Description

Tasting notes:

Preparation: We recommend brewing this coffee in a filter (V60) or French Press. Wait 30 seconds after your kettle has boiled before pouring onto the coffee. Allow to brew for five minutes, stirring just the once – with a plastic spoon. Avoid Moka pot preparation, which is great for Italian blend, but here will do some of the delicate flavours no favours, as it were.

Shiriki Lifestyle: Quite a dark roast but mild. Citrus notes are there with a twist of red berry at the end.

Shiriki Gold: Another fairly high roast, but very fruity, complex with citrus, passion fruit and red fruits.

‘Shiriki’ is Swahili for ‘Co-operate’ or ‘Fellowship’. Click here for the Shiriki Coffee website.

There isn’t space to say all we want about the concept of adding value at source. But one thing we want to share is that Kenya Cooperative Coffee Dealers (KCCD) are conscious that young people are not going into coffee farming because they see little money in it. Instead, they migrate to the cities. As a result, coffee production has tumbled by two-thirds since the eighties. KCCD hope that adding value will help convince sons and daughters they can make a living out of coffee and preserve the Kenyan coffee industry.

So how come we are selling this coffee? We found it on sale in Kenya last November and were really touched by the taste and the story and the ambition of these small-scale farmers to do something positive for themselves, their industry and their country. So we met up with them, did a deal and brought some back (the posh word is ‘imported’). We paid what we were asked, by the way. One could try to screw them down on price, but that would defeat the object of trying to do some good, wouldn’t it? We have added just enough to make a small profit, but the pricing is still competitive in the premium coffee market. Try some, and see what you think.