Yirgacheffe         1950-2150 mt

 Region/Zone          Elevation   

 

Pulping process       Cultivar    

 

     Picked in              Landed in

 

Gedeb District is located in the the southern part of the Yirga Cheffe zone, and is also the name of the site where the coffee is collected and dried on elevated beds. This Gedeb site has roughly 700 local farmers who bring their coffee here for drying and hand-sorting. The farms are little more than large 'gardens' adjacent to homes, growing heirloom varietals native to the region. Farmers deliver their coffee as whole cherry to the station where it is graded, and then laid out on drying beds. The preparation of this coffee is Grade 1, which for dry-processed lots means a lot of hand-sorting, removing over and under-ripe coffee cherry. The coffee is again sorted after dry-milling in order to identify any additional defects that were missed at the drying beds. Naturals are milled before being transported to Addis, where, again, the coffee is sorted to improve the appearance and cup quality. Competition in the region for cherry is quite strong so farmers are paid well, especially for ripe cherry selection. This year's price to farmers was increased from last years rates because of competition among washing stations, a win for the growers.

Gedeb Asasa is a striking example of a dry-processing done right. And this consistency shows in the cup too, from one brew to the next. The aroma is intoxicating, heavy fruit smells, a strong cherry cola scent, and floral hints. There's a nice mingling of stone fruit flavors in the hot cup, the sweet fleshy aspects as well as a tannic, bittering quality associated with the skin. This is an extremely sweet natural, loads of complex sugar notes, counterbalancing the high level of berry and tropical fruited tones. As the cup cools, a sweet citrus flavor comes up in the profile, a bit like sweet lime and floral Meyer lemons. But there is a bracing quality too, a level of acidity that weaves these top notes tightly together.