Burundi, Bumba - Single Origin Espresso

Padre has purchased coffee from Long Miles Coffee for more than five years, with each release forming part of our Good Coffee Doing Good program. Previous seasons have focused on lots from Gishubi Hill, while this year we’re excited to share Bumba Washed after the delicious Bumba Natural released over summer. For every kilo sold, $4 goes to Trees for Kibira, a major reforestation and environmental sustainability project in Burundi.

Long Miles began in 2011, when Ben and Kristy Carlson moved to Burundi to build a coffee program centred on producing families rather than intermediaries. Their first washing station, Bukeye, opened in 2013, but increasing cherry volumes soon meant some families were walking more than three hours to reach accurate scales and a fair price. Long Miles has spent the years since moving infrastructure closer to farmers, including Ninga Washing Station and new drying facilities near Bumba itself.

Bumba is the work of 698 smallholder farmers whose plots average just 800 square metres and carry around 200 Red Bourbon trees, grown alongside beans, bananas, maize and cassava. Long Miles supports the community through farmer field schools and extension visits, while paying a higher cherry price and an annual premium. Its agronomy training, savings groups and leadership workshops also work to create greater opportunities for women, who carry much of the farm labour and harvest management.

The farms sit between 1700 and 1900 MASL on Bumba Hill, within the Ninga Zone of Matongo Commune. The highlands were historically part of Kayanza Province and now sit within the enlarged province of Butanyerera. Cool nights slow cherry maturation and support sugar development in the seed, while shallow loam soils with heavy clay and silt hold moisture across the gentle north-facing slope. Red Bourbon rewards careful management with the sweetness and clarity found in this lot.

For the Washed process, cherry is delivered on the day it is picked, floated to remove low-density fruit and hand sorted before disc pulping. The coffee ferments under water, is graded in washing channels and receives a clean water soak before the parchment dries slowly on raised beds. It is covered through the hottest hours and sorted throughout drying until moisture reaches 10 to 11 percent. Keeping Bumba discrete by collection day and delivery site also helps protect cup quality from antestia-related potato taste.

The cup leads with ripe, yellow-fleshed nectarine, while lime shapes a bright, clean acidity without becoming sharp. Malt brings biscuit and light caramel sweetness through the middle, giving the coffee weight before chamomile arrives as a dry floral note on the finish. The texture is crisp on entry, with the clear separation of flavours that careful washed processing can produce, then silky through the mid-palate.