The Ijen Plateau of eastern Java is home to a piercing, aquamarine-colored lake, which is nestled in contrast to the gray cone volcanoes surrounding it. North of Ijen are Kayumas and Curah Tatal, where smallholders grow, harvest, and process our Organic Java Taman Dadar. Organic by nature, village farmers became certified after farming organic for generations, but coffee hasn’t always been easy for the region. The late 1800’s saw a coffee rust epidemic that swept through the low-altitude plantings, forcing producers to plant a new, rest-resistant varietal further up in the highlands.

Despite the tragedy of this decades-long setback, the coffee that came out of it was exceptional. The rich, volcanic soil and high altitude combined to develop low-acid, sweet brews with notes of citrus and deep chocolate. Unlike offerings from Sumatra and Bali, Javanese coffee has sweet, not earthy, undertones. What starts as a heavy, bold cup up front finishes clean. But this coffee doesn’t just have impressive flavors, its certifications are also worth some of the spotlight.

Organic and Rainforest Alliance

The benefits of organic certification for the producers and the roasters are huge. Certification provides access to markets that might otherwise be less attainable, premium pricing, and eligibility for grants and financial assistance, among other things. The Rainforest Alliance Certified seal ensures that the farms are regularly audited to meet strict standards of social, environmental, and economic sustainability. These standards seek to promote and continuously improve biodiversity, natural resource conservation, effective planning and farm management systems, and improved livelihoods and human well-being.

Washing and Drying

Our Organic Java Taman Dadar is Wet Hulled and sun-dried on cement patios. Coffee from Java is wet hulled to accentuate the coffee’s body. What separates washing from wet hulling is the moisture content of the bean—for wet hulling, the beans are retain more moisture, so more of the parchment sticks to the bean. Unfortunately, the wet hulling process can be rougher on the beans, but those that survive the whole process make an amazing cup. Coffees dried in the sun on cement patios are spread thin in long rows and rotated every 30 – 40 minutes to promote airflow. Common in Indonesia, many producers substitute sun-drying for mechanical when the weather is unfavorable.

Using condition-controlled warehouses, the famous flavors adored by Europeans can be replicated again and again. This is done by exposing the beans to constant humidity during monsoon season, so the beans undergo the same characteristic changes. Monsoon Malabar tends to be low in acidity and sweetness with high body and a rich mouthfeel.

Madikeri

Our Indian Monsoon Malabar’s high quality is thanks to several long-standing (some as long as 100 years) family farms and the region’s geographical makeup. Madikeri is surrounded by mountains, making it ideal for growing coffee, the elevation of which ranges from 1,220 – 1,524 masl. At these elevations, coffee develops citrus, vanilla, cocoa-dusted nutty flavors, with possible notes of spiced wine.

Drying

Drying coffee on cement patios in the sun takes about 6 - 7 days until it’s ready. The beans are spread out thin in layers in rows and shifted every 30 - 40 minutes.

Fresh Roasted Coffee

Indian Monsoon Malabar is an example of a coffee that’s processing method is more significant than its origin. This a unique coffee with unmatched smoothness and a mellow flavor and mouthfeel. Notes of baker's chocolate come through predominantly and finish with mild, creamy flavor.

The current success of Balinese producers grew out of the catastrophic 1963 eruption of Gunung Agung, which swallowed communities and claimed over a thousand lives. To rebuild Bali’s shattered coffee ecosystem, the government enacted an island-wide coffee growing campaign. Their success fostered 7,500 hectares of Bourbon and Typica varieties, canopied by lush shade trees. To maintain the sanctity of the island’s crops, the use of pesticides is strictly prohibited, and all fertilizers must be 100% organic.

Coffee producers anticipate this commitment to environmental stewardship will help them attain advanced agricultural technology, which will, in turn, enhance the social and economic well-being of the Balinese people. Their organic and Rainforest Alliance certifications already put them in a good place to reach their goals.

