I can’t enough of these samples from The Barn in Berlin, Germany! Let’s take a look at one that I think has unfortunately sold out (or is at least out of rotation currently), their Hunkute from Ethiopia…
Reviews in this series: Colombia La Montaña | Rwanda Huye Mountain
THE BARN ETHIOPIA HUNKUTE
Three coffees into this big box of samples my new German friends sent me, it’s easy to see why Berlin’s The Barn has a worldwide reputation. The La Montaña from Colombia was one of the best Colombian coffees I’ve ever had (and I’ve had A LOT and this is one of my favorite origins) and the Huye Mountain was fantastic, too. This morning I’m looking at the Hunkute, a washed coffee from the Sidamo region of Ethiopia. This one isn’t on their currently available list and I did see they finished out 2017 with this coffee as their last Ethiopian offering, so it may be sold out or just taking a rest for now.
This coffee got The Barn’s “espresso roast” treatment, but with approx. 35g that’s just enough for me to make my standard pourover and not nearly enough to dial in for espresso, so I went the safer route. The Barn gives us flavor notes of, “apricot, orange blossom, caramel sweetness, lemon finish” for this coffee, and I’m assuming that’s when it’s pulled as espresso, but let’s see what I get from this as a pourover. I’m using my standard 1:16 rati of 28g of coffee to 450g of water in a notNeutral Gino dripper with Kalita filter. I used Third Wave Water in all my brewing and a Knock Aergrind grinder. This is a dense coffee and it came in at 3:46 brew time, not including the bloom.
I know I say this in just about every review, but it’s true and I’ll keep saying it… give this coffee time to sit and cool down quite a bit and you’ll be handsomely rewarded! This is a medium to medium-light bodied coffee with really clear, really strong flavors in it, somewhat at odds with the lighter body, which is an interesting contrast. Lots of apricot up front in the sip. I differentiate apricot from other “stone fruit” flavors, especially peach, by the presence of some tartness in the flavor note and that’s here, too. It’s dried apricot for days! Hidden in the high end with the light tartness (and sweetness) of the apricot is a hint of lemon candy acidity, too. Between the tartness of the apricot and the lemon candy, there is a good amount of acidity in this cup, but it is perfectly balanced by the sweetness of the fruit and a lightly caramelized sugar note that anchors the bottom note and gives this cup sweetness.
This is exactly the kind of washed Ethiopian coffee I love. Bright, clear, structured flavors with lots of balance and sweetness. Perfect! The finish and early aftertaste have clear peach notes for me and in the long aftertaste I get some roasty notes. With larger sips I do get more florals on my palate and into my nose and this is a nice example of how a coffee can be complex without losing any drinkability. Another stellar coffee from The Barn!