Ethiopia has a wide variety of Arabica coffee beans. Limmu is not the most known but instead produces excellent coffee. Limmu coffee originates from the southwestern parts of Ethiopia, in the Oromia Region. Such coffees are grown at altitudes of up to 2000 meters above sea level. They show a cup profile with a medium body and flavor notes of wine and fruit with sharp, citric-like acidity and a clean finish.
Acidity: Low but sharp.
Body: Well balanced.
Bean color: greenish color
Aroma: Mixed berries, spice, cocoa.
Flavor: Chocolate, spicey, pleasantly sweet with floral overtones.
Bean: medium in size and has a distinctive rounded shape.
Washed Limmu coffee are a moderately recent phenomenon in the Ethiopian coffee market. Down the generations, coffees in these areas were produced as sun-dried coffees. To protect the final quality and consistency, washing these coffees was popularized relatively recently and successfully.
Before the large-scale beginning of cooperatively owned washing stations, farmers would dry their coffees on the ground and store the coffee in their houses till they needed some money. At that moment, the producer would bring the dried cherry to a buying station and get the little money they needed. The issue was that these coffees earned the farmer lower prices due to the lower quality of what was known as Jimma coffees.
As cooperatives opened washing stations, the coffees started earning a higher income for farmers right away. As a result, quality improved, and better prices for the farmers followed. The rise of Washed Limmu coffees presented a new region of premium coffees for the specialty roaster to explore and share with their customers. Still, it also introduced a newly afforded livelihood for the producers in Western Ethiopia.