ETHIOPIA - Chorso (Black Honey)

Friedhats (Amsterdam)

Ethiopia - Chorso 250g

Note: Peach iced tea, bergamot, maple syrup
Variety: Heirloom
Producer: Smallholders
Region: Chorso, Yirgacheffe
Altitude: 1900-220masl
Process: Black Honey
Harvest: 2024

We bought this coffee through Primavera, a coffee importer that we’ve been buying Guatemalan coffees from for some years. They even had their Dutch office in our roastery for a while.
Recently they started doing other origins and we must say, rather successfully.
This is a black honey processed coffee from Chorso, Yirgacheffe. Made up of collected cherries from smallholders in the area.
Honey process means the cherries are pulped in a way that the pulp is mostly removed but the mucilage (the layer after the pulp) stays mostly intact. Usually this means the cup profile has more sweetness than a fully washed coffee, but not the funkyness of a natural processed coffee.
“Black honey” refers to the color of the parchment due to the high amount of mucilage left on the beans before drying.
But, honestly, it just sounds good. “Black honey process”.. you kind of want to drink it just because of those words. That’s the magic of marketing.
I think Graciano Cruz from Panama actually coined this term, but I can be wrong.

Ok cool, but what does it taste like?
It tastes like warm black honey in a cup of black tea accompanied by one of those really good peach pastries. Maybe there’s even a slice of lemon in the tea.