our coffee processing methods

During a period of time, we have been doing coffee tours in Sipi. We noticed that people have different tastes and preferences. This prompted us to experiment with other processing methods, some of which are listed below.

1. Natural processed method

(naturals, Anaerobic / Aerobic method)

At the time Arabica coffee was discovered in Ethiopia, there was no machine, and coffee cherries were picked and sundried completely.

Flavor: Fruity, Cane Sugar, Nectarine, Banana & with dry wine finish.

2. Wet processing method

The washed method is commonly used while processing Arabica coffee and it is mainly dedicated to weather conditions.

You can read more about processing methods below.

Flavor: dark chocolate, caramel & clean crisp

3. Honey processed method

(red honey coffee, yellow honey coffee, white honey coffee, and black honey coffee)

This is the new processing method. No honey is added but the farmer plays around with the mucilage (natural sugars) found within the coffee cherry.

Flavor: Honey, Vanilla, Blossom, Nutty, Lime, Caramel & Red Apple

Wet processing method

Wet processing is more complex than dry processing, requiring specific equipment and the availability of large quantities of clean water.

Two methods eist and they include

a) Full wash process

This process can produce high quality coffee, but reuqires large quantitiy of water between 2-10 liters per kilogram of fresh cherry and good management of the fermentation and washing process to ensure the coffee flavor is not compromised in the process.

b) Semi-wash process

In the semi-wash process, the mucilage is removed immediately after pulping using a mucilage remover, the parchment washed straight away and dried.

The mucilage does not ferment with coffee parchment as it is removed during the pulping process.

This method is cost effective as is uses 0-5 liters of water per kilogram of fresh cherries in addition to reducing the risk of over fermenting.