Natural Ethiopian Yirgacheffe Kochere

Last weekend I went away with two girlfriends that I’ve known since childhood. We were all in each other’s weddings, but we haven’t been away together since the last bachelorette party. So eight kids, eight houses and around a dozen years later, it was definitely time to get away. It was a 40th birthday celebration and a girls weekend rolled in one. We drove to Bodega Bay and could not have had more fun–talking the night away and then getting up in the morning to a French press of our Organic Honduran Eriban Mendoza: yum.

Hiking the Buttermilk Bend trail

As we drove to the ocean via Petaluma, the spring grass had colored the hillsides green and lambs were prancing in circles around their mothers. It didn’t seem like you could see a more beautiful landscape. However, the kids and I took advantage of the unseasonably warm weather to head to the South Yuba River yesterday (thanks to this inspiring blog post from the Outside Inn) and I was reminded that our local scenery is certainly just as inspiring. And after a weekend away the company of my children was especially nice.

For this week’s featured coffee we are headed across the world to Ethiopia, the birthplace of coffee. As the legend goes, an enterprising young goatherd, named Kaldi, noticed his goats eating some red berries and dancing around. He too tried the berries and soon he was gamboling around the hillsides. Kaldi brought the fruit to a local monastery where the beans were thrown away in the fire, only to produce an unusual aroma–and you can guess the rest of the story.

From Ethiopia coffee spread around the middle east through monasteries, and eventually enterprising sorts (some of whom stole the seeds/seedlings) planted it around the world. We’ve come a long way since then, but coffee is still grown in Ethiopia, and this week’s beans are an indigenous heirloom variety, which may well have been discovered by a goatherd a thousand years ago.

This Natural Ethiopian Yirgacheffe Kochere is a dry processed (or natural) coffee, meaning that the beans are dried with the fruit still attached. This leads to strong berry tones in the finished product, and you can taste this in the cup. Yirgacheffe is known for its perfect growing conditions for coffee, and the Kochere region is prized for it’s high altitude and acidic soil. This is coffee grown and processed in a traditional manner, as it has been for centuries.

The berry and floral tones are predominant in this coffee. You can sample a cup of Natural Ethiopian Yirgacheffe on us this week with the code South Yuba*. Have a great President’s Day weekend and enjoy your Valentine’s Day, if that’s something you celebrate. Cheers!
–Holly Fike

*Code good for one free 12 ounce cup of Natural Ethiopian Yirgacheffe Kochere. Code expires on 2.18.16. Limit one free cup per customer please. Valid only at Carolines Coffee Roasters, 128 S. Auburn Street, Grass Valley, CA. Code/Offer has no cash value.