Starbucks Reserve Sun-Dried Ethiopia Kayon Mountain Farm Coffee Review
It's always a good day when you use rare coffee beans. Whether you like Starbucks or not, these beans are fantastic. Plus, it's super convenient to pick them up at any Starbucks Reserve locations. Just to be clear, this isn't a sponsored post by Starbucks.
You won't find many of these coffee beans online, so it's best to check your local Starbucks cafe. If they don't have them, the baristas can probably tell you if another Starbucks nearby does.
This Ethiopian coffee was truly amazing. As a rule of thumb, you can almost always guarantee that a sun-dried coffee is going to be amazing. There is a sweetness that comes with that drying process I have not tasted in other methods.
This roast really surprised me.
ABOUT
On the Starbucks website, they offer the following small write-up about this roast:
“Sun-dried processing contributes to bright lavender and Meyer lemon favors. Kayon means ‘goal,’ a mantra for these extraordinarily driven farmers who take extra steps to bring us this unparalleled Ethiopian coffee.”
Starbucks indicates that this coffee is from the Kayon Mountain region of Ethiopia, and offers the following details about the roast:
Roast Level: Medium
Processing: Sun-Dried (Natural)
Regarding this coffee, Starbucks offered the generous write-up on the back of the card:
“We look forward to every crop from Kayon Mountain because the farmers go to such obsessive lengths. Their coffee is grown on their own land, whereas many Ethiopian coffees are blended from multiple farms. They employ extensive pruning and use half their land for shade trees, protecting the delicate, history-rich Ethiopian coffee ecosystem. For this lot, extra effort was taken to rotate the beans while they dried in the sun on raised beds, slowly soaking up the deep flavors of the coffee fruit. Sun-dried coffees are always cause for extra excitement—more so when they come from a farm as driven as this one.”
REVIEW
I went into this roast with some hesitation. I am not the biggest fan of cherry flavor, so reading about the generous amount of cherry flavor, I was skeptical. I should have kept an open mind.
When I opened the bag I knew this was a special roast. The symphony of scents on this roast is spectacular. Truly a bouquet of aromas.
According to Starbucks, this coffee has “generous and concentrated notes of macerated cherries and spiced chocolate with a grape-candy sweetness.”
The cherry notes are there, but not in the generous and overpowering way that I had thought they would be there. As Starbucks shares on their site, there are some flavors of citrus in this, and the spiced chocolate really is a nice addition.
I used the beans from this roast to make Americanos (iced and hot), cappuccino, latte, flat white, cold brew, and an affogato. All were delightful.
Should you try this coffee? Yes. Resoundingly so.
Rating: 9.1/10