Overview
This release marks our seventh consecutive season purchasing from Biranu Dulo’s farm in the Tima sub-kebele of the Guji zone. It’s processed and exported by Ture Waji and his rapidly growing company, Sookoo Coffee.
You’ve likely heard us mention Ture before, as he’s who we’ve been purchasing the bulk of our natural processed Ethiopian coffees from the past few seasons - like Daannisa, Bookkisa, and Biranu Dulo from previous years. We’ve been consistently impressed with every coffee we’ve tasted from Sookoo, and we’re thrilled to continue diving deeper and strengthening our relationship with each passing year. They primarily specialize in natural processed coffees at the moment (though have recently expanding to washed lots as well!) working with five groups of farmers within the Odo Shakiso woreda of the Guji Zone. Sookoo focuses on small groups and providing education for the farmers - teaching proper farm maintenance, best picking practices, etc.
This is the sixth season that Ture has kept coffees separate from growers with larger than average farms. Biranu Dulo owns 4.5 hectares of land, which is roughly double the average in Guji, and he can produce around 50 x 60kg bags of green coffee per year. Currently, we’re purchasing around half of his total volume. We established a premium price to Ture that allowed him to cover his higher cherry pricing to Biranu and also give a second payment later in the season. Full transparency in the Ethiopian coffee supply chain has historically been quite complicated. Due to complex regulations on the commodities market, coffee from a single farm would have been impossible to purchase pre-2020. This is why many of our past Ethiopian offerings were named after the washing station itself and consisted of hundreds of smallholder farmers’ coffee. Long story short, policy changes have opened the market in a way that now allows increased transparency and the new options to form relationships directly with producers.
As we’ve come to expect, this natural processed lot from Biranu Dulo is incredibly clean, complex, and fruit-forward. The acidity is juicy and mouth-watering, like blueberries and raspberries. The saturated fruit flavors and white sugar-like sweetness produce a very sweet, silky body. Layers of milk chocolate and vanilla round out the experience to keep the coffee beautifully balanced. Biranu Dulo is everything we love about natural processed coffees, like explosive fruit flavors that make you re-imagine what coffee can be, but presented in a silky, refined package. We’re tasting: blueberry, strawberry, raspberry, red grape, lavender, lemon icing, honey, white sugar, vanilla, poptart, sweet tea, milk chocolate.
Relationship
Ture initially reached out to our green coffee buyer on instagram way back in December of 2018 as they were flying home from a visit to Ethiopia. We soon learned that he used to be the manager for a processing station we purchased from many years ago, called Guji Highlands. Ture explained how he had decided to start his own company with a laser focus on quality and transparency. And the rest is history! Ever since that first season, we’ve been blown away by nearly all samples we’ve tasted. They were (and still are) some of the cleanest natural processed coffees we’ve ever experienced, hands down. It’s no surprise that in specialty coffee circles he’s been lovingly nicknamed The King of Guji.
Our primary relationship for all things Sookoo related is directly with Ture. After coffees are selected and prices are agreed upon each year, we then transition into working closely with Tim Hill at Atlantic Specialty Coffee. They handle the logistics of moving the coffee across the ocean, importing, and warehousing for us throughout the year.
Processing
The strict attention to detail in the drying stage is what separates Ture Waji’s coffees from the rest of the pack. There are two key components to his technique - (a) lots of moving and turning of the coffees, a minimum of six times per day and (b) a very shallow bed of cherries, a maximum of only one inch.
Because of the nature of drying the fruit around the seed, coffee processed this way is inherently packed with intense fruit flavors; but because of these specific protocols, coffees from Sookoo are particularly crisp and clean. You get all of the big fruit juice flavors and none of the murky over-fermented or over-ripe fruit flavors that can sometimes accompany a naturally processed coffee.
Brewing
Brewing this coffee is quite versatile! Any way you slice it, you’re in for a mouthful of fruit flavor and a lot of natural sweetness. Finer grinds tend to bring out a fuller body and more intense flavors. You’ll find the flavor becomes more concentrated, like raspberry jam and chocolate. Coarser grinds will boost the flavor clarity and complexity - so in addition to berries and chocolate, you’ll find a plethora of tropical fruit and flowers in the cup.
If your brew is watery, lacking sweetness, and sour like under ripe berries - try grinding finer.
If your brew is drying and the flavors are muddled and unclear, like oversteeped black tea or cocoa powder - try grinding coarser.
