Advent Calendar Coffee Recipes
09/12/2021
Hey you!
It seems that you finally opened this box and you are ready to start a new journey.
It’s Holiday time! You have these exquisite coffees in front of you and we know you crave to sip each one of it.
Find out how to highlight the taste and flavour of each coffee in the box by preparing them with a perfectly designed and balanced recipe so you can enjoy a veritable coffee shop-like experience.
Moreover, you can read more about the background of each coffee and get to know it better. You deserve it. This amazing coffee deserves it. One year long, we traveled the world to find and roast complex and exquisite coffees, with unique profiles. We met farmers and we tried every day to explore the quality of each origin.
It’s your turn. This Christmas, make every day about exploring – tastes, stories and recipes.
Let’s start this journey!
Our recommended recipe (it is not the only one that works, so keep exploring)
Every jar in your box allows you to prepare 3 brews of each origin.
For our recipe we used:
- a V60 cone
- 14.5g of coffee (see the grinding size for each origin below)
- 240g water
Water temperature: 95°C
Brewing time: 2m30s (3m 00s total extraction time)
Start by rinsing the water filter with 100g of water at 50C°.
Brewing steps:
Step 1 – 0m 00s – 50g water – bloom – 30s
Step 2 – 0m 30s – 100g of water
Step 3 – 1m 00s – 90g of water
we found this as the best recipe that works for all of them, but here are some info about each one so that you can further play with them
We wish you happy holidays and exquisite extractions!
Day 1 – Ethiopia Konga Wete
Kinu M47/ Comandante Grind Setting: 31 clicks (recommended)
Konga Wete is grown in the backyard of Ethiopian farmers at about 2000 meters above the sea level. After being carefully picked, the beans are dried on African beds under the sun between 15 to 18 days during which they are raked 3 or 4 times a day, resulting in beans that have both delicate floral notes and zesty citrus notes.
The site is newly established at the end of 2019. The manager of the station is Mr. Beyene Eshete. This coffee is collected from different
farmers ( on average 1 500 farmers). Yirgacheffe Konga is the name of a district in SNNP region, Gediyo zone. Coffee is an important cash crop in the area.
The lots are separated by quality, producer and date of production. At least once a day, the collected coffee cherry is delivered to the mill, where it is floated and then placed on raised beds to be sorted by hand, usually by women, and dried. Great care is taken upon delivery to separate out any overripe, under-ripe or damaged beans.
Once sorted, the cherry will remain on the beds for around 15 to 20 days; until the cherry has reached the ideal moisture content. Next, the dried cherry will be transported to Primrose’s dry mill and warehouse in Addis Ababa city. Here coffee is dry milled to remove foreign material, remaining parchment, and defected beans.
Picking method: Manual
• Processing method: Washed, 72 hours of fermentation
• Drying method: Cherries are dried on african beds in direct sunlight. Beans are raked 3 to 4 times a day and dried between 12-14 days.
• Screening & sorting methods: Manually
Day 2 – Ethiopia Debeka
Kinu M47/ Comandante Grind Setting: 31 clicks (recommended)
In Ethiopia, Kamba source coffees from Israel Degfa and Kerchanshe. Israel is one of Kamba’s
shareholders and the owner of the Ethiopian export company, Kerchanshe.
The Debeka coffee began back in 2017 when Israel joined Kamba on origin trip to Brazil to explore new
and exciting processing methods to bring back to his farms and mills in Ethiopia.
This coffee is produced at Israel Degfa’s private farm, Debeka. With only 180 raised beds and just over
100 staff during harvest season, this is one of Israel’s smallest projects.
Initially, the coffee was grown under a sprawling one-hectare greenhouse with all agronomic practices being computer controlled. Disease resistant varieties and other experiments are also enacted at Debeka. This lot is from the second harvest of this experiment and the profile has continued to improve.
Day 3 – Kenya Kaguyu AB
Kinu M47/ Comandante Grind Setting: 31 clicks (recommended)
Kaguyu is a washing station or factory (as they are commonly called in Kenya), located near Kerugoya town in the Ndia division of Kirinyaga county in Kenya. The county is lying on the slopes of the amazing ice peaked Mount Kenya.
Kaguyu has an altitude of 1750-1800 masl, enjoying two distinct wet seasons. An annual average rainfall of more than 1500 mm is recorded in this county. The region’s soil is enriched with organic matter due to its deep volcanic red soils.
Kaguyu factory belongs to the Inoi FCS, comprising of 11 factories. The cooperative grows coffee in total area of 200 hectares, with an annual production of 250,000 kgs of green coffee. The coop has 1000 active members, growing an average of 200-300 trees on each farm.
