To be covered:
- Coffees:
- Gesha Village – secret offering only.
- New Kenyan
- Sao Joao
- Mpenjati back
- SITD coffee
- Equipment
- Behmor Brazen
- Jura E6
Gesha?
In the early 2000s, several elements transpired together that caused ripples through the upper echelons of the coffee industry. A book summarizing a few of these events was released in 2008, which helped concrete these events. The book was “God in a cup” by Michaele Weissman.
This culmination of events was launched by a single variety of Arabica coffee called Geisha or Gesha (depending on who you spoke to). At the time, we were newbies in the industry and felt the tremors even being far away from the excited crowd in Cape Town.
Many a coffee person started on a quest to find the origin story of this magical coffee bean. One of them was led by a coffee nobility, William Boot of Boots coffee. His quest took him to the Western side of Ethiopia. It was almost an established fact that the coffee had to have come from the land that used to be called Abyssinia. Once Boot had found the source he believed to be the birthplace of the now-infamous coffee, he worked with locals and investors and created what is today called Gesha Village Coffee Estate.
Their origin story may be a little more tailored to today’s market, and you can read their story here…
We are getting some
If you are part of the secret list, you will be offered some coffee. Winston, multiple SA Barista champ (and now co-founder of Cedar), has used their coffees at many competitions and has kindly allowed us to import some with him. He will be using different lots to compete with, but we will be getting a lot. The lot is only 15kg, and once we have it, we will send out a message to all secret list members.
New Coffees
We have already mentioned the Gesha Village coffee coming. Watch your emails for the offering. Other new coffees are:
- A new Kenyan. We will be offering a new Kenyan. The Kenyan is from a co-operative whose coffee we have offered before. Watch our social media for a final release date.
- We have a new crop of São João. We blind-tasted 5 Brazilian estates coffees plus the old São João when we got samples; the new crop came first, and the old 2020 crop came second. The new crop of São João is now available to order here…
- Mpenjati Coffee. Our first coffee from a South African farm is back. This time we are offering the Cataui. The F6 had a lower yield this year, so we are offering the Cataui. We only have 30 kg of the washed and 30 kgs of the honey. You can choose which you want. We may be offering other cultivars later in the year. Order Mpenjati here…
- Shot in the Dark coffee, want to taste the coffee we have to use for the shot in the dark roasting competition? Drop us a line at orders@quaffee.co.za, and we will send you a tasting set for R100 each. We will send you at least three different roasts, 100g of each. First come, first served here.
Equipment
We do not push equipment that much. We know it is a requirement to make coffee, but have found the market is full of choices. We tend only to do the equipment we prefer and are prepared to provide. If we like gear, but feel there is not enough demand, we will partner with someone like Cape Coffee Beans. That said, there are two pieces of equipment we think need to be mentioned in this newsletter.
Behmor Brazen 3
We have now had our Behmor Brazen 3 for over six months. We love this machine. In fact, we will now no longer recommend any other auto dripper. Our demo Technivorm has found a good home since we could no longer show it any love. We felt that with the Technivorm, the time and effort it saved did not translate to the sacrifice we were required to make in the final brewed coffee. This is not the case with the Brazen. As a traditional auto-drip, it produces an excellent cup of coffee. The gold filter the Brazen comes with is excellent, and the optional paper filters are okay. And if you want to use a Hario V60, Kalita Wave or Timemore Crystal, you can too.
We recommend this product with no hesitation.
Jura E6
There is a new version of the Jura E6. It has the new Jura software and now comes in “platinum” only. They have also moved the frother to a more sensible place. If you like the convenience and are looking at a home automatic coffee machine. This is the Jura we prefer. Unfortunately, it is sold out and will only be back in stock mid-July.