Organic and Rainforest Alliance Certified

Their organic certification demonstrates the organization’s commitment to preserving and enhancing their water and soil quality (which often suffers with conventional, non-organic coffee). EURA Organic coffee also averages a .0255¢ increase per pound. With how much coffee is produced annually, this seemingly insignificant number can add up. The Rainforest Alliance Certified seal ensures that coffee is regularly audited to meet strict standards of social, environmental, and economic sustainability. These standards seek to promote and improve biodiversity, natural resource conservation, effective planning and farm management systems, and improved livelihoods and human well-being.

Washing and Drying

Balinese producers wet hull and dry the coffee in the sun on patios. Wet hulling, also known as giling basah, a process native to Indonesia, which tends to accentuate the coffee’s body, making for a more intense flavor profile. What separates washing from the wet hulling process is the moisture content of the bean—for wet hulling, the beans are have a higher moisture content, so more of the parchment sticks to the bean. The wet hulling process can be harder on the beans, but the whole process leads to an amazing cup. Sun-dried coffee is spread out in rows on concrete patios and shifted every 30 – 40 minutes to ensure the coffee is consistently dried.

Fresh Roasted Coffee

Since this Balinese brew is grown so high up—where its sought-after flavors are developed—we medium roast it to add a little depth to its preexisting chocolate notes. Pairing this vanilla bean and anise makes for a delicious cup. Organic Bali Blue Moon coffee is overwhelmingly rich with syrupy dark chocolate notes, a creamy mouthfeel and spiced finish. The earthiness found in many Indonesian coffees takes a backseat with this Bali Blue Moon coffee, where earthy notes are very subtle overall. This stunning Rainforest Alliance Certified, single origin organic coffee remains one of our all-time best sellers.

From above, the Central Highlands look like a beautiful patchwork of cashew, cacao, pepper, and, of course, coffee tree plots. Vietnam’s robusta production is vast, accounting for 97% of the country’s total coffee output, but it wasn’t always like this. Robusta production boomed year over year throughout the 1990s, and has brought more people out of poverty than any other export. This vastness and rapid growth have made Vietnamese a bit hard to pin down to a single origin. Our robusta is sourced from Dak Lak, Gia Lai, Dak Nong, Kon Tum, Lam Dong, Ba Ria, Binh Phuoc, and Dong Nai.

The Stigma

In the specialty coffee sector, robusta is often treated as a second-class citizen because of its lackluster taste and low quality. While we don’t like to judge, it’s hard not to in this case. Robusta is often looked down on, appearing most often in “inferior” coffee products, such as instant coffee and as a filler in some coffee blends. If your big-box blend tastes a bit bitter no matter what you do to it, there’s a chance you’re tasting robusta.

If you’re looking for this sort of bite, however, then robusta may be the coffee you’ve been looking for. Perhaps you’re hardcore and love coffee because it hurts so good. There are coffee drinkers like that! Robusta also contains more caffeine than arabica—and it’s cheaper! In the end, it’s all about preference. But there is a lot you can do with robusta!

Home Roasting Robusta

If you want to fully submerge yourself in the robusta life, our customers have had continued success with medium-dark roasts. According to Elizabeth W., “it has a delightfully bold, rich, energy-boosting taste.” Others love robusta because it takes sugar, syrups, and flavored creamers well, not to mention tastes great as espresso. If you’re a little more hesitant about robusta, try the waters with blending. Robusta brings a little boldness to your blend. One home roaster suggests blending 20% Robusta with 80% Dominican, Guatemalan, or Mexican, saying it was the “most flavorful [they] have ever tasted.” Many commercial roasters use Robusta in their espresso blends to add body and a deeper crema than some Arabica blends develop on their own.

So, while some might consider robusta “inferior,” we like to think of it as an instrument that might sound too bold and brash for most people, but makes a symphony of flavor when combined with some other players.

