Halo Hartume EA Decaf

PRODUCER: HAILE FIGA - SOURCED FROM 476 FARMERS IN HALO HARTUME

VARIETALS: 1974-1975 JARC & LOCAL LANDRACES

PROCESSING: NATURAL

COUNTRY: GEDEB, YIRGACHEFFE, ETHIOPIA

WE TASTE: Tropical Fruits, Raisin, Toffee

Decaffeinated coffee is interesting. For a large portion of coffee drinkers, coffee is primarily a caffeine delivery vehicle. However, there is a large swath of folks that only drink decaf, or consume it very regularly. If that’s you - we think you’re really important. You drink coffee for the flavor, not the caffeine. So then, why is it so difficult to find truly tasty, decaffeinated coffee?

Enter the Halo Hartume washing station and Coffein Compagnie. Haile Figa, inspired by the new laws and regulations in Ethiopia, built his Halo Hartume wet mill in 2018 with the hope of purchasing coffee from the nearby farmers in the community. Haile, a native of the Gedeb town, started his journey in the coffee industry more than a decade ago and still describes it as a success built on a strong foundation of relationships with his community.

Our friends at Atlantic coordinated with Haile and Coffein Compagnie in Bremen, Germany to decaffeinate this lot via Ethyl Acetate. Ethyl acetate occurs as a natural component in sugar cane, coffee, and fruit, including musk strawberries and bananas. Ethyl acetate is used in decaffeination as it extracts caffeine gently and very specifically from green coffee seeds. During this process, the green coffee seeds are first treated with steam and the silver skin is removed. The seeds’ water content is increased and their structure is thus made accessible to the solvent. The caffeine is then physically extracted from the seeds in several steps with the help of ethyl acetate. Finally, the remaining ethyl acetate is removed from the seeds by steaming and then dried back to their original moisture content.

The result of this processing is a remarkably clear and sweet cup. We have found that EA decafs typically exhibit the lightest processing footprint and yield higher cup scores. We’re very excited to offer this sun dried EA decaf from Yirgacheffe and cannot wait for you to try.