Ethiopia “Almaz” Yirgacheffe

Roast: Light-Medium
Region: Yirgacheffe
Farm: ASB smallholder farms in Yirgacheffe, milled at the Hamebela Washing Station
Process: Washed
Elevation: 1800 – 2100m
Variety: Heirloom
Cup: Brown Sugar, Lemon Meringue, Black Tea

Cupping Notes

Ethiopia plays nothing but the hits, and they’ve served up another real winner with this coffee from Yirgacheffe.

Yirgacheffe (pronounced “YUR-GUH-CHEF”) is likely a name you know if you’ve been around specialty coffee. It’s actually a region of Ethiopia so prolific for coffee that even most outside of specialty coffee (looking at you, second wavers) have probably heard of it.

This is all for good reason. Yirgacheffe coffee is in the upper echelon of coffees in the world. There was a time, admittedly, when it was all that some of us drank. Even in running this coffee briefly as a drip offering in the shop, customers' faces lit up. It is as recognizable to some as Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee or Kona coffee from Hawaii.

Again, all for good reason. It is an origin of understood quality and taste characteristics.

Primarily, in our experience, what is most characteristic of Yirgacheffe coffee is a distinct tea-like flavor. We believe we taste much more complexity in this Yirgacheffe, so we list this note last. However, it is something you will find Yirgacheffe-wide, so to speak.

What we’re tasting:

Brown Sugar. This aspect of washed Ethiopian coffee is one that we pushed hard for. As a region, there is an intense level of sweetness that can be achieved if you roast it. We truly believe we unlocked some nice, round sweetness that resembles brown sugar.
Lemon Meringue. In the first few batches of this new offering, we really struggled to make this citrus note pleasant. As we tried to push past tasting nothing but black tea, we also struggled to get past the idea of lemon tea. With roasting changes, the mouthfeel became much thicker and there was a new creaminess present. All of these changes at the roasting level brought the lemon flavor to a very pleasant place, especially paired with the creaminess. To us, it’s reminiscent of lemon meringue.
Black Tea. There’s no escaping it. . . and honestly, we’re very happy about that. The black tea note is what makes Yirgacheffe so well known. Yes, if all there was to taste was black tea, that may be a downer. However, if a Yirgacheffe is able to build on the base of clean-tasting black tea. Add complexity and other unique notes to pair, and you’ve got an excellent Ethiopian coffee.

We’re confident that this coffee is going to win the hearts of Ethiopian devotees as well as customers curious about the birthplace of coffee. Give it a try, and you’ll understand why Yirgacheffe is a household name.

Farming Notes

How confident is Getachew Zekele in the coffees he produces?

Well, he named them all after his wife.

Almaz (meaning “diamond” in Amheric) is Getachew’s wife. She is also the namesake of Getachew’s coffee export company, Almaz Seyoum Beyene (ASB).

Here are what our partners at Mercon had to say about Getachew and ASB:

“ASB was founded to help improve the quality of Ethiopian coffee and one of their founding values is to be a resource to support the smallholder farmers in the area with technical expertise, seedlings, quality and production improvement training, and marketing to bring higher prices. Almaz teaches their outfarmers to pick only ripe cherries and pays a higher price for them.”

We are always pleased to bring high-quality coffees, alongside Mercon Specialty, to our customers, especially high-quality coffees from Ethiopia.

You may have noticed the variety is listed as “Heirloom” above. Because Ethiopia is the storied birthplace of coffee, there has been a lot of shifting and changing of varieties over the years that have naturally occurred. Coffee grows wild throughout much of the country. Therefore, it’s extremely difficult to find farms with just one variety.

This wonderful washed coffee dries on raised beds for 10–15 days after 72 hours in the fermentation tanks. We wholeheartedly believe that raised-bed drying and proper processing methods are part of what sets Ethiopia apart as a coffee origin.

Ethiopia “Almaz” Yirgacheffe

At Peregrine, we only source and roast coffee that pleasantly surprises. We invite you to slow down and enjoy our coffee to create meaningful memories with those you love.

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