Coffee in the Ngada district is grown and processed by 12 different, yet interconnected, cooperatives, all of which are organized by the farmers themselves. They manage an approximate 6,000 hectares of coffee plants, with varietals including Typica, Catimor, Timor Hybrids, and S795 Flores, a Kent-Liberica hybrid perfect for first-time coffee farmers because it can handle Indonesia’s breadth of microclimates. In addition to cultivating impeccable coffees, these coops also maintain high environmental standards, demonstrated by their Rainforest Alliance and organic certifications.

Organic and Rainforest Alliance Certified

Their organic certification demonstrates the organization’s commitment to preserving and enhancing their water and soil quality which sometimes suffers with conventional, non-organic coffee. EURA Organic coffees also average a .0255¢ increase per pound in payment to the farmers. With how much coffee is produced annually, this seemingly insignificant number can add up. The Rainforest Alliance Certified seal ensures that coffee growers are regularly audited to meet strict standards of social, environmental, and economic sustainability. These standards seek to promote and improve biodiversity, natural resource conservation, effective planning and farm management systems, and improved livelihoods and human well-being.

Washing and Drying

Largely, coffee from Indonesia is wet hulled, a process not used in most other parts of the world but necessary in Indonesia’s humid climate. This process tends to accentuate the coffee’s body, which makes for a more intense flavor profile. What separates washing from the wet hulling process is the moisture content of the bean—for wet hulling, the beans are have a higher moisture content, so more of the parchment sticks to the bean. The wet hulling process can be harder on the beans, but the whole process leads to an amazing cup. The coops dry their beans on patios and in solar drying machines. Beans dried on patios are rotated every 30 – 40 minutes to promote airflow, and when the weather isn’t favorable, beans are dried in solar mechanical dryers.

Fresh Roasted Coffee

Our Flores grows at 1,208 meters above sea level, at which height coffee matures a little slower. Here, the coffee walks a fine line where chocolate and nutty notes are starting to come through, but the low acidity is maintained. Any higher, and our Flores would taste fruitier with more acidity. Organic Flores Bajawa Ngura coffee is on the milder side for Indonesian coffees. This organic coffee has an excellent well-rounded chocolate flavor and a syrupy mouthfeel. The earthiness usually found in coffees from this part of the world is replaced with a peppery, herbal finish which creates a mild but rich cup with unique flavor notes.

More commonly known as “coffee leaf rust,” this fungus is one of the many persistent issues plaguing coffee farming. Coffee leaf rust is inevitable, unless a farm’s varietal is immune to it. Sadly, Maubisse’s wasn’t, and a rust epidemic destroyed their crop, but the replanting process did produce a brand-new varietal—Hibrido de Timor.

Cooperative Café Timor

The EURA and National Cooperative Business Association (NCBA) of Indonesia helped form the Cooperativa Café Timor in 1994 in an effort to preserve coffee production in the region and enter the international market. The cooperative’s association with EURA and NCBA improves the lives of Timor farmers, all of whom oversee no more than a hectare of coffee producing farmland. They do this through management, marketing, financial, and health care guidance and assistance. CCT is also organic, Fair Trade, and Rainforest Alliance certified.

Organic, Fair Trade, AND Rainforest Alliance Certified

The benefits of organic certification for the producers and the roasters are huge. Certification gives access to markets that might be otherwise unattainable, premium pricing, eligibility for grants, and other financial assistance, among many other opportunities. Fair Trade ensures fair financial compensation for their coffee, with a minimum Fair Trade market price plus up to a 20¢ premium per pound. The Rainforest Alliance Certified seal ensures that coffee is regularly audited to meet strict standards of social, environmental, and economic sustainability. These standards seek to promote and improve biodiversity, natural resource conservation, effective planning and farm management systems, and improved livelihoods and human well-being.

