Located on the slopes of Huye Mountain in the Huye District in Southern Rwanda, this private washing station is owned by David Rubanzangabo. David is something of a philanthropist, and cares deeply about the smallholder farmers who deliver their coffee to his station. Huye receives cherry deliveries from around 1,330 producers during harvest season. Typically, a small holding in the district is just a quarter of a hectare in size, with around 200 trees. The yield is about 4kg of cherry per tree, so each farm only produces roughly 2 bags of coffee.

To encourage consistency of quality, David awards members whose coffees carry the highest cupping scores with the prize of a cow or a goat. A cow makes a huge difference to the lives of a family since it will provide milk for around 6 years and a constant supply of organic fertilizer for the coffee trees.

Espresso recipe

Coffees from Rwanda are one of our favourites and they make wonderful espressos and truly delicious flat whites.

We recommend using a 19g dose with a classic 2:1 recipe to produce a 38g gram shot. Running at 9 bar, we find that a shot time of around 28 seconds will give a very balanced espresso with good sweetness. If you plan to drink with milk, aim for a slightly longer shot time of around 34 seconds to dull the acidity slightly. Extractions levels will be around 20%