Coffee’s Birthplace: Ethiopia
What is it about Ethiopia that produces some of the finest coffee in the world?
There is a popular Ethiopian legend about a goat herder named Kaldi. The legend goes that one day Kaldi was out herding his goats and to his surprise all of his goats were full of energy. The goats frolicked and jumped around as Kaldi watched. Kaldi soon found out that his goats were eating the red berries of the coffee shrub and so coffee was discovered in all it’s caffeinated goodness.

Ethiopia is located in sub-saharan Africa, bordered by Sudan on the west, Somalia and Djibouti on the east, Kenya to the south, and Eritrea in the northeast. The country is rich in beautiful landscapes and towering mountain ranges. These mountain ranges maintain tropical cloud forests and are also where a lot of the coffee is grown. Ethiopian coffee farmers cultivate coffee in four different systems: forest coffee, semi-forest coffee, garden coffee, and plantation coffee.
Ethiopia produces some of the most bangin’ coffees and we want to take a closer look at why that is.
Coffee Arabica, the coffee plant, originates in Ethiopia and since its discovery has been spread all around the world.
Ethiopian coffee beans are grown in the Harar, Sidamo, Yirgacheffe, and Limu regions. All of the coffees grown in these regions are kept apart and marketed under their regional name. All of these regional varieties are also trademarked names that Ethiopia owns the rights to.

Coffee in Ethiopia can be grown at various altitudes ranging from 550–2,750m above sea level. However, most of the coffee produced in this country is grown in the eastern, western, and southern regions, which have altitudes ranging from 1,300–1,800m above sea level. These high altitudes are what give a lot of Ethiopian coffee’s their distinct flavors. Coffees grown at high altitudes tend to produce flavors rich in fruit, spice, floral, berry, and wine-like characteristics. This is due to many factors such as the soil found at those altitude as well as the weather and temperature.
The Ethiopian Coffee Exporters Association has a solid breakdown of the soil contents for different coffee growing regions in the country:

“The soils in the southern and western parts of the coffee-growing regions of Ethiopia are of volcanic origin, with a high nutrient-holding capacity for clay minerals. The Mesozoic layer, made up of sandstone and calcium carbonate, is found in the eastern part of the coffee-growing region. All the coffee-growing regions have fertile, friable, loamy soils, with a depth of at least 1.5m. The topsoil is dominantly dark-brown or brownish in color, with a PH ranging mostly from 5–6.8 (water extract). One outstanding characteristic of the soil is that its fertility is maintained by organic recycling, i.e., through litter fall, pruning and root residue from the perennial, coffee and shade trees.”
The cool and shady environments of the Ethiopian highlands provide optimal conditions and temperatures for Coffee Arabica. According to the ECEA (Ethiopian Coffee Exporters Association) the ideal temperature for growing Coffee Arabica is between 15–25 degrees Celsius and this temperature prevails is most of the country’s coffee-growing regions.
The rainfall in Ethiopia’s coffee growing regions is distributed in such a way that different parts of the country are able to harvest coffee at different times of the year, enabling there to be a constant supply of freshly harvested beans all year round.
It is also worth noting that most of the coffee produced in Ethiopia by small and larger farms qualifies as organically-grown. Oftentimes farmers cannot afford the expensive process to gain official organically-grown status, however, their responsible farming practices often go above and beyond the requirements of being certified organic.
All of this information aside, what it really comes down to is the cup in your hand. We have found that Ethiopian coffees produce some amazingly floral and fruity cups that we just simply love making.

We hope this information adds to your enjoyment of what are truly some dope coffees.
