harvest coffee, it just tends to demand more selective hand-picking and sortingCoffee is sorted by size, density, and color in its preparation for export.: Sorting refers to several steps performed in the preparation of coffee for export. Coffee is....
I detail some of the varieties grown in Kenya here, SL-28Scott Labs selection 28 Kenya cultivar, a preferred type with Bourbon and Mokka heritage. It supposedly is selected from Tanganyika DR cultivar, found by A.D. Trench on a... and 34 (Scott Labs varieties from the 1930s), and the way Ruiru 11An Arabica cultivar from Kenya, a dwarf form with resistance to CBB (coffee berry borer) and CBD (coffee berry disease) : Ruiru 11 is named for the station..., a newer hybrid from Kenya Research is grafted.
Generally in Kenya the coffee is harvested by the farm owner and family, and there might be some paid helpers. But the farms in the highlands of Kirinyaga, Nyeri and other regions tend to be quite small. Sometimes neighbors simply trade assistance: you harvest my coffee with me, and I harvest yours.
In the cupping lab I look at the huge range of commercial grades of coffee, noting that it comes from good farms and coops often: there aren’t necessarily separate “commercial farms”. Low grades come from even the best farms.
I also note that if you are concerned about your own health in terms of coffee consumption, don’t drink low grade cheap coffee, especially that which is sold as already-ground coffee in the US or as Instant coffee. That is where the off grades, broken bits and mustyOff aroma and flavor that reminds one of a dank, moldy closet. This flavor can hint at a dangerous coffee mold and should not be consumed.: Off aroma.../moldy coffee goes. -Thompson
Also you might care to see:
Video: Visiting Dusangirijambo, a Burundi Coffee Cooperative
Congo Kivu Coffee Photo Tour
Flores: A Balanced and Beautiful Indonesian coffee
Burundi Coffee in Permanent Crisis
