Ethiopia Koke Honey (SEP 26)

This lot of Koke Honey comes from around 1,200 smallholder farmers across five kebeles (local administrative districts) in Yirgacheffe: Birbes Kela, Koke, Konga, Wedessa, and Tisho. Yirgacheffe is considered by many to be the birthplace of coffee, where heirloom varietals grow naturally alongside other species on traditional coffee farms. Cherries are picked selectively, with pickers rotating through the trees every eight to ten days to harvest only what's at peak ripeness, then delivered the same day to the Koke and Birbes Kela washing stations for processing. The Birbes Kela station is owned and operated by Semira Negash, who founded the site in 2020 as a vertically integrated partner of Tracon, an exporting partner in Ethiopia, and quickly established herself as a producer of high-quality coffee, earning a strong placement in Ethiopia's 2021 Cup of Excellence.

For this honey process, cherries ferment in-cherry for two days before pulping, then dry slowly on raised beds to reach optimal moisture. From there, the coffee travels to Tracon's cleaning and storage facility in Addis Ababa, where modern processing equipment and a final hand sort ensure quality before export. Yirgacheffe's warm, temperate climate and distinct wet and dry seasons shape this coffee from the start, and the careful work of the farmers and washing station partners carries that character all the way through to the cup.