RONA - Specialty Coffees & Gourmet Products

Yemen Mocha Coffee is cultivated and processed today much as it has been for centuries. Seedlings, grown in nurseries, are transplanted to terraced farms (from 6,000 feet to 7,500 feet), which have been carved out of the steep hillsides. Lack of rain necessitates the maintenance of irrigation systems designed to provide the trees with controlled constant moisture. The relative dryness of the soil and air results in the production of a bean that is small and extremely hard. Yemen's entire tiny crop is processed by the dry method, and much of it, in fact, is permitted to dry on the tree before picking and hulling. This rather primitive method of producing coffee goes back centuries and accounts for the classic flavor which this wonderful coffee displays. It's worth noting that this coffee is grown organically. It is not something the farmers set out to do, but there is probably no more primitive coffee-growing area on earth.

Yemen Mocha is packed in special plaited straw packages known as 'mats" rather than the bags now used universally. The appearance of the bean is as unique as its packing. These small round beans are irregular in form and size with a peculiar pale green to yellow color. But despite this (or perhaps because of it), they yield one of the finest cups of coffee on earth. The Yemen Mocha has tremendous character and wonderful complexity. It can be described as winey, spicy, nutty, malty and fruity. Its uniquely acid cup makes this coffee simultaneously smooth and piquant (pleasantly pungent). It possesses heavy body, and unique flavors a characteristic usually lacking in its nearest cousins, the Ethiopians. This coffee yields one of the most superbly aromatic and uniquely-flavorful cups in the world.

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