Cafetiere Brew Guide

Espresso Recipe:

Dose 18 grams

Yield 40 ml

Time 26 - 29 secs

Filter Recipe:

Dose 15 grams

Water 260 ml

Time 2:30 - 3:00

More details:

Once again, we have worked with James of Omwani Coffee Co. He sources some of the best East African coffees to the UK and aims to build long term relationships with producers, aiding them with market information, improved prices for better quality, and advice on how they can improve their primary processing techniques to improve the coffees cup score.

This is the second time we have bought this coffee, and for those who remember the '19-'20 harvest, you have every reason to be as excited as last time.

 The Rwenzoris are famously known as the ‘Mountains of the Moon’ and they stretch for 230km along the Western Uganda border with the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The producers harvest their coffees by hand, carefully selecting the ripest cherries. These are then pre-sorted before being placed in a tank of water; those that float are removed, leaving only the best cherries to continue in the process. The cherries are then sun-dried on raised tables inside purpose built poly-tunnels.

Producers carefully turn the cherries throughout the day, ensuring uniform drying. Once dried to the required moisture content, the coffee is sorted and processed via the wet mill in Kisinga Town.

After processing, the coffee beans then undergo a final check to remove any black beans or defects. The coffee is then bagged and transported to a dry mill in Numanve on the outskirts of Kampala, here it is prepared for export through Mombasa.

Many producers choose to sell the fresh cherries after they have been sorted and floated, often with the assistance of the field team based out of Kisinga. This enables them to access quick payment for coffee and takes away the risk of processing coffee at their farm, many of whom are not well equipped to dry coffee. The cherries are delivered to the wet mill in Kisinga Town where a team of trained workers are able to carry out the whole process to a high standard.

Cup Profile: A delightfully sweet and decadent coffee. We find notes of strawberries and cream, blueberries and tropical fruits in the cup.

How We Drink: We love this coffee as a black pour-over. We use 15g and pour 50g of 100° water every 30 seconds, until a total of 250g water. The whole brew usually takes around 3:10.

It also brews fantastically in a cafetiere. We follow our brew guide, available here.

More Details: The owner of Bwenda, Bernard Uwitije, is a native of southern Rwanda, in the district of Nyamagabe. Coming from a region where coffee was a dominant crop, he first entered the sector trading ordinary home processed coffee. He later learned of the added value if one processed fully.

Wanting to set up a proper and sustainable business in the coffee sector, he built his first wet mill near his hometown in 2016. He used the first year to learn all the details of operating a wet mill successfully, and he built a second Washing station the following season, where he then mastered processing large volumes without compromising quality.

Bwenda was his third washing station, which he built in 2018 after realizing a group of farmers who were a bit isolated, did not have a closer washing station to process their cherries into high quality coffee. 2019 was the first season of operating Bwenda, processing only 1 container worth of cherries.

Bernard is already developing various programs to help farmers delivering to Bwenda with extension services and he is expanding the capacity of the wet mill.

More details:

Our latest Brazilian coffee comes from Pantano Buriti, and has been sourced by the consistently excellent Kamba Coffee. Kamba's GM Bruna comes from the third generation of a Brazilian coffee producing family - so there is no import partner who we trust more when it comes to excellent Brazilian coffees. 

Wagner Ferrero family not only produces coffee but also has a seed nursery at Buriti farm. Ferrero was born in 1956 in Altinópolis - São Paulo, in a coffee region where many Italian immigrants settled in 1912. Ferrero later moved to the region of Cerrado Mineiro, where he was a pioneer and is today one of the largest producers of high  quality coffee in Brazil, grown on more than 550 hectares distributed in Cerrado.