Ngerwe - Christmas Edition

Ngerwe - Christmas Edition

An intense and fruity coffee from Embu in Kenya, with notes of blackberry, blackcurrants and rose hips.

 250g whole coffee beans

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About this coffee

Cultivar: SL28, Batian, Ruiru 11

Flavour notes: Blackcurrants, blackberries & rose hips

Producer: Several smallholders farmers
Country: Kenya
Region: Embu
Process: Washed

Roast profile: Light roast
Harvest date: December 2025

More about the cultivar

This coffee is a blend of mainly SL28, Ruiru 11 and Batian cultivars with some SL34. The SL28 and SL34 cultivars are well known for contributing with the intense fruity blackcurrant like flavours that Kenyan coffees are so famous for.

How the coffee was produced

Picking and sorting

  • The coffee cherries are delivered by smallholder farmers to Ngerwe Factory after harvesting. After delivering the coffee cherries to the wet mill the good coffee cherries are separated from the inferior ones by hand sorting and they are delivered in separate cherry hoppers.

De-pupling, fermenting & washing

  • At the factory, the coffee cherries are mechanically de-pulped to remove the fruit skin and pulp. The coffee is then fermented in large tanks for approximately 24 hours before being washed with clean water.

Drying

  • After washing, the coffee is dried on traditional African raised drying beds, which allow good air circulation around the beans. The coffee is dried until it reaches a moisture content of approximately 10–12%. Once drying is complete, the parchment coffee is transported to the dry mill for grading and sorting.

Shipping

For our Norwegian customers, we offer two shipping options:

  1. Pakke i Postkassen - With Pakke i Postkassen, tracking is provided, and delivery is estimated within 2-3 business days.
  2. Pakke til hentested - The parcel can be collected from a Post in Store, Post Office, parcel locker, or parcel box. This option includes tracking, with delivery expected within 1-5 business days.

For all international orders, we ship via DHL - Worldwide Express. This shipping method includes tracking, and all customs duties and taxes are covered in the shipping price, ensuring there are no unexpected charges for your order or its importation into the final destination. The estimated delivery time with DHL is 1-5 business days. For more information about shipping, please visit our FAQ page here. If you have further questions, please contact us here.

How to brew

Filter

We strongly recommend using the correct measurements and brewing techniques when you brew our coffees. Use a digital scale both to measure water and coffee in order to get consistent results, and we recommend using between 60 to 70 grams of coffee per litre (1000g) of water, depending on the brewing method, water quality and coffee used.

Tim's notes

This is our first encounter with coffee from the Ngerwe wet mill. It was among my absolute favourite lots that i tasted during my annual buying trip in Kenya in February 2026.

When I tasted this coffee it took me back to my first buying trip to Kenya in 2008. Back then the high quality coffees were in abundance and they all tasted intensely of blackcurrant.

Since then the quality has gradually changed because of many factors like re-placing the SL cultivars with more resilient hybrids like Batian and Ruiru 11. Hotter climate has also lead to more disease on the trees, shorter fermentation times and faster ripening of coffee cherries. All these factors affect flavour, yield and quality.

But every now and then I come across coffees in Kenya that have intense blackcurrant flavours and this year one of those coffees came from Ngerwe.

This coffee has a winey acidity that I believe come from prolonged fermentation that used to be the traditional way of fermenting in Kenya.

The intense ripe fruity flavours of blackcurrants, rose hips & blackberries and its refreshing acidity makes this a really nice coffee to drink alone or after a heavy Christmas dinner.

Kenya

Ngerwe

Ngerwe factory is a coffee processing station located on the slopes of Mount Kenya in Embu County. The factory serves around 560 members and works alongside other factories under the Kibugu Farmers’ Cooperative Society.

The members are all smallholder farmers, most of whom cultivate some hundred coffee trees on farms ranging from 0,5 to 1 hectares.

The average farmer is approximately 40 years old, with increasing numbers of young people entering coffee farming. This is contrary to the overall trend in Kenya where the average age of coffee farmers is above 60 years and increasing.

The main coffee cultivars grown in the region are SL28 (with some SL34) , Ruiru 11, and Batian, accounting for approximately 80%, 12%, and 8% of the coffee trees, respectively.

Ngerwe Factory has both permanent staff, seasonal workers, and an agronomist employed by the cooperative.
These teams help coordinate processing activities, provide technical advice, and train farmers in good agricultural practices, including pruning, weeding, fertiliser application, mulching, and pest and disease management.

The factory also maintains a demonstration plot where farmers can learn how to improve their coffee-growing practices.

Tim’s Choice – Coffee Subscription

With this coffee subscription, every month Tim will pick out his favourite coffees from our roastery in order to make sure that you receive something new and exciting every time. Freshly roasted coffee is sent out the first Wednesday of the month to all subscribers around the world.

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