The Story and Pour-Over Flavor Characteristics of Murundo CWS Processing Station Coffee Beans from Rwanda

Rwanda: The Land of a Thousand Hills

Rwanda has long been blessed with excellent coffee-growing conditions: high altitude, volcanic soil, abundant sunshine, and a favorable climate. Because so many coffee trees are planted on mountains between 1,700 and 2,000 meters above sea level, Rwanda is known as the "Land of a Thousand Hills." Rwandan coffee offers a world-class experience, more balanced than Kenyan coffee yet distinctive enough to compare with Central American varieties. In general it features the fresh sweetness of fruit, the delicate fragrance of flowers, and a black tea-like aftertaste. Coffee production models often vary by country, but Rwandan coffee is produced entirely by small farmers rather than large enterprises. Compared with Brazilian farms, where even small ones reach twenty hectares, Rwanda's 0.1-0.2 hectare plots are truly modest.

Murundo CWS: A Story of Serendipity

Murundo CWS is one of two washing stations owned by Teuscher Invest Ltd. The company produces, processes, and exports fully washed specialty coffee under the Kivubelt Coffee trademark. The story of how Kivubelt coffee comes to be processed at Murundo CWS is one of remarkable circumstances. In fact, the Kivubelt coffee estate consists of three locations with over 90,000 trees, located 20 kilometers from Murundo CWS.

Two years after planting, in 2014, the farm produced its first coffee harvest. However, the estate had no CWS to process the cherries. The better solution was to temporarily rent a CWS that was preparing to begin operations, and that is how Kivubelt coffee ultimately became part of Murundo's process. Because the estate's cherry volume was small relative to the facility's capacity, management decided to buy cherries from small farmers in the Mahembe area, where Murundo CWS is located, to improve efficiency.

Building Community Relationships

What was meant to be a temporary solution grew into a long-term relationship between more than 500 small farmers in Mahembe and the owners of Murundo CWS, who bought the wet mill in 2016. The quality and potential of the cherries brought to the CWS were exceptional and met one of Kivubelt Coffee's primary objectives: to deliver an outstanding cup of coffee to consumers, a truly memorable experience.

Quality Control and Processing

To keep quality consistent, Murundo CWS staff must explain to farmers and demonstrate how and when to pick ripe cherries. At the CWS, cherry selection undergoes strict quality control. After floating in water, only ruby-red mature cherries are accepted.

The cherries are then pulped and given roughly 12 hours of dry and wet fermentation. Afterwards the beans are thoroughly washed with clean spring water. The fully washed parchment beans are then slowly sun-dried and hand-sorted several times. When the beans reach 12% moisture content, they are bagged and stored in a dry, well-ventilated warehouse.

Community Engagement and Social Responsibility

Since 2014, the owners of Murundo CWS and their team have been active members of the Mahembe community. They regularly take part in community services such as Umuganda and organize capacity-building meetings with small farmers to improve coffee quality consistency.

In December 2017, Kivubelt Coffee paid an additional 5 Rwfr/kg as a bonus to every farmer who brought cherries to Murundo CWS that year.

Socially, the owners of Kivubelt Coffee and their team are deeply aware of the vulnerability of rural community life, which is why the company committed to and provided healthcare services for the whole of 2018 to the 100 most vulnerable people selected by local authorities in Mahembe.

Exceptional Coffee Production

Murundo CWS has become the place where Teuscher Invest Ltd., through Kivubelt Coffee and Mahembe's small farmers, can process and produce exceptional high-end specialty coffee for the world market.

Location and Technical Specifications

Location: S: 02°13.788'
Longitude: E: 029°16.707'
Province: Western Province
District: Nyamasheke
Sector: Mahembe
Altitude: Located at 1,708m ASL
Farm elevation range: Between 1,515m-1,900m
Soil type: Volcanic soil, deep and well-drained
Soil pH average: 3.9-4.8
Precipitation range: 1,200mm-1,600mm
Temperature: 18°C-20°C

Operations and Infrastructure

CWS Owner: TEUSCHER INVEST LTD (Kivubelt Coffee)
Status: Private Company
Established: 2008
Processing System: Washed processing
Drying Beds: 80 tables, full sun-dried, 12% moisture content, shore control
Storage: A warehouse with natural ventilation system and pallets
Road Access: Fair
Water Source: Natural mountain spring
Energy Source: Electricity
Environmental Measures: Natural trees

Roasting Recommendations

How to roast Rwandan coffee?

Because of Rwanda's high altitude, its coffee beans are dense. FrontStreet Coffee applies significant heat when roasting African specialty coffees. Hard beans like these transfer heat well, so higher drop temperatures and larger rates of temperature rise are preferable.

Rwandan coffee also has an excellent body, so you can try extending the flavor development time and the first crack period to emphasize it. Light-roasted Rwandan coffee offers pleasant acidity, but do not be afraid to build a more syrup-like body and mouthfeel.

FrontStreet Coffee recommends brewing Rwandan coffee with water at 89-91°C. With its grassy aroma and tropical character, this coffee presents fruity sweetness along with a refreshing, bright, fresh sensation. The Bourbon grown in Rwanda is acclaimed for its fruity sweetness, with a rich, full fragrance, absolutely no astringency, and a long-lasting aftertaste. It features a delicious citrus-like sweet aroma, a deep chocolate color, and notes of red apple, cherry, cinnamon, and honey, with excellent sweetness and balance and a lingering finish of cinnamon, almond, and chocolate.

About FrontStreet Coffee

FrontStreet Coffee is a roastery in Guangzhou with a small shop but a diverse range of beans, where you can find both famous and lesser-known coffees, and it also provides online store services.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Rwanda's Bourbon-based coffees share their lineage with Brazil's classic Bourbon varieties, and FrontStreet's Brazilian single origins make a good comparison. The Cerrado Red Bourbon comes from Brazil's Cerrado savanna, grown above 1,000 meters and processed as pulped natural. Medium roasted, it delivers creamy peanut, toast, caramel, and hazelnut aromas with a rounded body, low acidity, and a gentle bitterness, and it brews well as pour-over, moka pot, espresso SOE, siphon, or French press.

For a cleaner, sweeter Bourbon line, the Queen Estate Yellow Bourbon is grown in Mogiana on fertile red volcanic soil. A rare yellow mutant of Red Bourbon, it has cleaner fruit, and at medium roast it shows cane-sugar sweetness alongside fruit and chocolate notes.

To brew either one, use a KONO or V60 dripper with 15 g of coffee, a 1:15 ratio, water at 90°C, and a medium grind size set to a 75% pass-through rate on a China standard #20 sieve. Bloom with 30 g of water for 30 seconds, pour to 125 g, then finish to 225 g, for an extraction of about 2'00" in a V60 and about 2'10" in a KONO.