Uganda — Gamatui Smallholders "Supernatural" Blend: Natural & Anaerobic Natural (Sipi Falls Washing Station)

Tastes Like — 🍇 Concord Grape • 🥜 Praline Pecan • 🍊 Orange Zest • 🍫 Milk Chocolate

DETAILS

• Producers: Smallholders in and around Gamatui
• Washing Station: Sipi Falls
• Region: Kapchorwa, Mt. Elgon, Uganda
• Varietal: SL varieties
• Process: Natural & Anaerobic Natural (blend)
• Elevation: 1,600–1,900 masl

INTRO
A SUPER natural blend from one of Black & White's most beloved coffee-growing communities. Due to low crop yields in Uganda this year, they couldn't source as much Gamatui as they'd have liked, so they blended a small natural lot from Gamatui with an anaerobic natural from neighbouring smallholders. In the cup: concord grape, praline pecan, orange zest, and milk chocolate.

THE PRODUCER
Through their longstanding partnership with Atlantic Specialty Coffee and its sister company Kawacom, Black & White has tasted and bought coffee from the Gamatui community for nearly a decade. Local farmers bring their freshly harvested cherries to the Sipi Falls washing station, which manages the washing, drying, and milling for these smallholders, cutting down farmers' labour and raising the quality and value of each lot, with better price outcomes for the farmers. Gamatui is well known for coffees that are distinctly grape-y, a rare and delicious flavour, experienced as everything from Welch's grape juice to grape Jolly Ranchers to, this time, fresh concord grapes.

THE PROCESS
This coffee is a blend of two lots processed at Sipi Falls.

Natural: fermented in water for 48 hours, re-washed, and sent to African-style raised beds to dry. The slow drying varies with humidity, temperature, and sunlight, and the coffee is turned frequently for even, precise moisture. Once dry, the skin and pulp are removed, leaving beans noticeably impacted by the cherry's sweet, fruity mucilage.

Anaerobic Natural: cherries arrive at the station and are placed in GrainPro bags to ferment anaerobically for 48 hours. Thanks to the high temperature and specific yeasts in the air at Sipi Falls, fermentation happens quickly, a "flash fermentation" that gives the coffee a spicy, boozy character enjoyed year after year. It is then spread on raised beds to dry in the Ugandan sun.

Blending a traditional natural with the flash-fermented anaerobic natural is the defining structure. It combines the natural's sweet mucilage fruit with the anaerobic lot's spicy, boozy depth.

THE CUP
Fun and fruity: fresh concord grape leads, with a sweet, nutty praline pecan and a smooth milk-chocolate bar sprinkled with orange zest.

Flavour Notes
🍇 Concord Grape 🥜 Praline Pecan 🍊 Orange Zest 🍫 Milk Chocolate