Our upcoming coffee release, the Ethiopia Sidamo Keramo, is our next Fresh Crop coffee feature. Harry shares his recipes for both filter and espresso below for this fortnight's Fresh Crop Exclusive!
One of the first single origin coffees I ever tasted was an Ethiopian, so it seems fitting for my first Fresh Crop Exclusive to feature our Ethiopian Sidamo Keramo.
When I began my specialty coffee journey in 2016, I was as green as the unroasted beans themselves. Up until then I believed coffee was dark, bitter and best taken with milk unless you were some kind of wild man.
You can imagine my surprise when I tasted something bursting with bright floral sweetness and pleasant acidity. This new coffee took me back to that first sip 5 years ago and, boy howdy, I was glad to be back.
Coffee was discovered in Ethiopia some 600 years ago and was roasted, ground and brewed not unlike it is today. I was humbled to be sitting here writing, drinking a cup and thinking on how this came to be.
Ethiopia isn’t one of the biggest producers of coffee, but they’re certainly up there with the best. Rich fertile soil, consistently high rainfall, sunny skies and just the right temperatures make for tip top conditions.
This particular coffee comes from a micro lot in the Keramo Village in Bensa, Sidamo. The micro lot grows on Shanta Golba Mountain at a staggering elevation between 2260 and 2360 MASL (meters above sea level). It honestly doesn’t get much higher than that.
Brewing this was such a treat. It offered such a clean, light, endlessly drinkable cup. For me, I found strawberries and rose petals. Being a naturally processed coffee, there was the characteristic fermented quality, creating a rosé like drink, acceptable to consume just after the sun has risen.
Natural coffees to me are like the prog rock of coffee. If you get it, you REALLY get it, but if you don’t you don’t. Either way, this is worth a try.
I’ve chosen to brew with a Chemex, arguably inferior to the v60. I however have an affinity for it, it’s old school, not bad to look at, it’s deeply flawed and can make a very decent cup. It just takes a little more care.
You’ll need:
Preparation:
Bring your kettle to the boil or set your variable kettle to 96 degrees.
Grind 40g of coffee to medium/coarse. I used a Comandante hand grinder at 30 clicks.
Once your kettle is at temperature, rinse the filter in the brewer to remove any paper taste and to preheat the Chemex.
Discard the water and add your coffee. I like to make a little well in the bed to ensure the grounds are evenly saturated. Place the brewer on the scale and tare it to zero
0:00
Start the timer (and start the soundtrack). Pour 100g of water from the centre moving out towards the edge in circles then give the brewer a swirl to evenly wet grounds. Wait.
0:30
Add 350g water. Starting from the centre, pour in circles toward the edge and back again bringing the total weight to 450g. gently swirl the Chemex. This should take around 30 seconds.
1:30
Add the remaining 200g of water. When the water descends about 1cm, give the Chemex a final swirl ensuring a flat bed and an even draw down.
The brew time should take approximately 4 minutes. By now the guitar solo is underway. Smell the coffee, feel the music. Once fully filtered through, enjoy your brew.
Espresso Recipe:
Dose: 22g ground at a fine setting
Yield: 34g extracted
Time: 31 seconds
Note: This espresso recipe is developed on a Slayer EP. Please use this as a guide to aid in achieving your desired flavour preference. If you are unable to reproduce the exact result on your home machine, don’t panic, an alternative is to simply adjust your recipe using the ratio, so it works best for your set up.
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