Roast Level: Medium
Process: Fully washed 
Varietal: 100% Red Bourbon
Roaster's Notes: Roasted specifically for espresso, this bright, bold coffee comes from a favourite producer of ours, Buf Cafe. This coffee cuts beautifully through milk with rich raspberry, cranberry tones and a caramel finish.

Farm Info

Producer: Buf Cafe
Region: Kamegeri Sector
Altitude: 1,700 - 1,900 metres

Background Information

This 100% red bourbon coffee was processed at Buf Café’s Nyarusiza washing station, at 1,743 metres above sea level in the south of Rwanda.

Buf Café was founded in 2003 by Epiphanie Mukashyaka, a dynamic businesswoman and a source of inspiration to countless other female entrepreneurs in Rwanda’s coffee sector and beyond. Buf is now managed by Epiphanie and her son, Samuel Muhirwa, who is taking an increasingly active role in running and expanding the business. The title ‘Buf’ derives from ‘Bufundu’, the former name of the region in which its washing stations are located.

Epiphanie, who was born in 1959, was widowed during the 1994 genocide - which claimed over 800,000 lives in just 3 months - but chose not to leave her family’s small coffee farm. Instead she set about rebuilding and developing her business and with it the local community. She started Buf Café in 2003, when she established Remera washing station with a loan from the Rwandan Development Bank and the assistance of the USAID-financed PEARL project.

This transformational programme was aimed at switching the focus in the Rwandan coffee sector from an historic emphasis on quantity to one of quality - and so opening up Rwanda to the far higher-earning specialty coffee market. The programme and its successor, SPREAD, have been invaluable in helping Rwanda’s small-scale coffee farmers to rebuild their production in the wake of the devastating 1994 genocide and the 1990s world coffee crash.

Buf Café now owns three coffee washing stations - Remera, Umurage and Nyarusiza - as well as its own coffee trees, and buys coffee cherries from as many as 264 surrounding smallholder farmers, as well as three different local cooperatives! At Buf’s Nyarusiza washing station in 2014 there was a total of 798,685kg of cherry delivered throughout the season, approximately 5% of which was delivered by trees owned by Epiphane and her family. The remaining quantity of delivered cherry comes from farmers within the community surrounding the washing station.

Buf has very strong links with the local communities that supply it, providing jobs for 116 at Nyarusiza during peak harvest (May - June/July) and 9 permanent positions. A further 127 people are employed at Remera during harvest, with 10 permanent positions. (2014 figures) At the end of each season Buf will share any surplus profits with both the cooperatives that it works with and its washing station managers.

The majority of the small farmers in the area have an average of only 300 coffee trees (less than a quarter of a hectare) and use some of their land to cultivate other crops such as maize and beans to feed themselves and their families. Most of their income from the sale of coffee is used to take their children to school, pay for medical care and for investment in livestock such as a cow for milk, both for use in the home and for sale locally.

The level of care that all Buf washing stations take over their processing is impressive. Cherries are hand-picked only when fully ripe and then pulped that same evening using a mechanical pulper that divides the beans into three grades by weight.

After pulping, the coffee is fermented overnight (for around 12-18 hours) and then graded again using flotation channels that sort the coffee by weight (the heaviest – or A1 – usually being the best). The wet parchment is then soaked in water for around 24 hours to stabilise moisture content.

As at most washing stations in Rwanda, women do the majority of the hand sorting. This takes place in two stages - on the covered pre-drying tables and on the drying tables. Washed beans are moved from the wet fermentation tanks onto the pre-drying tables, where they are intensively sorted under shade for around six hours. The idea is that greens (unripes) are still visible when the beans are damp, while the roofs over the tables protect the beans from the direct sunlight. Next, the beans are moved onto the washing station’s extensive drying tables for around 14 days (depending on the weather), where they are sorted again for defects, turned regularly and protected from rain and the midday sun by covers, ensuring both even drying and the removal of any damaged or ‘funny looking’ beans. After reaching 11% humidity, the coffee is then stored in parchment in Sovu’s purpose-built warehouse prior to final dry-milling and hand-sorting at the Cooperative’s brand new dry mill in Kigali. Each coffee that arrives is also cupped by the Q-graders of Maraba’s exporting partner, Rwashocco.

Lots are first separated by collection point (farmers usually hail from around 3 km distance from each collection point) and are also separated out by days. Upon delivery as cherry, the coffee receives a paper ‘ticket’ that follows the lot through all its processing. This ticket bears the date of harvest, the collection point name, and the grade (A1, A2 etc) of the coffee – for instance, if a coffee lot is called ‘Lot 1- 06/04 - A1’, this means it was the first lot processed on April 4 and the grade is A1. This simple but effective practice is a crucial tool in controlling quality and ensuring the traceability of lots.

Nyarusiza Espresso, Rwanda

Founded in 2015 by Luke Underdown (pictured centre), Garage Coffee is a speciality coffee roasters based in the beautiful village of Hoath, just outside of Canterbury, Kent. Owner & Founder Luke identified a gap in the market to bring great coffee to the people of Kent, and started of trading at local markets and events to build the Garage brand. By 2016, Garage Coffee had gained a significant following and started to supply some wonderful hospitality businesses across the county.

In 2017, Garage Coffee opened it's flagship shop and training room in the heart of Canterbury, just off the high street and now has a small team making great coffee and sharing the same vision!

We roast in small 3kg batches for optimum quality, and only roast speciality grade coffees which are always fully traceable and fairly traded. Since launching, we have been building relationships with farmers, and sourcing coffee from the same farms season after season, with plans to make trips to these farmers in the near future!

And finally, why Garage Coffee?  Well, we are not actually based in a garage. But that's where it all started! Our roastery is situated on a campsite in Hoath and Luke had plans to convert a garage on site into a wonderful roasting labrynth - however it was just a little too close to the campers! So, he decided to source a shipping container and convert into a roastery! As 'Shipping Container Coffee' didn't quite have the same ring - he decided to stick with 'Garage Coffee', and 

Nyarusiza Espresso, Rwanda

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Nyarusiza Espresso, Rwanda