Washing and Drying

CCT coffees are fully washed and sun-dried interchangeably on patios and mechanically. Fully washed is typical of high-quality coffee. Washed coffee is all about the seed, not the cherry. Most specialty coffees are washed because this process gives the most true-to-origin experience, as the mucilage can impart syrupy flavors if left intact during processing. Mechanical dryers function a lot like coffee roaster cooling trays, in that they utilize a rotating arm that turns the coffee continuously. When the weather is favorable, the coffee is spread flat on cement patios to dry in the sun.

Fresh Roasted Coffee

Timor coffee is classically Indonesian with deep, developed flavor and dark chocolate notes. When roasted to a true medium like our organic, Fair Trade, and Rainforest Alliance Certified Timor coffee you get subtle woody and herbaceous cupping notes through a relatively mild finish for a truly stellar cup of organic coffee.

Founded by Ibu Rahmah in 2008, the Ketiara Cooperative is primarily women-owned and is made up 890 growers and members who are passionate about improving the well-being of their members, delivering a quality product, and protecting the environment. In the 20 years before the coop formed, Rahman was managing nearly all aspects of her family’s coffee business—purchasing cherries, processing, and local sales. This gave her the foundation needed to not only produce great coffee but also to elevate women in the region, creating opportunities for them to succeed in a male-dominated field.

Organic, Fair Trade, and Rainforest Alliance Certified

The support and teamwork at Ketiara Cooperative helped the coop expand their production to sell to larger suppliers. And their vote to become Organic, Fair Trade, and Rainforest Alliance certified has only made their network larger. The benefits of organic certification for the producers and the roasters are huge. Certification gives access to markets that might otherwise be unavailable, premium pricing, and eligibility for grants and financial assistance. This ensures better financial compensation for their coffee, with a minimum Fair Trade market price plus up to a 20¢ premium per pound. The Rainforest Alliance Certified seal ensures that coffee is regularly audited to meet strict standards of social, environmental, and economic sustainability. These standards seek to promote and continuously improve biodiversity, natural resource conservation, effective planning and farm management systems, and improved livelihoods and human well-being.

Washing and Drying

Coffee from Sumatra is wet hulled, a process not used in most other parts of the world but necessary in Indonesia’s more humid climate. This process tends to accentuate the coffee’s body, which makes for a more intense flavor profile. What separates washing from the wet hulling process is the moisture content of the bean—for wet hulling, the beans are have a higher moisture content, so more of the parchment sticks to the bean. The wet hulling process can be harder on the beans, but the whole process leads to an amazing cup.

Fresh Roasted Coffee

We offer several different Sumatran coffees, including Organic Sumatra, conventional Sumatra Mandheling, and Dark Sumatra Mandheling. We roast to different levels to accentuate the various flavors from pepper, chocolate and cedar to softer, earthy and herbaceous flavors.

A little over three hours from Goroka, the capital of the Eastern Highlands Region, Roots #1 is a network of partnership-minded smallholders who sow Typica, Arusha, and Bourbon varieties in the Okapa district. Producer Tony Tokah took the helm in 2012 to establish a system of resource management for the 60,000-person population, whose coffee lots resemble gardens more than they do, well, lots. This restructuring of the Okapa district’s coffee production helped stabilize and increase their output. Deeply rooted shade trees help protect coffee plants from strong winds and provide nutrients to the soil.

Washing and Drying

Tokah and Roots #1 utilize wet processing—also known as washed—to maintain the true flavor of their coffee beans. Washed coffee is all about the seed, not the cherry. Most specialty coffees are washed because this process gives the most true-to-origin experience, as the mucilage can impart syrupy flavors if left intact during processing. After washing and fermentation, the coffee is dried on raised beds, which are specialized beds made of wood, chicken wire, and plastic netting that promote airflow.

Fresh Roasted Coffee

Coffee from Papua New Guinea is already impeccably dynamic, so we keep its origin notes front and center with a medium roast. This gives its cherry flavor some rich chocolate grounding while maintaining the brew’s overall clarity. The initial taste reflects dark berry flavors and ends with a dark chocolate, but remarkably clean finish.