Overview
For our first washed processed Rwanda offering of the year, we’re welcoming back a familiar selection from the Muzo station for the sixth consecutive season! We’ve been working with Baho Coffee to hone our focus primarily on smaller lot separations. This specific offering consists of coffees collected from 15 smallholders that are a part of the new Ikizere producer group at Muzo. Meaning confidence in Kinyarwanda, Ikizere is a group composed of widowed women and single mothers who share the unique challenges of navigating traditionally patriarchal systems.
The Muzo washing station is located in the Northern Province of Rwanda, near Volcanoes National Park and the border of Uganda. The lands surrounding Muzo, in the Gakenke district, are absolutely ideal for coffee growing - altitudes climbing above 2000 meters, dense volcanic soil, and very cool average temperatures. Because of the remote location, there are actually only a small handful of other stations near this area, and it is additionally Baho’s smallest station by far. For perspective, Emmanuel’s other stations produce anywhere from about 900 - 2000 60kg bags of green coffee per year; Muzo produces just around 300 bags. Unique challenges in this area include drastic mountainous topography and farms that are spread out and not centralized to the station. Because of these factors, Muzo employees spend a significant amount of time driving around to collect coffee cherries from farmers rather than requiring everyone to deliver to them.
Muzo Ikizere is a classically complex offering from Rwanda. As we’ve come to expect from Baho’s washed lots, this coffee harmoniously combines high end citrus fruits and florals with a deep honey and brown sugar sweetness. The result is a dynamic drinking experience that’s zippy and playful, yet remains structured and balanced to the last drop. We’re tasting: nectarine, clementine, apricot, sprite, lime, honey, brown sugar, vanilla, pastry crust, sweet black tea.
Relationship
This is our seventh consecutive year purchasing from Emmanuel Rusatira and his private exporting company, Baho Coffee.
After nearly 20 years of experience establishing and managing washing stations throughout Rwanda for a large export company, Emmanuel Rusatira and his family decided to branch out and start their own operations. Establishing Baho Coffee allowed him to freely focus his energy towards implementing his personal philosophies and pushing high quality protocols with his own privately owned stations. Emmanuel is impressively proactive with education and outreach. He works closely with producers year round - distributing seedlings, educating on proper growing and picking techniques, giving loans for infrastructure or quality of life investments, and generally being a positive force in the community and friend to all.
Over the past few years, we’ve seen the Ikizere project grow quickly from just around 20 growers at the Fugi station to now 100+ women with representation at each station that our importing partner, Sundog Trading, works with. Baho is heavily investing in support for this group via access to financial education, providing short term loans, and establishing clean water lines in specific communities. Emmanuel plays an active role here by arranging meetings each season to discuss their needs beyond coffee. Because of the overwhelming success of the program, they’re all making significant improvements to their farms and investing in growing their operations. In addition to planting new coffee seedlings, many are strategically planting shade trees and using compost fertilizers as well.
Historically, coffee from the 400 farmers delivering to Muzo would have been grouped into large blended lots. Thanks to the increased traceability and smaller lot separations that Baho was able to establish the past few seasons, we’re thrilled to be able to publicly recognize the specific producers who grew the coffee that make up this offering. This is a first step in building a transparent and equitable relationship with groups of growers that we hope will deliver to Muzo for many years to come.
MUKAMBUGUJE BIBIANE
NYIRABAHINDE REGINE
AKIMANIMPAYE TRIPHINE
MUKAMANA COSTASIE
MUKANOHERI LOUISE
NYIRAMAYAMBERE VESTINE
MUKAMUHUTU ALPHONSINE
NYIRANSABIMANA ANISYLLATHA
MUKABAZIGA MARGUARTE
NYIRANSENGIMANA VALERIE
MUKAGATERA VERENA
UWIMANA MARGUARTE
INGABIRE PURIQUERIE
UWURUKUNDO MARIE CLAIRE
DUSABE ODETTE
Processing
Coffee production in Rwanda works very similarly to most other countries in Africa - thousands of smallholder farmers deliver cherries to centralized processing stations. At these stations, the coffees are fully processed and dried on raised beds. Upon time for export, parchment is transported to the capital city of Kigali where it is dry milled, further sorted, and prepped for export.
When cherries arrive at the station, they’re intensively sorted to remove any visible defects or under/over ripe fruits. After enough volume has accumulated, the cherries are stored in clean plastic bags for a brief 8 hour in-cherry fermentation period before being depulped. The parchment then undergoes a 10 hour wet fermentation before being pushed through the grading channels. Here the coffee is rigorously washed to remove any remaining mucilage and separated by density - with the highest density lots being reserved for our selections.
The drying protocol begins by moving coffee onto shaded beds for 12 - 72 hours. This is a unique step in Rwanda, called skin drying, that has two distinct benefits. First, it sets the trajectory for the entire drying phase by initially beginning very gently and slowly under complete shade. Secondly, it allows ample time for intensive sorting while the parchment is still wet - this is important because certain defects (seeds bitten by Antestia in particular, thought to cause the potato defect) can be seen much more easily when the parchment is wet.
The parchment is finally moved into full sun on raised drying beds, where it’s very frequently turned until drying is complete. Weather conditions are closely monitored throughout the day, and if certain temperature thresholds are exceeded, workers will focus on turning coffee more frequently or cover the beds with mesh netting. When moisture content reaches the target of 11%, the drying phase is considered complete.
Brewing
This coffee extracts easily and there’s a lot of complex flavors available to play with. You’ll want to use a relatively coarse grind size for brewing, as this will help keep the coffee tasting bright, clean, and transparent.
If your coffee tastes thin, tart, and lacking sweetness - like lemon or under ripe plum - try grinding finer.
If your coffee tastes cloying, intense, and bitter - like cacao or over steeped black tea - try grinding coarser.
