Fucking Strong Coffee from Rwanda Ishema

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fucking strong coffee

RWANDA ISHEMA

€15,00

Tax included

Abakundakawa, Rushashi
Espresso / Filter
Bright & juicy. Raspberry.

Size:

250g 1kg

Grind:

Whole Beans Espresso Filter

One of our most beloved coffees from the inspiring Ishema Youth Coffee Group in Gakenke Province in northwest Rwanda. Bright and juicy. What more can you ask for, partner?

The coffee
the producer
The brand

The Rushashi Coffee Washing Station (the largest of two washing stations owned by the Abakundakawa coffee producer cooperative), is located in the rolling hills of Gakenke Province, towards the northwest of Rwanda. This is the country’s volcanic region, with high elevations and active soil providing prime conditions to produce high quality coffee cherries with bright acidity.

This coffee is hand-picked, depulped, dry fermented for 12 hours, double wet fermented (2 x 18 hours), washed with mountain water, shade dried, then sun dried on raised beds.

At our shop in Amsterdam, we rock this as our mainstay espresso, but some of our oldest Rwanda fans swear by filter brewing these beans. Either way, you’ll get some wild candied orange notes and a real consistent body.

ISHEMA YOUTH COFFEE GROUP

All the way back in 2013, our beloved specialty import partners (This Side Up, with whom we collaborate on almost all our coffees), began one of their oldest and most fruitful relationships with the Abakundakawa Rushashi cooperative in Gakenke Province. Over the years, they've built a deep and enduring partnership that has seen the region and Rushashi itself (which has partners in 17 villages) grow from a diffuse, disorganized network of small farmers, into a highly connected, motivated cooperative that produces some of the country's most consistently sought-after coffee. None of this would have been possible without the vision and perseverance of Antoine Kagenza, Rushashi's longtime manager.

These beans come specifically from the Ishema Youth Coffee Group, which the cooperative established in 2015 as a response to a very pressing problem: 80% of Rwanda's coffee farmers were elderly, and their children were increasingly leaving their family farms and villages for opportunities in Kigali and other parts of the country. Since 2016, the group has evolved from 63 founding members to 477, of which 289 are young women. In addition to creating pathways for young farmers to take over their family's production, they are learning about finance, administration, and sustainable agricultural practices next to older farmers.

Fucking Strong Coffee is a specialty coffee brand from the folks behind Good Beans - a beloved bean shop tucked amongst the canals of Amsterdam. We built the brand in 2018 as a response to the monotonous, snobby tone that had infected most of the specialty coffee world. Minimalist cafes, ridiculously technical language, pretentious branding, and moralizing eye rolls… they all snarkily whispered the same thing: specialty coffee is for the few. You want to know what we think…? Fuck that.

In many ways, our beans are fancy as fuck. We traceably source coffee from small, top-notch producers who are paid far above market price for meticulously processing their cherries and sustainably maintaining their land. In Amsterdam, we specialty roast with the type of care that would make any smirking barista smile – bringing out bold, surprising flavors that we’re always jazzed to share with our friends.

Our fresh beans are packed in our signature resealable cans (which you can refill for a discount at our Amsterdam shop if you're in town) or in swanky black kilo bags. We roast weekly and ship within 2-3 business days.

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