News articles tagged with 'Coffee farm'
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Gems of Araku
I’ve just come back from two weeks of intensive coffee travel in South India and now I’m finding myself completely re-thinking everything I thought I knew about Indian coffee. My trip had a twofold purpose. The first week was dedicated to the Gems of Araku cupping competition, where we focused on a non-traditional, but emerging coffee growing region in South India. Week two…
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From Small Beginnings
I can still remember my first meeting with the farmers of Tri Karya quite vividly. We met them under the lean-to of a ramshackle little roadside shop a few miles past Bedugul. The rain was pouring down outside and I watched as Santosa made the customary small talk that precedes any “business meeting” in Bali. With some ceremony, they handed over a small plastic bag containing the most motley assortment of green beans I’ve ever seen. With my best poker face I said I would take it back to Australia for further assessment.
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The Many Facets of Colombia
Do you remember those funky, printed, refracting images you had as a kid that changed to a different image depending on the angle you looked at it? I know I had a few – mostly comprising superheroes in a “ready for action” pose. Then, with a tilt of the page, they adopted a body-busting “Ka-pow!” pose. Colombia reminds me of those images for the simple reason that from pretty much whatever angle you look at the country, you see something very different.
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PNG: So Close, Yet So Far Away
Every time I visit somewhere new, I am humbly reminded that the complex journey from seed to cup has its own set of unique challenges and opportunities which are particular to each country. My first visit is always an exercise in listening, observing and trusting my instinct. Whilst I never know what to expect, against all odds, the results are often new relationships, lasting friendships and precious life experiences. My first visit to PNG was all that and more.
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Do Good, Feel Good
Well, this was supposed to be a story about a little coffee nursery in the Highlands of Bali, but a few different events have conspired to convince me to take a slight left turn. Bear with me; it’s still a coffee story at heart, just one with a slightly philosophical detour!
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New Era for Indian Coffees
Five years ago, I ummed and ahhed over Monsoon or Tiger Mountain branded coffees. They were savoury, dusty, baggy and cigar-like — and I wasn’t quite sure whether I liked them or not. All I knew was that they blended poorly, had a very bubbly crema and required a very different grind setting to most of the other coffees I was using. Fast track forward five years and I’m no longer a fan of these coffees. Sounds harsh, but those coffees were just that: harsh! Now that the global quality standard has rapidly increased, the old-style Indian coffees just don’t stand a chance against the super sweet and refined coffees of today. That’s pretty much all I knew about Indian coffees, until my recent visit to India, that is.
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Roaster Goes to India
We were pretty much up and running right from the start on our trip to India. Early on the first morning we met Mr. Appadurai, the owner of Sangameshwar Coffee Estates. We currently buy coffee from one of these estates, the Attikan Estate, meaning ‘fig jungle’ estate as it’s surrounded by dense jungle and, of course, fig trees. Mr. Appadurai inherited the company from his grandfather who had bought the farm from A.C. Morris in 1960.
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The Fruit of Determination
Burundi is changing. This tiny East African country, which is still bouncing back from civil war and the genocide that took place in the 1990’s, is determined to become an exporting country known for its specialty coffee. Yet how does Burundi, which was once part of Rwanda before WWII and is today ranked in the top five poorest countries in the world, intend to be put on the specialty coffee map? By allowing the women of Burundi to have more input, of course.
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Coffee Story At Gitgit
This edition’s guest writer is Komang Sukarsana. Komang helps us with our coffee projects in Bali and was a key driver of the nursery project at Tri Karya. He has made a dramatic improvement with his English over the last 12 months. What he lacks in technique, he makes up for with enthusiasm — enjoy!!
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Adventures in Attikan
I take the short flight from Hyderabad to Bangalore, spend one night there and then leave early in the morning for Attikan Estate. It’s not necessarily that far away, it’s just that even on a Sunday morning the roads are packed with bull carts, tuk tuks, bicycles, motorbikes, honking trucks — and us. India has a lot of people and that is part of its allure.
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