Rwanda Gitwe Peaberry

Gitwe is a relatively newer washing station in Rwanda's southern Nyamasheke District. Gitwe sits at roughly 1800 meters above sea level, and the farms of the 800 outgrowers who deliver their coffee to Gitwe are situated between 1800 and 2000 meters. This is a fully washed/wet process coffee, meaning that after the coffee cherry is removed from the seed, the remaining sticky fruit layer (mucilage) is removed by fermenting in a tank for several hours. Gitwe has several cement fermentation tanks, and should have no problem moving coffee through to the drying tables during the peak of the harvest. We were a little surprised by how deep the tanks are, and slightly worried that it might affect the coffee during fermentation. But after cupping a handful of samples, we were pleased with the resulting clean cups across the board. This is the peaberry selection, which are the small, nearly perfectly round beans. Peaberries occur when one of the two seeds inside the cherry fails to germinate. The remaining single coffee bean continues to mature, taking on the round shape of the cherry, rather than flattening out on one side. Pretty much every coffee shrub produces a few peaberries, and make up about 3% of the total yield. I roasted Gitwe to light and medium roast levels, and found that Full City roasting flattens out acidity too much for my taste, and mutes complex top notes found at City and City+.