Intelligentsia's Ethiopea Yirgacheffe Adodo

Photo (c) IntelligentiaCoffee
Few coffees have just completely changed my mind about a region, and I have a hard time paying over $15 a lb for coffee, but hurray for the Adodo from Intelligentsia. I've had quite a few Yirg's over the years, and it's one of those coffees that everyone (even 3rd and 4th tier roasters) get all excited about. I don't disagree that in general its fun, fruity and yummy, but I've never got the WOW factor. Until last Sunday that is.

Cupping the Yirg Adodo:
The first thing you notice is that these beans are very small and compact. The varietal is listed as "indigenous" which means very little. To put it in perspective, the beans are approximately 1/4 the size of the Geisha beans.

The dry aroma is very particular. First in the nose is bitter herbs, followed by the distinct scent of grape soda.

The break and wet smell is classic African: berries, dried cherries, with the distinct and interesting smell of candied fruit.

The first sip lets you know this is an extremely acidic coffee, a citrus bomb. The first flavor to show up is fruity pebbles, followed by lime, like a popsicle. This coffee cools into dark cherry pie and chocolate mousse. How lovely!

This coffee has been the first to benefit from my new Hario V60 pourover and Range Server. So much of coffee is coffee jewelry, but I really have enjoyed this V60, and Alyssa says its "really pretty." Here it is pressed into service Wednesday morning. This coffee really shines as pourover. I'm coming around to the pourover as a method for making coffee, though I've learned it takes a very steady hand and care in production. My current method is this: Grind 30g of coffee to fine, use my espresso machine to wet the filter, use water slightly off a boil. Carefully cover the coffee and once fully saturated allow it to bloom for 25 seconds. Once 25s passes, slowly pour around the edge and towards the center, I believe this helps to even out top/bottom extraction. I need to find an extractmojo in Austin to see if there is any accuracy to this theory.

As a pourover, the lime forward flavor remains, but is accompanied and followed by a substantially more mellow caramel and toasted marshmallow flavor. I loved this coffee so much as a pourover in fact, that I never got around to making it as a siphon. I did, however, make it as an espresso. As an espresso, that lime wasn't just forward, it was explosive, overpowering and downright shocking. It was smooth, but frankly, hard to drink. Not so with milk however. Accompanied with 3.5 oz of carefully stretched milk, this lime-forward yirg made a fantastic cappuccino. Chocolate and velvety, with a creamy flavor and aftertaste of the fruity pebbles that showed in the cupping.

Overall, this was a really fantastic coffee that changed my opinion about how exciting the world's favorite coffee is. This has been the best summer for coffee in a very long time!