Burundi time is a favorite time of year here at Five & Hoek. It is easily one of our highest quality offerings of the year. Each year we cup potential offerings from our friends at Long Miles Coffee Project in Kayanza, Burundi to decide which hill to feature. We have partnered with them for our Burundi offerings each year for multiple reasons, one reason being the quality is always impeccable, year after year after year.
1.Relationships. Long Miles Coffee Project has been a partner since 2015 and it started because we noticed the incredible impact they were making in Kayanza, Burundi. Ben & Kristy Carlson live life with the farmers throughout the hills of Burundi. It is a way of life they chose for them & their children, and we are honored that we get to purchase their labor of love and serve it to all of you year in and year out!
2. Quality Assurance. This years Gishubi Lot 31 offering is going back to the hill we started with back in 2015. Each hill is unique and outstanding in its own way, but this year we decided to pick lot 31 because the cup quality immediately jumped off the table. Heavy black cherry notes jumped out of the cup first followed by amazingly soft florals, and an incredible brown sugar sweetness that lingers throughout.
One thing that Burundi coffee is known for is the "potato defect." This is where a bug infects the cherry and causes it to have a potato like taste. No one wants their coffee to taste like potato, which is where LMCP outstanding quality control specialists come in (Coffee Scouts). Gishubi Hill is controlled and maintained by Alphonse, who roams the hill daily. Because of his commitment to Gishubi, not only is Gishubi rarely impacted in the cup by the potato defect, but farmers are now looking for land to plant more coffee because of the success of there beloved hill.
Gishubi is a special coffee for all of us here at F&H and it is another coffee worthy of Relationship Reserve status. We know that by purchasing coffee like this one from LMCP that we are doing our best to contribute to ethical sourcing and truly inspiring community from farm to cup. We hope you experience this coffee soon as we only have a couple hundred pounds of it.