Farmers from this area also grow tea, bananas, and corn in their farms, under the shade provided by macadamia, eucalyptus, and grevillea trees.
Day 4 – Honduras San Rafael
Kinu M47/ Comandante Grind Setting: 25 clicks (recommended)
A new and exciting origin, traded directly from Mount Totumas farm on our trip to Panama is now available on our website and in our coffee shops.
Sustainability in terms of relationship with the farmers is one of our most valued practices. While being in Panama, we got the chance to meet the people behind the coffee and cherish their work and involvement in the process.
This coffee is here to remind you about the sweetness of apricot jam on a cold winter morning and the acidity of wild berries, surprising you with an aftertaste of vanilla.
Enjoy the views and don`t forget to cherish the coffee and the people behind it.
Day 5 – Columbia El Jardin
Kinu M47/ Comandante Grind Setting: 25 clicks (recommended)
Elmer & Juan Felipe Restrepo, the father and son team behind Finca Jardin & Finca Chambacu are re-envisioning coffee production in Chinchina. The rolling hills of Chinchina, Caldas, the third biggest coffee producer in Colombia after Pitalito in Huila and Planadas in Tolima, are home to bigger estates that mainly focus on high volume commercial quality production. Elmer and Juan Felipe are redefining their coffee production with a hybrid approach.
While they continue to devote a portion of the farm to commercial production, they have been increasingly developing their specialty offerings and experimenting with new and varied processing styles.
Juan Felipe has taken the helm of the specialty aspect of the operation. He has been a passionate experimenter, developing countless processing protocols to enable him to bring out the best in the coffees from their 4 specialty plots – El Placer, Jardin 1, Jardin 2 and Chambacu.
Colombia’s wetter, more humid climate makes producing Naturals more difficult, making their clean and fruity, repeatedly large volume Naturals an extraordinary find.
Today, producers in Caldas are increasingly focused on high-quality coffee production. These producers have become common and well-known enough to earn an affectionate colloquial name in the region. They’re called juiciosos (literally: sensible/wise), which in this case means hard-working and attentive to detail. In addition to finding ways to perfect existing processing methods, juiciosos are experimenting with new processing methods and planting new varieties of coffee.
Much of their success is due to their innovative processing methods that make producing clean, large volume Naturals possible, no matter the weather.
Elmer and Juan Felipe use Brix (a measurement of sugar content) to ensure that only perfect ripe cherry – cherry with about 21% Brix – is processed.
After selective harvesting and sorting, the cherry is sundried in parabolic driers for 5 days. Throughout this time, workers rake cherry frequently to ensure even drying. Then, the cherry is dried in mechanical driers on low heat for an additional 3 days.
Juan Felipe and Elmer are constant innovators looking for new ways to highlight coffee flavors and improve each cup. This lot, Jardin 6, was dried with pineapple.
The coffee is milled at the Restrepo’s dry mill, called Invercafe, located in the town a few kilometers away from the farm.
Day 6 – Nicaragua Mierisch
Kinu M47/ Comandante Grind Setting: 25 clicks (recommended)
Located in the department of Jinotega, La Escondida about 20 minutes driving from the city proper.
La Escondida is home to the “varietal garden”; this is where they test out new varieties before deciding if it’s worth planting it on one of the farms. It’s also the only farm in Nicaragua that has Laurina growing on it (this specific plot is the only one irrigated due to its close proximity to a river source).
A cross between a Mundo Novo and Caturra, the Red Catuai is a compact plant that has a good production yield and can give a good cup quality with high enough altitudes and proper processing. It is the most planted variety on their farms, and very common amongst producers in Nicaragua along with Caturra.
It begins with only picking optimally ripe, blood red, cherries. They place floated and rinsed whole cherries into juice barrels (due to their food-safe interior) with no water and covered with a lid. It’s important to note that they need to make sure that the lid would seal the barrel airtight so as to prevent any oxygen from entering the barrel.
After spending 48 hours inside a cold room, the cherries are spread out as a thin layer on our patio under 100% sunlight where they spent four days. The cherries are then moved three to four times a day, always making sure not to damage the cherries. After spending two days on the patio they are transferred onto African beds inside a greenhouse. The cherries finish drying on the African beds after 25 days. So total drying time is 29 days.
Day 7 – Columbia La Floresta
Kinu M47/ Comandante Grind Setting: 25 clicks (recommended)
A 34-hectare family coffee farm, with a 70-year tradition of growing specialty coffee in the highest coastal mountain in the world: the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta-Colombia. The production is carried out with love and respect for nature and a tribute to the values and traditions of the coffee growers.
