I love coffee sacks. Don't get me wrong. I love the colourful designs and beautiful pictures of a colombian microlot. I love the soft texture, the basic identifying markings and the corded closing stitch of an co-op Ethiopian. But today there was no sweeter packaging than what my new Kenyan coffee came in. Kenya Ichanjeru AA Microlot comes in a square box with two 15 kilo vacuum sealed foil bags. Pulling one of those bricks of coffee made me think of the book Mr. Nice about a big time hash dealer from England. When I opened the first bag the smell of fresh alfalfa was so intoxicating that I felt nearly drunk! Once I was able to finally pull my nose away from the bag I ran my hands through the beans. Kenyas are usually clean and a very hard bean. So it through me to feel a soft spongy quality to the beans. The beans are actually a hard bean, however at this stage of freshness they felt like they had a velour coating on them. When roasting this coffee I have to be careful to push it into first crack and then really ease up on the temperature. This is a delicate coffee and must be approached with caution. The first batch I roasted I took a bit too fast and It ended around 430 degrees in 15 minutes. I will try again for a 420 roast in 14:30 the next time. Cupping my "darker" (430) batch I get the body and sweetness, but it lacks the citric acids that I am looking for in this beautiful coffee.

The packaging is what I really wanted to focus on. George Howell loved the coffee from this particular exporter in Kenya and told them that he would buy their coffee if they changed the packaging. So George helped them set up the equipment and started buying their coffee. This vacuum packaging keeps the coffee at peak freshness for as long as the vacuum holds. The clarity of the coffee holds longer and you do not get the usual spoils of transportation. Moisture, light, air and time are no longer a factor. One can sample fresh greens and know that the rest of the shipment will taste the same even if it gets lost in transport somewhere in Africa. The only concern that I have is the plain unmarked box that it comes in. No longer do you see beautiful art on a burlap canvas. It reminds me of buying a record off itunes. Great sound quality with easy to use functions, but it is not like buying an LP record with liner notes and cool cover art. There are somethings in life that just can not be beat. The double Japanese import Kiss album with the 20 page booklet on the history of Kiss is on of them, but fresh, I mean really fresh green beans are another. All I ask is that vacuum packed coffees come in a uber cool printed box. The Clover when it was hot came in collector boxes. I got one of five Godzilla print boxes. This was the selling feature for me and made the $$$$ easier to swallow. A balance needs to be found between the quality of the product and the packaging that surrounds it.