Basha Bekele Kokose Dry Processed

Basha Bekele won the Ethiopian Cup of Excellence competition in 2024! This lot from his project in Kokose in Bensa, Sidama is a stunning, fruity and CLEAN dry processed coffee. The Kokose mill is well-known for its deliciously fragrant, fruity and sweet coffees.

Basha’s father—also a community man who with Basha built a church for the community at their site in Bombe—was once a manager for a co-op in Bombe that supplied coffee to the Sidama Union. Before the government made it possible for smallholders to obtain export licenses, both he and his father sold their cherry to the cooperative.

Basha now has his own export license and grows coffee (primarily 74158, known locally as “Walega”) in semi-forested plots on 12 hectares in addition to operating collection sites in Bombe, Shantawane, and Kokose—collecting cherry from producers growing coffee as high as 2,300 masl.

While cherry prices were high this year, Basha maintained a practice not seen everywhere: delivering a second payment to the 126 producers he bought cherry from once the coffee sold.

Like most smallholders around Bensa, Basha mostly produces dry processes—which includes experiments with anaerobic styles of fermentation—and practices cherry flotation before drying his coffee slowly on raised beds (with some preparations drying under shade). 

This natural processed coffee has bright notes of hibiscus, cherry, nectarines and other stone fruit, with complementary chocolatey undertones.

Location:  Kokose, Bensa, Sidama
Producer: Smallholder Farmers
Varietal:    Ethiopian Landraces Primarily Welega
Process:   Sundried Natural
Altitude:    1,900 - 2,300 m.