Costa Rica Santa Maria

Mainland: Two coffees from Chickmagalur, India

$ 22.00

Coffee from mainland Asia isn't new -- and, specifically, coffee in India has a storied history that traces back farther than anywhere in the world besides Ethiopia and Yemen. Indian coffee dates to the late 1600s when, according to legend, a Sufi pilgrim named Baba Budan smuggled coffee seeds from the Arabian Peninsula, planting them in the Western Ghat mountains range.

Despite the long history, we haven't always associated Asian coffees with the qualities we seek out, and Huck had previously limited our roasting to a few coffees from the Pacific islands, rather than the mainland.

Over the past few years though, producers in India, China, and Myanmar, to name a few countries, have raised the bar for specialty coffee in Asia, and we've had to reconsider our preconceived notions. Gundhikan and Ratnagiri Estates are among the producers that have forced us to open our minds to coffees from mainland Asia, and both happen to lie in Chikmagalur, India, the same region where Baba Budan purportedly planted his smuggled seeds.

Gundhikan Natural and Ratnagiri represent the best of our first year roasting coffees from India. We're stoked to share these two beautiful coffees with you, and expect that there will be more coffee from mainland Asia - perhaps not only from India - in HUCK's coffee future.

Ratnagiri
Ashok and Divya Patre are 3rd-generation coffee and pepper farmers, and for the past decade or so, the family has focused on innovative processing techniques and equipment to push flavor potential at Ratnagiri Estate. “Anaerobic” can mean many things, but in this case, the Patres depulped their coffee, then fermented the seeds in oxygen-purged, stainless steel tanks, before washing and drying. The result is a coffee that’s bright, clean, and creamy. We’re tasting citrus and mango, balanced out with sweet shortbread cookie and nougat.

Gundhikan
Saif Ulla and his farm, Gundhikan Estate, are founding members of KaadKaapi Collective, a group of environmentally-conscious farmers aiming to preserve habitats and migration corridors for native animal species. Extremely dense shade cover and the occasional downed tree - courtesy roaming elephants and Gaur (Indian Bison) - make for significantly lower productivity and higher costs, offset by pursuing quality and earning higher prices. This small, natural-processed lot is wildly fruity and a bit boozy, with notes of red wine, honey, bittersweet cacao, and pomegranate.

Mainland is available as two options:

1. A boxed set of both Gundhikan Natural and Ratnagiri, each in 8 oz bags

2. Ratnagiri on its own, in an 8 oz package.

While most of the credit undoubtedly goes to Saif Ulla, the Patre family and their teams in India, kudos to David Stallings and the team at Osito Coffee, too. Without David’s interest in seeking out Indian coffee, getting to know the producers over the years, and Osito importing their first Indian coffees to the US this year, we definitely would not have tasted these coffees and been able to roast them here at Huck.

Photos of Ashok + Diviya Patre, Saif Ulla courtesy David Stallings, Osito Coffee

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India Hulikere

$ 20.00

Size

12 oz

2 lb

5 lb

Qty

India’s been producing coffee longer than any country besides Ethiopia and Yemen, but this is HUCK’s first go at roasting coffee from the world’s most populous country!

Hulikere is one of three Indian coffees we’re roasting this year, and while we’re saving the other two more-exotic offerings for special release, this honey-processed coffee is sweet, balanced, and approachable.

The Indian coffee industry is largely based around the Robusta coffee species, and is perhaps best-known for the Monsoon Malabar process. While we’re not completely close-minded about Robusta, it’s a different species than Arabica, and we haven’t found one that tastes good enough for us to roast, at least so far. And Monsoon Malabar is a process of intentionally aging coffee in a humid environment. It’s an acquired taste, to put it politely, and it’s a taste we’re not planning on acquiring.

That being said, there are plenty of producers producing - and pushing - specialty Arabica coffee in India, including Shreedev Hulikere, his family farm Hulikere Estate, and their environmentally-focused producer group, KaadKaapi. KaadKaapi is a group that uses specialty coffee production as both an income source and land use to protect animal habitats and migration corridors that might otherwise be jeopardized by development or clear-cut agriculture. Hulikere and the other farms in KaadKaapi sacrifice productivity for extremely dense shade cover, an occasional elephant-trampled coffee shrub or two, and it’s not uncommon to see tigers or their prey amongst the coffee trees.

While most of the credit undoubtedly goes to Hulikere and the growers in India themselves, kudos to David Stallings and the team at Osito Coffee, too. Without David’s interest in seeking out Indian coffee, getting to know the producers over the years, and importing their first Indian coffees to the US this year, we definitely would not have tasted these coffees and been able to roast them here at Huck.

As far as Hulikere goes, sweetness, approachability, and low acidity are the name of the game in this honey-processed coffee. We definitely skew towards some fruitiness and brightness in even our more approachable offerings, so if you’re looking for something a bit different than typical Huck, this will be our least fruity and least acidic coffee this year. We’ll roast up some brightness and berries in other Indias, but we’re tasting just a hint of raisin in Hulikere, with cocoa powder, almond, and honey graham front and center.

*** for roasting schedule, shipping, receiving & additional information, please visit out Frequently Asked Questions . And, for a primer on coffee processing, check out our Processing Basics Guide. ***

Photos of Shreedev Hulikere and Hulikere Estate courtesy David Stallings, Osito Coffee.

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Ethiopia Danche Marcelo

$ 24.00

Size

12 oz

2 lb

5 lb

Qty

Gettin' wild, but without gettin' too funky. We're kicking off 2023 Ethiopias at Huck with something a bit different from our friends at Snap!

Ethiopia's the birthplace of coffee, with unparalleled genetic diversity, plus unique terroir and processing that can produce super floral, citric washed coffees and the cleanest, juiciest, most berry- and tropical-forward naturals. We look forward to these coffees every year, and we're still looking forward to adding those to the roast lineup!

And Snap Coffees, a quality-focused exporter and washing station operator, has been a longtime partner for us at Huck. We've featured coffees from Snap's two washing stations in the kebele of Worka Chelbesa - the eponymous Worka Chelbesa station, plus the newer Danche station - for most of the last 5+ years, and coffees from within the Snap network often make up at least some, and sometimes all, of our flagship Phantom Limb Blend.

Over the past couple years, Snap has given its washing station managers the opportunity to experiment a bit with processing, and deviate a bit from the traditional washed and natural profiles. In this case Marcelo, one of the employees at Danche, pioneered a weird take on the washed process, keeping the coffee in-cherry, but in a sealed, cool environment, for 5 full days before undergoing a more typical washed process. Risky, but it works.

Earlier this year, we spent some time with Snap in Addis Adaba, tasting dozens of coffees from throughout their network. When we came across this one, it was "wow, wtf is this Amanuel?, we gotta have it" at first sip. And we were tasting samples blind, so even better that it came from a station we've bought from for years.

This one's combines what we love in both the best washed and natural Ethiopias - citrus and florality, plus bigger fruit and body - without some some of the funky wine, pushing vinegar, that we sometimes taste in super-long fermentations. We're tasting bright and juicy berry lemonade, honey, watermelon, and lavender florals in this banger - not our typical start to Ethiopia season, but we're very much into it!

*** For roasting schedule, shipping, receiving & additional information, please visit out Frequently Asked Questions . And, for a primer on coffee processing, check out our Processing Basics Guide. ***

*washing station photos courtesy Snap Coffees.

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