Kenya

Beans: Kenya
Roaster: Akaimi coffee
Roasting Degree: City


【Impression】
Balmy sweet aroma of ripen chestnuts combined with a hint of lime, very light to medium body.  Sweetness as roasted almonds and cashews, lemony acidity slightly touches, earthy strong flavor in core flavor, mixed spice like refreshing with subtle bitterness after taste.  Well-balanced and mild flavor.

【Note】
Although the Kenyan coffees used to have a settled and earthy flavor with defined bitterness, characteristics have been sifting to milder and sweeter flavor range even with consideration of roasting degrees and techniques.  The Kenyan beans seems to be taking efforts to "compromise" with the majority with minimizing their original uniqueness...

Special Winter Blend

Beans: Special Blend ～ Winter
Roaster: Akaimi Coffee
Blend/Roast: After Blend

【Impression】
Mid to dark, soothing aroma of cocoa, citric, jasmine note on top, mellow, light and smooth in texture, dark chocolate like bitterness, apricot, dates, dejo pear, fruity, cashews, nutty sweetness, hint of lime, a long lasting aftertaste of soothing bitterness with sweetness.
Enjoyable and warming sweetness/bitterness of flavor with citric acidity as refresher.



【Note】
This years winter flavor has definite sweetness mixed with bitterness.  The balance of blending varies ever year since flavor of beans changes.  "Blend" means often "stable flavor" but Akaimi's seasonal special blend means seasonal", presents the best flavor of the season harmonized beans of the house. 


  

Akai-mi Coffee in Feb.

The joyous moment of my life!
Here are new coffee beans from Akaimi coffee:

Seasonal Blend ~ Winter
Kenya
Bolivia
Peru

Coffee roasting shows not only roster's technique but personality.  This applies to the atmosphere of Cafe/Roastery.  If coffee belongs to articles of taste/luxuries, "chemistry" with a roaster, in person, might be a part of flavor?
Certainly, flavor, such includes roasting technique, beans discerning beans, comes the top of everything, but it is difficult to ignore that personality of  roaster and atmosphere of roastery.          

Guatemala Antigua Bella Carmona

Beans: Guatemala Antigua Bella Carmona SHB
Roaster: Beans-Tei
Region: Antigua, Bella Carmona, Guatemala 
Altitude: 1,500-1,800m
Varietal: Bourbon, Catura
Screen: N/A
Grade: SHB

【Impression】
Medium body, very light acidity with creamy and silky texture.  Chocolaty aroma like Criollo cacao beans,  with well-balanced bitterness and sweetness.  Deep and well-developed balance of bitterness and acidity is harmonized with fruity sweetness similar to cacao beans.  This fits any time  in a day but may fit better at evening or 3pm with sweets, scones with whipped-cream.   
Food pairing : Strawberry shortcake with a lot of whipped cram!!

Red mountain ～ Pea berry

Beans: Red mountain, Pea berry 
Roaster: Bean's Tei
Roasting Degree: Dark
Origin: Nyeri, Kenya

 【Flavor scale】
Mildness: 2
Bitterness: 3
Richness: 5
Aroma: 5
Acidity: 2
Sweetness: 3
※Grade 1 to 5

【Impression】
Citrus top note with dark chocolate like cacao aroma as mid/bottom note,  medium body with simple, clear flavor, sweetness as a long lasting after taste, strong Earthy feeling.  Soothing and light texture, nutty, almonds chocolate like mild sweetness as core flavor,  harmonized with a bit of bitterness, no acidity detected.  Well developed and harmonized flavor.

Good for Morning and afternoon break coffee w/o cream and sugar.

Beans Tei

Walking along Takakura street, a green sun-shade catches your eyes together with beautiful aroma stimulate your olfactory sensation.  Beans Tei is KIOSK type coffee roaster at Shijyo, Kyoto.  Located near Nishiki-Ichiba, a traditional and historical marketplace in Kyoto, some may expect "Tradition" and "History" behind this roaster.  According to one of shop staff, this roaster has founded in 1990's, 1994 from their HP, which is considered relatively new in both this historical city and Japanese Cafe history.   Although this roaster is pretty new, it's merged into atmosphere of Nishiki, sitting there silently.  Beans Tei @  Shijyo is very small and hidden, cozy and friendly.  This Kiosk offers a Cup of coffee, so it will be fun to grab a cup here to explore the town.  

As other 90's coffee roasters, Beans Tei  also follows "trend" of 3rd wavers; Specialty, single origin.  There are some micro farmers as well as COE, cup of excellence.  Roasting technique and degrees closely resemble to Seattle style, but has a tip of a traditional Japanese light roasting and flavor sensitive "Blending" techniques.  Understanding roasting machine capabilities, their roasting technique is high.  Also, their flavor, their blending technique, is good enough considering the price.  The price range at Beans Tei is around JPY 450 to around 550 per 100g, quite reasonable price setting for both Specialty coffee beans and Shijyo, the down town Kyoto.    

My recommendation for first timers is Special Blend, reasonable and flavorful coffee best for paper brew.

Dominica Ramon Rodoriguez

Beans:  Ramon Rodoriguez
Roaster: Beans Tei 
Roast: Medium
Area: Juncalito, Santiago province,Altura, El Cibao, Dominican Republic
                   Ramon Rodriguez Estate
Altitude: 1200m
Variety: Caturra、Typica
Grade:  N/A
Screen:  N/A
Processing method: Wet

 【Impression】
Light Citrus as a top note on crispy Oats like aroma, Nutty and Chocolaty sweetness with hazelnuts like spicy flavor, medium body, light touch refreshing bitterness as aftertaste.  A tint of  lemony acidity touches shortly on top, mild and mellow layer of sweetness stays as core flavor.
Black is recommended to enjoy this flavor-full and well-balanced cup with a piece of  Marron glacé. 

This beans expresses full characteristics of Cibao Altura coffee, lower acidity and higher quality contributed by higher altitude with  ample rainfall.  The Dominican Specialty coffee are generally known as full body, moderate to light acidity, rich aroma, and earthy tones, and, of all these, Cibao Altura coffee has much less acidity to emphasize rich mellow flavor.   




【Note: Dominican Coffee】
The main varietal grown in Dominican Republic is the Typica, about 90%, and the Arabica, about 10%, including Bourbon, Catuai, Caturra, and Mundo Novo, a hybrid of Caturra.  The Dominican Coffee retains and exhibits characteristics of classic caribbean coffees, well-balanced, among all others such as Jamaican and Puerto Rican, which due to processing methods.  
Dominican Republic is on the list of one of the finest coffee country which produces CEO specialty beans from established seven growing areas:  Cibao, Barahona, Noroeste, Neyba, Sierra Sur, Sierra Occidental, and Sierra Central.  In those areas, coffee tends to elevate acidity with altitudes.   Basically, the Dominican beans are composed with full-bodied, rich aroma, earthy spice flavor, and mild to light acidity varied by growing altitudes.