Ethiopia Dry Process Buno Dambi Uddo

Dambi Uddo is the name of the town where this coffee is from, procured, and then processed at a privately run mill in Woreda Odo Shakiso, Western Guji. Elevation at the farms they buy cherry from range from 1850 to 2200 meters above sea level. Each lot they produce is made up of coffee from hundreds of different farmers in the region, most with only a few hundred coffee trees or less. You tend to see coffee intercropped with other fruits and vegetables, "false banana" being one the more common food staples to see planted in the region. The false banana plant has many uses, and is widely utilized for its starchy inners that are often fermented with yeast to make a bread ("kocho"), and the leaves can be transformed into roofs for houses, baskets, and more. Dry processing is the oldest coffee processing method still used, and involves drying the coffee bean and cherry whole. It's not as simple as casually drying full cherries, and the best lots take a lot of preparation! The coffee has to be spread out to a layer depth of only a few centimeters, no more, in order to allow air flow. The coffee is turned hourly, or even more frequently, in order to facilitate even drying and keep the coffee from molding. It's not difficult, but requires constant attention. Workers continually pull out lower quality coffee in the form of physical defects and coffee that was not harvested at peak ripeness in order to cultivate Grade 1 quality.