Coffee: Detroit St. Decaf

Origin: Guatemala

Overall Rating: 91 points

A versatile espresso with a pungent authority that should serve particularly well in big milk drinks. Slightly spicy, apricot- or mango-toned fruit in the deeply sweet-impressioned aroma.

See the full review here

What’s So Special About African Coffees?
I’ve always been a big fan of African coffees. They’re very complex and often have unique defining characteristics. For example, a classic Ethiopian coffee might taste like blueberries with a nice winey body. A quintessential Kenyan will have an unmistakable cassis (black currant) flavor that no other region produces. They are quite often surprising.

They’re also quite flexible. A good Ethiopian can lend some fruitiness to a sweet espresso blend and at the same time can be roasted lighter for a bright and lively drip coffee. Our Yirgachaffe is wonderful with our lighter roast. It has a lemony, dark berry flavor when roasted lightly.

We’ve carried quite a few East African coffees in the last 3 years including Ethiopia, Kenya, Zambia and Uganda. We taste many more than we carry because, frankly, there is a lot of variability from year to year. Some years we don’t find anything we like from a particular region but when we do find one, we make sure we get our hands on it.

Conditions on the Ground
The coffee crop from Africa is certainly affected by the political strife in many of the producing nations. Coffee is often THE major export and source of economic growth for
the rebuilding of these countries. For a great article on the current coffee situation in Africa, click here.

Zingerman’s Coffee Company made some news recently. We’ve always known our popular decaf makes great espresso and now a lot of other folks know it to:

The two 91-rated espressos, Fieldheads Espresso Decaf and Zingerman’s Detroit St. Decaf (a Guatemala single-origin) situated themselves at opposing but complementary poles of expression: The Fieldheads was mildly roasty but quiet, smooth and silkily complete. The Zingerman’s decaf Guatemala, rather than understating its roastiness, proclaimed it with pungent, milk-mastering emphasis.

Click to read the entire article.