Ethiopian Halo Beriti One Roast
Ethiopian Halo Beriti One Roast
Something that strikes me about coffees like Halo Beriti is that you would have to spend a small fortune if you tried to match this level of complexity with another ingredient. Imagine you tried to recreate this profile with wine. Coffee is still incredible value, even taking current market pressures into account.
In my view (for what it’s worth), it is more important that we keep supporting/buying from the same producers repeatedly for many reasons. In the same way that we are always delighted when our customers keep on buying from us.
We started buying Halo Beriti a few years ago now. Ethiopia were relatively late to come to market with alternative processing methods. Arguably Ethiopia offers originality unlike any other origin, even with “conventional” delicious washed, pulped naturals and, of course, naturals which are (to me) the Holy Grails of coffee. Value and where to add it are big questions in coffee. Beyond this, whatever process you put a coffee through, it is all about the original ingredient, like cooking. This coffee is deeply delicious.
This coffee was a winner in the Cup of Excellence 2020, the first in Ethiopia. If I could make financial sense of Cup of Excellence, I would buy Ethiopian first!
Top Trumps:
Roast: One Roast
Cup Profile Filter:🥣
Based on 60-65g per litre
|Aromatics: Honey, Ripe, Wild, Cacao | Body: Light to creamy | Acidity: Sweet, soft and deep.|
On opening, Halo Beriti starts with a deep, soft, ripe liquor with a hint of cacao. There is an abundance of subtle ripe fruit sugars like melon, strawberry jam and a hint of umami. On cooling, there is a boozy ripeness and bags of rich chocolate, all of the way down to cold.
Cup profile Espresso:
9oz Milk-based drink. Funky chocolate milk
6oz Milk-based drink. Rich Boozy Cacao
For espresso, I recommend longer extractions 18g-50g and late 20 seconds and beyond. In fact to be specific the best brew we had was 18g of coffee extracted in 39 seconds and 39g of liquid. We have been brewing this at 95C and it’s been wild.
Farm Stuff
Abyote Ageze and Mebrahtu Aynalem are mill owners, producers, and exporters. They founded Boledo in 2018. Boledo translates to “Source”, a critical word in coffee. Working directly with washing station owners means that they can avoid the restraints of the ECX, whilst being able to offer both traceability as well the same coffees year after year. To secure the quality and volume of cherries, Boledo pays more money for the cherries that they receive and they also train their partners in how to achieve the high quality they require.
Boledo was a finalist in the first Ethiopian cup of excellence using this “Tej” process.
Winey or Tej Process at Boledo
Coffee cherries are first placed in tanks of water, with floaters removed. After the initial sorting, the cherries are placed in tanks for 4-5 days to start the fermentation process. This is also where the anaerobic process happens. The cherries are left on the coffee seed during this process, making it a natural anaerobic. After 4-5 days sealed in tanks, the cherries are then placed on raised beds to dry. The cherries are regularly rotated and further visible defects are removed during the whole drying process, leaving behind only the best cherries. This style of fermentation requires a lot of attention, both in the tanks as well as on the drying beds, as the bacteria involved can be quite volatile. The result is a deeply delicious, complex cup of coffee.
