I have just returned from the Cup of Excellence in Rwanda and leave this Tuesday for Colombia where I will be cupping some of the best micro-lot coffees Colombia has produced this season, quite a few of which we will be receiving later this year.  When I return I will write a report on these travels as well as  resume writing The Long Road to Quality ©.

High quality roasters and importers from the US, Japan, France, Norway, the UK, Taiwan, Sweden and Guatemala joined two Rwandan coffee cuppers to form an International Jury of twenty-three jurors.  We went through fifty coffees that the National Rwanda Jury had selected from over two hundred original entries and whittled them down to twenty-four in four days of intensive cupping.  Some of the finalists are spectacular. Rwanda's President Kagame presided over and spoke at the Cup of Excellence awards ceremony, indicating just how important he considered this event for his country; click here to read the The New Times from Kigale article. The photo to the left shows the women cuppers of the jury.  They are the two Rwandan cuppers and, from the US, Lindsay Bolger of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (far left), and Christy Thorns of Allegro Coffee Roasters (right, in back).

Roasters and importers from around the world, including Terroir Coffee, will compete in an internet auction in mid-October for these lots.  Each will receive samples of all twenty-four winners and cup them again to make a final assessment about which coffees each will bid for.  This event marks the beginning of Terroir Coffee's return to Rwanda coffees - this time, I believe, on a permanent basis.  I am hopeful that with the elimination of the traditional jute bag for green coffee shipping and its replacement with vacuum packaging, the freshness and unique features of Rwanda's best coffees will be preserved.  It is why we have held back for so long. Coffees coming from this land-locked tropical country through Kenya's port of Mombassa all too often arrive very late, aged and drained of their wonderful aromatics.  The international jury continuously noted flavors of sweet orange, red currants and cherry in these coffees.

One of the great things Cup of Excellence (CoE) does is insist that the name of every farmer whose coffees went into the winning lots be recorded and that they each be paid their portion of the auction proceeds. Farmers receive the lion's share after administrative costs are paid and washing stations, so critical to the final quality of the coffee, are given a modest percentage of the final price.  The development of transparency down to the farm level is a critical role played by CoE.  In the case of Rwanda a tiny lot of just fifteen bags (2,000 pounds) may be produced by several hundred farmers (click here to see the list for the number one prize winner; the full information on the winning farms and washing station are still in process but their names are up).  In densely populated Rwanda, where every square inch is cultivated, farmers do not measure how many acres they have but rather the number of trees they have.  Most only own a few hundred (with an average production of well under a pound per tree)..

This coffee arrived in far better condition than previous years. I believe this lot to be the best we have ever received from El Injerto.
 
El Injerto keeps making great strides in selecting strictly ripe cherries.  The result is sweet age-free coffee (age produces generic woody notes) that allows the full integrity of the coffee to come through. El Injerto has always had great structure, displaying real spine.  This lot is exemplary, with sweet ringing citric notes.  

El Injerto is perhaps the highest quality coffee producer in Guatemala.  Their coffees have won first place the last two years in a row at the annual Guatemala Cup of Excellence.  This has never happened before in any Cup of Excellence, which is nine years old and operates in nine countries. Click here to order.

We will run out of Aged Sumatra this month.  Looking for more...

Upcoming Limited Edition Roasts

Sale Coffees for September

Daterra Farm Special Reserve, Cerrado, Brazil


The new crop Daterra Farm Special Reserve is a spectacular improvement over the past. This is still a wonderfully mellow coffee but with far more delicate clean fruit sweetness than in the past, giving a refined Beaujolais-like character to this coffee. Daterra is Rainforest Alliance and Utz certified.

Favorite of Food & Wine Magazine, March 2006
Roast Style: Full Flavor Roast
Regularly $15.95 on Sale for $13.95
Click here to order.

Kangocho, Nyeri, Kenya

What a thrill to once again have a great lot from this cooperative mill after so many years! I first had coffee from Kangocho during my Coffee Connection days in the early 1990's, when I grasped what greatness Kenya coffees were capable of. What makes this lot of Kangocho so special are its sumptuous mouthfeel and its sweet blueberry notes, melding so harmoniously with the classic grand Kenya riot of blackberry and black currant flavors.

We are offering this Kenyan coffee in two roast profiles, our classic full flavor and a slightly darker profile wonderfully suited for French Press. Both are on sale!
Regularly $15.95 on sale for $13.95
Click here to order.

Sumatra Mandheling, South Italian Espresso Roast

This coffee produces massive crema and jumps out with an intense perfume of roasted almonds, followed with a burst of blueberry embedded in dense bitter-sweet chocolate, and ends with a smooth, sweet creamy finish.

Regularly $14.95, on sale for $12.95.
Click here to order