The Geisha variety of Arabica is the most expensive green coffee in the world. Year after year, this sought-after variety — known for (in the hands of a good roaster) its florality, delicate fruit, integrated structure and balance — breaks new price records in the Best of Panama auction. The Panama with the highest price in 2021 was a Geisha that sold for $2,568.00 — per pound. It’s gotten
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Fun With Ferment: Anaerobically Processed Coffees
In early April, some rather odd-smelling packages began arriving at the Coffee Review lab. Describing the collective aromas that wafted from them is difficult. And describing those aromas continued to be difficult once we started actually tasting the coffees inside the packages. Certainly, there was lots of fruit and chocolate. And fragrant cut cedar, and sweet flowers. But along with these more
Buy Coffee E-Gift Cards
One of the best ways you can support coffee companies and their employees during the COVID-19 crisis is to simply purchase their coffee. Better yet, you can purchase e-gift cards, which provides immediate cash support. If possible, buy gift cards in excess of your immediate needs. Perhaps get an early start on your holiday gift shopping with some special stocking stuffers. On behalf of the
Top Coffees by Category – 2019
In 2015, we began the practice of recognizing top coffees by category to focus attention on fine coffees that may not have earned a place on our Top 30 Coffees list. The coffees below may not have attracted the highest scores of the year but they merit recognition for their excellence nonetheless. For more information, visit our expanded rankings post from 2015. We are pleased to recognize
Revisiting the Andes: Coffees From Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia
The three coffee-growing countries that range along the Andes south of Colombia — Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia — have rich and storied coffee histories. When Coffee Review last dove in to this region, with reports in 2010 and 2013, we found many impressively solid, softly balanced coffees in the Latin-American tradition — all produced from classic tree varieties like Typica and Caturra and processed
Top Coffees by Category – 2018
In 2015, we began the practice of recognizing top coffees by category to focus attention on fine coffees that may not have earned a place on our Top 30 Coffees list. The coffees below may not have attracted the highest scores of the year but they merit recognition for their excellence nonetheless. For more information, visit our expanded rankings post from 2015. We tip our hat to our 2018 top
Women in Coffee: Why It Matters That “She’s the Roaster”
Last summer, we began our exploration of women's roles in the complex coffee supply chain by looking at the work of farmers—women who work in coffee production as pickers, managers, members of cooperatives, and owners of small farms. In this month's report, we turn our attention to those women who are crucial in the next step of the supply chain: turning green coffee into roasted. We structured
Top Coffees by Category – 2017
In the past, our Top 30 Coffees lists tended to favor high-scoring coffees produced from botanical varieties of Arabica with striking sensory properties such as Geshas, coffees from the distinctive traditional Ethiopian varieties, Kenyan coffees, and so on. In 2015, we began the practice of recognizing coffees by category to focus attention on fine coffees from other parts of the world and/or
Holding Up (More Than) Half The Sky: Coffees From Women Producers
Mao Zedong’s famous statement that “women hold up half the sky” became central to the zeitgeist of the Western feminist movement of the 1960s and ‘70s, when identity politics began to foreground the plight of women—economically, socially and politically—both in the U.S. and abroad. Regardless of one’s position on the merits of focusing on gender-based affiliations versus shared values as tools for
Category Rankings – 2016
In the past, our Top 30 Coffees lists tended to favor high-scoring coffees produced from botanical varieties of Arabica with striking sensory properties such as Geshas, coffees from the distinctive traditional Ethiopian varieties, Kenyan coffees, and so on. Last year, we began the practice of recognizing coffees by category to focus attention on fine coffees from other parts of the world and/or
Category Rankings
Over the past couple years, Coffee Review's annual “Top 30” ranking of the year's most noteworthy coffees has attracted considerable attention. As many readers have noted, our rankings tended to favor high-scoring coffees produced from botanical varieties of Arabica with striking sensory properties: coffees of the Gesha/Geisha variety, coffees from the distinctive traditional Ethiopian varieties,
Elegant Earth: Wet-Hulled Sumatras and One Sulawesi
Wet-hulling is not an obscure Olympics sailing event nor (at least to my knowledge) a special trick in waterskiing or wakeboarding. It is a fruit removal and drying variation that contributes much of the distinct character of traditional Indonesia coffees, particularly those from Sumatra and Sulawesi. It is also practiced on other Indonesian islands, almost everywhere in Indonesia where small
Sumatra KUD Silimakuta AAA
This coffee is produced by the small community of Silimakuta north of Lake Toba, one of four micro-regions that comprise the KUD Cooperative. Coffees from the northern part of the Indonesian island of Sumatra are valued for their complex earth and fruit notes that appear to result largely from unorthodox fruit removal and drying practices called “wet hulling.” This is a particularly refined
Colombia Granja La Esperanza Grand Cru Mokka
This exceptional coffee was selected as the No. 22 coffee on Coffee Review’s list of the Top 30 Coffees of 2015. Mokka is an unusual variety of Arabica with tiny split-pea-sized beans and distinctive cup character. Mokka was collected by researchers in Brazil, probably having originated at some point in Yemen, since it is identical in appearance to a Yemeni variety called Ismaili. The Brazil
Villa Loyola Colombia
Produced exclusively from trees of the respected Caturra variety by Padre José Alejandro Aguilar Posada at Villa Loyola, a 2008 Cup of Excellence green coffee competition winner. Roasted at PT’s Coffee, where the motto is “without the love, it’s just coffee.” Visit www.ptscoffee.com or call 888-678-5282 for more information.
Auromar Camilina Geisha
Produced from trees of the rare Ethiopia-derived botanical variety Gesha (also Geisha) by farmer Roberto Brenes of Auromar Estate. 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 most unique coffees. This is a dry-processed or “natural” Gesha, meaning the beans were dried inside the
Konga Natural Ethiopia
Yirgacheffe is a coffee region in southern Ethiopia that produces distinctively floral- and fruit-toned coffees from traditional varieties of Arabica long grown in the region. This is a “natural” or dry-processed Yirgacheffe, meaning the beans were dried inside the fruit, encouraging a flavor profile that is lower-toned and more pungent than the more familiar wet-processed Yirgacheffe floral- and
Costa Rica Cafetín San Martin 2000m
Cafetín is a collective of twenty-five small farmers around the village of San Martin. This particular coffee is from the farm of Asdrúbal Gamboa Jiménez, who has one of the highest elevation farms in the cooperative at two-thousand meters. Only five bags of this coffee were produced at this harvest. Roasted at PT’s Coffee, where the motto is “without the love, it’s just coffee.” Visit
El Socorro Maracaturra
Maracaturra is a relatively recently developed cross between the huge-beaned Maragogipe and the compact-growing Caturra varieties of Arabica. The El Socorro Maracaturra grown by Juan Diego de la Cerda has consistently scored in the top five in recent Guatemala Cup of Excellence green coffee competitions. Roasted at PT’s Coffee, where the motto is “without the love, it’s just coffee.” Visit
Rusty’s Hawaiian
Ka’u is a newly emerged Hawaii coffee growing district centered thirty miles or so southeast of the famous Kona region; Lorie Obra’s Rusty’s Farm is one of Ka’u’s best-known and most celebrated farms. Lorie meticulously picks and processes her coffees using traditional methods and artisan attention. This coffee was subjected to an experimental final step in processing based on practice in Kenya in