News & Notes from July - Volume 2

What's Happening at the George Howell Coffee Company

 

July 25th , 2008

 

 

Summer Arrivals!

In the last few weeks our Acton warehouse has been jammed with new crop coffees harvested Image this past winter throughout the Northern Hemisphere coffee-producing countries.  Some, like all of our Kenya coffees, have arrived vacuum-sealed and boxed (thank you Dormans!)- an innovation in the packaging and shipping of gourmet green coffee which greatly impacts the freshness of the green coffee and that Terroir Coffee has had a lot to do with.  For the first time in Terroir Coffee's existence (and The Coffee Connection's before that), I can say that our Kenya coffees have no trace of aging (very similar to oxidation in wine), nor will they have over the coming years.  A dwindling number of green coffees still arrive in jute and are immediately transferred into smaller boxed, vacuumed bags, ready for freezing, another Terroir Coffee innovation that will, in time, revolutionize the way top-quality coffee is stored by roasters.  All Cup of Excellence coffees will be packaged next year in vacuum bags next year going forward - a really sweet milestone for me, its co-founder.  In the meanwhile we continue to purchase only those Cup of Excellence coffees which are vacuum sealed at origin. 

Harvest The next two key coffees we are expecting are a very special lot of Ethiopian Yirgacheffe from the Konga Cooperative and another lot from the adjoining Sidamo region that will knock your socks off, both organic.  They should arrive, I am praying, sometime in early September.  We are still waiting for the small immaculate Pacamara lot produced by the great four-time winner of Cup of Excellence La Montaña farm of El Salvador this winter, despite the devastating windstorm of January 2008.  It is incredibly late, no fault of La Montaña, despite our pleas for timeliness from those responsible for this particular export.  We are hoping that the vacuum sealing will save the day!

At the end of August I will be at the first Cup of Excellence competition to be held outside the Americas - in Rwanda.  I will be joining an outstanding international jury which will be cupping through Rwanda's finest lots, highlighting its great farmers and cooperatives.  Our early customers will recall the fantastic lot of the Karaba Cooperative we had in 2004.  While Rwanda has produced some great lots since then getting them out of the land-locked country while still having a modicum of life in them has been just about impossible.  The Rwanda Cup of Excellence winners will all be vacuum-sealed. 

Finally, we are starting to get samples of the new Colombian coffees from the late spring harvest.  There is already no doubt some of our old favorites will be returning based on what we have cupped so far.

 

La Esperanza Returns!

La Esperanza, from South Huila, Colombia returns this Monday - on sale next week, as we say goodbye to El Descanso - for now.

We have just run out of the 2007 El Descanso from Huila.    Beginning this Monday, August 28, we will start roasting the very special winter 2008 lot of La Esperanza.  Fans will fondly recall this coffee which we featured as the first prize 2007 Colombia Cup of Excellence winner.  There has not been a Cup of Excellence there since (one is scheduled for this fall) but I am sure this lot would have gathered top honors again!  It has arrived vacuum-sealed as all our Colombian coffees are.  This lot received one of our highest cupping scores ever and we have paid a very high premium for it as the appropriate response.  Perhaps because of the substantial percentage of heirloom Arabicas on the farm, this coffee is fuller bodied than other Colombians while sharing its unique subtle tropical fruit flavor notes.  We will be roasting this coffee strictly on Mondays so as to maintain the freshest inventory possible over the week.  If we are out in the middle of the week it will not be until the next Monday that it becomes available again.  Any excess La Esperanza from the previous week will not be sold.
 
The La Esperanza Farm can be seen in the adjoining photograph as a thin whisker of tall shade trees, including bamboo, crossing diagonally from bottom left to upper right in a landscape of surrounding shadeless and near-shadeless erosion-prone farms.  La Esperanza's ongoing success will, as we have already seen elsewhere in Colombia, influence how his neighbors practice agriculture in the future.

To order, please click here: on sale for $18.95 per 12 ounces (regular price: $21.95 per 12 ounces) To read more about La Esperanza and its fascinating owner, Isaias Cantillo Osa, click here.

 

Upcoming Limited Edition Roasts

Our Special Edition coffee for this Monday, July 28, is Panama's already legendary La Esmeralda, new crop.

This coffee has, for the first time, been packaged in boxed vacuum-sealed bags at origin.  It makes a difference!  Full bodied with bold aromatic notes of peach.  Click here to read more or purchase - or call (866) GHH-JAVA.

The last of the Special Edition Colombia Villa Flor to be roasted on Monday, August 4.

Villa Flor is the quintessential expression of the Colombia Nariño flavor profile, with crisp light tropical fruit and underlying notes of wintergreen.  Its owner, Marcos Aurelio, is another small-farm Colombian visionary whose success is affecting his neighborhood in more responsible agricultural practices and better quality management.  Click here to order or call (866) GHH-JAVA.

 

   
 
 
[ Back ]