Ethiopia - Bensa Ayla

We roast this coffee for espresso. It suits both lever and automatic machines, as well as home brewing.

Want it for filter? We also roast a filter version. You'll find it here: Ethiopia - Bensa Ayla

This natural coffee comes from the Ayla processing station, which sits in the Bombe area, in the Bensa district of the Sidama region in southern Ethiopia. Smallholder farmers from the surrounding Shentawane area, around 725 of them, deliver their cherry here, from farms sitting between 1,950 and 2,150 metres and planted mainly to the 74110 and 74158 varieties.

1. Delivery and sorting - farmers from the Shentawane area deliver ripe cherry to the station, where the team first removes underripe and overripe fruit along with any foreign material. Only then is the coffee weighed and accepted.
2. Density separation in a water bath - the sorted cherry is immersed in water. Lighter, damaged fruit floats to the surface and is removed, while the dense, healthy cherries sink. Only those move on to drying.
3. Drying on raised beds - the selected cherries are spread on African drying beds, around 25 kg per bed in a layer roughly 5 cm deep. The team turns the coffee 5–6 times a day so it dries evenly and doesn't overferment. Depending on the weather, this takes 15–21 days, until the cherries reach a moisture content of 11–12%.
4. Conditioning and storage - the dried coffee moves to the station's warehouse, where it rests before milling and export.

The whole cherry stays around the bean for the entire drying period, giving it time to slowly pass on its sweetness and fruitiness, which is why naturally processed coffee tends to taste bolder and fruitier in the cup.

74110 and 74158 are Ethiopian varieties selected by the Jimma Agricultural Research Centre (JARC) in the 1970s. They were selected from local coffee trees with an emphasis on resilience, yield and cup quality.