Melese Wolde Natural

Producer: Melese Wolde
Origin: Shantawene, Bensa District, Ethiopia
Elevation: 2250 MASL
Variety: 74158
Process: Natural
Roast Level: Light
Importer: Crop To Cup
Flavor Notes: Pink Lemonade, Strawberry, Jasmine, Caramel

Wow. Hard to believe this is our first Ethiopian release in... ever?! In the early monthly-drop days of Enjoy, Ethiopian coffees were a bit harder for me to acquire, but hey, Enjoy 2.0 is a way different beast and thrilled to bring some coffees in from one of my favorite coffee growing origins. Big ups to Danny of Crop To Cup for getting this farmer ID Ethiopian banger my hands, here are them deets:

As told by Crop To Cup:
Melese Wolde’s farm in Shantawane developed a reputation for quality after winning a competition through one of the major specialty importers twice—an importer who never, in the end, showed up to buy the coffee. Melese is a farmer through and through, he told us, as we stood in his warehouse to avoid the rain, his coffee sleeping protected under plastic tarpaulins on his raised beds. He said would have happily continued to sell his farm’s cherry to private washing stations if the government had not given him the ability to get his own export license—which he did, in 2018. His son, the oldest of his six children, helps him and runs the harvest.

Private farms in Ethiopia are becoming more common to the specialty market here in the US. Since 2008 and the establishment of the Ethiopian Coffee Exchange (ECX), private farms have been the one option that preserve relationships and traceable coffee. The issue has been that Ethiopia is so populous, that farms large enough to fill a container, or produce an export size volume of coffee are rare. Where they do happen is most commonly seen in the west (Jimma and Keffa Zones) where land redistribution has formed larger coffee blocks.

Melese's farm sits at a staggering 2250 MASL - one of the highest elevation coffees we've sourced and is growing the 74158 variety (this variety was approved and released by the Jimma Agricultural Research Center ((JARC)) in 1979. It has a high yield potential and resistant to coffee berry disease).