Processing Details
Coffees are grown and harvested in smallholder farmers’ backyards, known as “garden coffee,” throughout the Yirgacheffe region.
Harvested cherries are delivered to the washing station, where lots from multiple smallholder farmers are combined.
The coffee is pulped, and lower-density floaters are removed before the beans are transferred to large fermentation tanks.
The beans are submerged in water and wet-fermented for 12–24 hours to break down and remove the mucilage.
After fermentation, the beans are thoroughly rinsed in washing channels to remove any remaining mucilage and to further separate floaters.
The coffee is then moved to raised African drying beds and dried under the sun for 10–15 days until the moisture content reaches 10–12%.
During periods of intense heat and overnight, the beans may be covered with plastic to help regulate the drying rate.
Once dried, the beans are stored in parchment for protection until milling and export preparation.
During milling, additional hand-sorting and color-sorting processes are carried out to further improve overall quality.
Our local partner, Primrose, performs extensive quality control and sorting during milling. At a minimum, the coffee passes three times through a color sorter and three times through hand-sorting tables to ensure a cleaner, higher-quality final product.