BeanFruit Coffee Company out of Jackson, Mississippi have done a great job with every coffee I’ve had from them and this one is no exception. Up for review today is their Ethiopia from the Chele’lektu washing station in the Yirgacheffe region of Ethiopia. Approximately 600 small farmers contribute to the lots that this coffee came from and it’s prepared to Grade 1 standards (sorted for minimal defects).[ref]http://beanfruit.com/collections/coffee/products/ethiopia-yirgacheffe-chelelektu[/ref]
This is a washed coffee grown at 1800-2000masl and BeanFruit gives the tasting notes, “Apricot, Caramel, Clementine, Floral” for this coffee. It is a 2015 Good Food Award winner and it’s currently available directly from BeanFruit for $15.25/12oz bag.
Opening this bag greeted me with a great dry fragrance and coffee beans that looked nicely developed. I prepared several cups using a 1:15 ratio on both my notNeutral Gino pourover and Chemex. I think the acidity was a little more pronounced in the Gino and the florals were more apparent in the Chemex, but both pourovers yielded mostly similar cups.
This coffee has medium body, which I like to find in washed Ethiopian coffees since they can often be so light and almost watery at times. I picked up a lemony, sometimes limey, acidity backed up by lots of sweetness that reminded me of raisins in the finish. The aftertaste was lingering and sweet with that touch of raisin, limes and lots of floral notes, too. In the Chemex cups I picked up on some black tea flavors and something spicy that reminded me of baking spices in character, but nothing I could really put my finger on. Something that would go with ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon, etc, but it wasn’t really any of those flavors.
Overall this is a clean, easy-drinking cup and I found it to be more satisfying than usual for a washed Ethiopian. It’s no wonder this coffee won a Good Food Award and I was very pleased with it! BeanFruit continues to impress me!