Filter coffee blooming in a paper cone as water is poured

Roasted beans tipped from a brass scoop onto the scale

Roasted beans scattered across the steel cooling tray

Kirinyaga, Kenya

Karimikui

4.9 · 1,284 reviews

Blackcurrant
Grapefruit
Cane sugar

The loudest coffee on the shelf. A washed Kenyan with blackcurrant up front and a clean, juicy finish — our pick for pour-over.

250 g bag

£14.50

£12.33 on subscription

1 kg bag

£49.00

£41.65 on subscription

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Roasted Tuesday and Thursday · posted the same afternoon

How we brew it

Pour-over: 15 g coffee to 250 g water at 94 °C, medium-coarse, 2:45 total
Espresso: 18 g in, 44 g out in 28 seconds

Where it comes from

Origin: Kirinyaga, Kenya
Producer: Karimikui washing station — 1,340 smallholder members
Altitude: 1,750–1,860 m
Variety: SL28, SL34, Ruiru 11
Process: Washed
Roast: Light
Harvest: Picked November to January, landed in March

Delivery and freshness

Roasted to order and posted by Royal Mail Tracked 48 on the day it leaves the drum. Free on subscriptions and orders over £30, otherwise £3.95. Best from five days to six weeks after the roast date on the bag.

Why we buy Karimikui

Kenyan washed coffees carry enough acidity to survive a light roast without tasting green, so we take Karimikui to 203 °C and stop — a minute and forty-five seconds past first crack, no more. Any longer and the blackcurrant flattens into plum, which is pleasant and not what we paid for.

It comes from the Karimikui washing station on the slopes of Mount Kenya, where more than a thousand smallholders deliver cherry on the same day it is picked. The station ferments and washes each day’s delivery separately, and this lot is three of the best days of the season blended together.

Brew it as filter first. On an espresso machine it makes a bright, sweet shot that works best without milk.