Black & White Coffee Roasters
Raleigh, NC, USA
Led by sisters Hirut and Mahder Birhanu, Dumerso is a family endeavor that has proved itself resilient and steadfast in the face of several real challenges over the past twelve years. Back in 2017, Dumerso's flagship washing station was looted and destroyed (along with more than 40 others) in the wake of rising racial tensions. That same season, the Gedeo Zone in which Dumerso is located experienced record low nightly temperatures, causing frost to decimate the harvest that year. In the wake of all of this, thirty washing stations were deemed irreparable for the washed coffee season, and four processors abandoned their coffee businesses altogether. But the Birhanu sisters forged on. Today, the Dumerso site employs 14 year-round workers and more than 400 during the harvest season - 95% of which are women! Over 650 farmers from nearby communities supply coffee cherries to Dumerso's washing station, legitimately anchoring them as the lifeblood of the Gedeo community. Throughout their rebuilding and restructuring, Dumerso has honed in on one thing in particular: perfecting their processing methods. This lot from Dumerso was processed using anaerobic fermentation, or, more specifically, their very own Limited Oxygen Process. During this process, an additional fermentation step is added after the cherries are hand sorted: the hand-sorted cherries are bagged and tied off in fresh GrainPro bags and stored in a shaded area for a fermentation cycle. During the course of this carefully timed cycle, oxygen becomes limited within the environment of the GrainPro bags, and the resulting fermentation is of a pseudo-spontaneous nature, meaning that it is impacted by naturally occurring environmental yeasts. By using this method, Dumerso's goal is to intensify the clarity of these coffees and boost their intrinsic fruit notes and sweetness.
Guava
Red Apple
Watermelon
Tamarind
Type
Single Origin
Origin
Yirga Chefe, Ethiopia
Roast
Medium-Light
Species
Arabica
Varieties
Heirloom
Process
Anaerobic Natural Fermentation
Altitude
1800-2200m
Producer
Dumerso Washing Station