Alo Hybrid Washed

Safo is where it all started for Alo Coffee. It's their original washing station, perched in Alo village in Bensa, Sidama, at a staggering 2,420 to 2,520 metres. Safo means "foundation" in Sidamic, which is a fitting name for the place where everything began.

Alo Coffee is Tamiru Tadesse and his wife, Messi. Tamiru grew up right here in Alo village. Before coffee, he was an electrical engineer and a university teacher, and he spent years watching the coffee from his home region get undervalued. Ethiopia's first Cup of Excellence in 2020 changed that. It convinced him to start his own company, and their very first submission, a lot from their home village, took first place in 2021. They haven't slowed down since.

I spent a lot of time with the Alo team on my trip to Ethiopia this past season, and I practically lived in their cupping lab, working through table after table of their coffees. Tamiru is the real deal. He's not just a businessman in coffee, he's a coffee guy in business, and you can taste that difference in everything they produce.

Now, about the "hybrid" part. Most washed coffees are pulped right away: the skin and fruit come off the same day the cherry is picked, and the beans ferment in tanks before they're washed. Not this one. Here, the ripe cherries are hand sorted and then left to ferment whole, skin and all, for 72 hours. Only then are they pulped, and the sticky layer of fruit (called mucilage) is washed off. So it starts out like a natural and finishes like a washed coffee. That's the hybrid.

From there, the clean parchment goes onto raised African beds to dry slowly in the shade for 9 to 13 days. The shade slows everything down, so the coffee dries evenly and holds on to its sweetness and its delicate aromatics.

When I first tasted this coffee on the cupping table in Ethiopia, it was so sweet, complex and fruity that I wrote "is this actually a great co-ferment?" in my notes. It isn't a co-ferment, but it is great. Those three days in the cherry are doing all the work. It still has the clarity of a washed coffee, with peach, black tea and florals, but there's a juicy, fresh fruit sweetness layered on top that a typical washed coffee just doesn't have. We hope you love it as much as we do!

As always, this green was frozen immediately upon arrival.

-Phil