Every time you enjoy a cup of specialty coffee from Finca la Floresta, they improve the quality of life of the coffee growers of the Camagual Village of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. Their mission is to improve the education, technification and infrastructure of the community.
La Floresta has a coastal geo-location at altitudes of 900- 1700 m, where due to the shade-grown techniques there is only one harvest per year required, between October and December. This climate makes this particular coffee more rare and limited than the one from the rest of the country, which normally has two harvest seasons.
Day 8 – Columbia La Gabriela
Kinu M47/ Comandante Grind Setting: 25 clicks (recommended)
Finca La Gabriela is at the heart of the Cafe Lumbus family who we have sourced this beautiful geisha through. La Gabriela has been in the family for 4 generations and Catalinas (owner of Cafe Lumbus) grandma received the 26ha farm as a wedding present from her parents so with her new husband they would have an opportunity to grow food provide for themselves through coffee.
This farm is a sacred place to the family and the farm is named after Catalina’s grandma, Gabriela Vasquez. As Cafe Lumbus has grown and developed over the last 5 years they have made this farm their “garden of Eden” where they have planted exotic varietals including Java, Pacamara, Red & yellow Bourbon, Gesha, Tabi, Maragoype and Typica. These are also grown with the regular varietals of Castillo, Colombia and caturra on the farm. These coffee plants are grown in the rich red fertile soil that is slightly alkaline across the 9 plots that make up this farm that is also certified RFA.
On La Gabriela, they have 45 employees in total who are overseen by the manager Fabian and his wife Dora who does the cooking for all the employees. The workers here have access to Wifi when they stay and work on the farm as well. There is a huge emphasis placed on picking ripe cherry too with signs positioned around the farm to help workers understand the importance of this to the quality of the coffee. This Geisha coffee comes from one plot on the farm where these trees are just 5 years in age. The coffee is carefully selected before it is then taken to the wet mill where it is cleaned, floated, and separated. After this, it is then taken to the constructed drying house they have built on the farm. This tent has 100 small beds where they can lay out the coffee and dry it slowly moving it 5 times a day and drying it for between 15 – 20 days weather depending at around 35 centigrade.
Day 9 – Panama Chicho Gallo
Kinu M47/ Comandante Grind Setting: 35 clicks (recommended)
Panama Chico Gallo is part of our Founder’s Selection- a series that speaks about the farmers growing extraordinary coffees from generation to generation. Chico Gallo was selected by the founder himself, Bogdan Ciocian, CEO Meron, while visiting Finca Hartman, one of the farms in Panama with the longest-lived tradition in growing coffee.
As a variety Chico Gallo is an exquisite treat related to Gesha (both are from the Ethiopian Heirloom class). For over 12 years, the people from Finca Hartmann have been cultivating it and with careful processing to get more complex crops over the years.
This varietal was originally brought to Panama from Ethiopia as “Amaro Gayo ” (also a region in Ethiopia). Due to the name being protected in Ethiopia they named it after their Father “Don Chicho”. The natural is dried on African beds in the sun for 15-20 days and then finished in electrical driers.
Finca Hartmann was founded by Ratibor Hartmann in 1940 and became world-famous mostly due to sustainable farming practices and biodiversity. All coffee is grown in the shade of native trees and plantains that also serve as a habitat for numerous bird species. The Finca consists of several smaller farms/lots, all located between 1.300 and 2.000 m above sea level with nearly 100 ha of forest reserves bordering on the Parque Nacional de La Amistad.
Day 10 – Panama Drima Zede
Kinu M47/ Comandante Grind Setting: 25 clicks (recommended)
Ninety Plus is a coffee producer which has been transforming the coffee farming and marketing model since 2006. The Ninety Plus story begins in Ethiopia where its very first coffees produced by the hands of founder Joseph Brodsky amazed judges in the world competitions and created waves of change in the industry.
The Ninety PLus Gesha Estates were designed with inspiration drawn from coffee growing wild in its natural habitat in Ethiopia.
The Gesha variety, along with all heirloom coffee varieties, comes from the understory of wild forests in Ethiopia.
With its significant production in 2014, Coffee from Ninety Plus Gesha Estates was used to win the first of 5 World Brewers Cup Championship in 6 years. Ninety Plus Gesha Estates proves that coffee can be used to reforest and sustain tropical lands while producing the highest valued coffees in the world.
Drima Zede was first developed by Ninety Plus in Ethiopia in 2013 in a successful effort to improve the flavor of common coffee varieties through deeper fermentation. The heaviest processing formula is now applied to mixed heirloom grown in Panama, to create this bold and intensely aromatic coffee.
discover more coffees and profiles here or find the perfect coffee lover gift here
if you have any questions or recipes recommendations, don`t hesitate to let us know here