Muchagara AB Kenya
Muchagara AB Kenya
- We roast and fulfill orders Tuesday and Thursday
- Free local pickup available on Wednesdays at Buckman Coffee Factory in SE Portland
PUNCHY, COOKED FRUIT, SPARKLING.
Producer: Multiple Smallholder Producers
Location: Kirinyaga County, Kenya
Elevation: 1700-1800 meters
Variety: SL28, SL34
Process: Washed
Muchagara has been milling coffee since 1959, which makes it the first coffee processing factory in Kenya's Kirinyaga County and one of the oldest in the country. The station falls under the Baragwi Farmers' Co-operative Society. The Baragwi Farmers' Cooperative Society oversees Muchagara along with 11 other facilities, with just shy of 17,000 members growing and delivering coffee across their total of 12 factories. Muchagara alone receives cherry from about 1,531 smallholders in the surrounding area, most tending somewhere between 200 and 500 coffee trees apiece on volcanic soil.
The processing follows Kenya's double fermentation method, cherry gets depulped and fermented, then moved to soaking tanks where any remaining mucilage gets rinsed off in clean water, followed by a second fermentation period before the coffee heads to the drying beds for 10 to 15 days. Though the exact amount of time in the tank shifts a bit from harvest to harvest depending on how fast the fermentation moves.
The varieties here are mostly SL28 and SL34, the two cultivars you'll find across most of Kirinyaga, bred decades ago for cup quality more than yield. This lot is graded as an AB, a size below the AA that tends to get more attention at auction. The size grading has more to do with how the coffee gets sorted for export than with how it tastes.
In the cup, Muchagara is giving us some serious roasted strawberry or cooked plum notes with an effervescent finish that makes this coffee not only well rounded but deeply satisfying.
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Shipping policy.
We roast all orders on Tuesday and Thursday. Orders placed after 4:30am PST on Tuesday or Thursday will be shipped on the following roast day.
Please select a secure delivery address to send your coffee. All packages are shipped with insurance; however, this does not cover packages that have gone missing after they are marked as delivered by the carrier. Pastime Coffee is not responsible for packages that are lost or stolen.
Please email orders@pastime.coffee for any additional questions or concerns.
Roasting style.
All of our single-origin coffees are roasted as lightly as possible while ensuring full flavor development, clarity, and highlighting terroir.
Our blends, 4:30am and Sure Thing offer a variety of roasting styles and are engineered for consistency and reliability. Please visit those products for more information on those specific roasting styles.
Please note that our coffee should be rested for at least 7 days after roasting to achieve optimal results.
Can you grind my coffee for me?
Yes! All orders are shipped whole bean by default. If you need us to grind your order, please let us know in the notes section at checkout. Don't forget to also add your brew method so we get the grind size correct.