Blossom Coffee Roasters
Vashon Island, WA, USA
Jeanine Niyonzima-Aroian, the founder of JNP Coffees, is one of the most influential individuals in Burundi coffee today. Raised in Bujumbura, Jeanine went on to earn an MBA from Northwestern Universityâs prestigious Kellogg School, cycle through corporate America, and eventually reconnect with her birth country by founding Burundi Friends International, a not-for-profit that funds educational and economic empowerment programs for rural Burundians, which is now in its 13th year. After a few years marketing Burundi coffees stateside for friends and family, Jeanine realized she had every reason to lead the business, and JNP Coffee was born. JNP Coffee is highly focused on womenâs empowerment, and along with a few local womenâs rights advocates, formulated the Burundi chapter of the International Womenâs Coffee Alliance. This coffee, created from two distinct processing lots, has been titled Incuti, which translates to ârelativeâ, and is often used to mean ââfriendâ in Kirundi. A fitting title for a new coffee relationship between Burundians. In Kayanza and Ngozi, the two provinces at the heart of the nationâs coffee production, competition for cherry can be fierce, so washing stations may pay well above the countryâs minimum price to court premium harvests. Fully washed processing by the Incuti group is as detailed as anywhere in Burundi where the best coffees are produced. Cherry is floated for density and visible defects prior to depulping and fermentation. After fermentation is complete the wet parchment is sorted by density in concrete washing channels. Drying takes place at first under shade, and then in open air with the parchment piled into pyramids, which are flattened and re-shaped each day as a form of incremental air exposure to slowly and evenly dry the coffee and lock in the final moisture. The resulting profile is juicy and lime-like, a great expression of high-elevation Kayanza.
Orange Blossom
Bittersweet Chocolate
Blueberry
Floral
Type
Single Origin
Origin
Kayanza, Burundi
Species
Arabica
Varieties
Yellow Bourbon, Red Bourbon
Process
Washed
Producer
Incuti Producers