Blind Assessment:

Absorbingly intricate yet quietly complete. Honey, strawberry guava, lavender, roasted almond, a hint of light, floral-toned spirits in aroma and cup. Very sweet in structure but delicately crisp and savory-edged. Light but silky and buoyant in mouthfeel. Lavender in particular carries into a balanced, deeply layered finish.

Notes:

This coffee tied for the second-highest rating in a tasting of 20 coffees of the Gesha (also spelled Geisha) variety for Coffee Review‘s September 2017 tasting report. With its generally elongated beans and distinctive floral and crisp, often chocolaty cup, the Gesha variety continues to distinguish itself as one of the world’s rarest and most unique coffees. Although the Gesha variety originated in Ethiopia, it was “discovered” by the coffee world in 2004 growing in Boquete, Panama, and Panama continues to dominate the expanding world of Gesha. This particular version, however, is the outcome of efforts to commercialize Gesha in the region from which it originally came. It was grown in western Ethiopia by farmers Adam and Rachel Overton and their indigenous Meanit culture collaborators from seed selected from wild trees in the nearby Gori Gesha forest. This is a dry-processed or “natural” version, meaning the beans were dried inside the fruit rather than after the fruit has been removed, as is the case with wet-processed or “washed” coffees. Ho Soo Tsai is a micro-roaster based in Kaohsiung City, Taiwan. Visit https://m.facebook.com/hstcoffee/ for more information.

The Bottom Line: A light roast develops the delicacy and gentle vivacity of this cleanly understated yet spectacularly aromatic dried-in-the-fruit or “natural” Gesha profile.