This is currently my favorite Coffee. I picked up a pound while in Chicago this summer, and I’m about to place an order for at least two more bags of it.
Intelligentsia Coffee & Tea, Inc. - Rwanda
Over the last three years Rwanda has become Africa’s most actively improving coffee country. Its many cooperatives are now producing some of the cleanest coffee on the continent, and this lot is a great example of what you should learn to expect from the ‘Land of 1,000 Hills’.
by Geoff Watts
Location: Butare, Kibuye and Byumba provinces
Varietal: Bourbon
Altitude: 1650-2100 meters
Description
Fruity in nature and tart in acidity, this gem offers dominant notes of peach, strawberry and lemon. The body is clean and rich and finishes sweet, with traces of wine, syrupy cocktail fruit and cocoa.
Tasting Notes
Exceptionally sweet and smooth. When hot there is a profound caramel-toffee sweetness that yields to soft dark fruit and berry notes as the cup cools. Very clean, extremely silky. Plenty of fruit and acidic nuance but maintains a sweet, approachable charisma that has universal appeal.
Geoff Watts’ Notes
Traditionally the vast majority of Rwandan coffee was sold to European commercial roasters at below-market prices as a cheap option for blending. The quality was low and the farmers were paid next to nothing for their work.
Fast forward to 2006, and there is a whole new reality. Rwanda is producing some of the cleanest coffee in all of Africa and is a hot new option in the Specialty market, so much so that Roasters are actually fighting with each other to obtain some of these outstanding beans. Producers are getting better prices than many well-known and historically successful Central American farms, and there is a mad scramble to try to cement long-term relationships with some of the cooperatives there.
Perhaps the most astonishing fact of this turnaround is that it happened in less than 6 years. In 2000 the PEARL (Partnership to Enhance Agriculture in Rwanda through Linkages) Project was initiated with the goal of creating better economic opportunities for farmers in Rwanda. An educational program was created to teach members of the local coffee cooperatives quality protocols for handling coffees post-harvest, and in June of 2004 professional tasters from the US and Europe were brought in to provide cupping training and roasting lessons for young students who would later become the quality specialists for their respective cooperatives.
Click for larger image
I have been deeply involved in this process since 2003 and have traveled to Rwanda seven times in the last three years to teach, taste, and help in the effort to build momentum. Over this period I’ve developed a relationship with the coffees and the people there that is personal, emotional, incredibly gratifying, and above all, exciting as this is really just the beginning for their new industry. Already, over 20,000 farmers have more than doubled their annual income. There nearly 30 new washing stations in operation throughout the country, and the country’s goal is now to have 100 stations by 2010.
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