Ah, there is just too much to say here even though this is a tiny producer of coffee when compared to the rest of the world. Please see our origins section to get some more general information on Yemenis coffees.
It is very likely that Yemen is the first place where coffee was intentionally cultivated as a crop. The current mythology says that coffee started in Ethiopia and then was taken to Yemen by traveling Sufi pilgrims. In spite of this heritage, coffee production in Yemen is falling and might soon no longer exist.
Several factors are at play here, including old stock, old varietals, and the usual suspects in decreasing coffee yields that often make a very nice cup, but make it economically unsustainable to produce at the current market levels. Yemen has the additional issue of Qat production, a leaf that is often stated to be a mild stimulate, but from some of the scenes that I've seen in Harrar and eastern Ethiopia of men laying in the street in a stupor chewing leaves, seems to have all the characteristics of a stronger drug. Qat demand also saps this country of its very little agricultural land and some say is sucking the water out of the ground destroying the aquifers.
Of all our Yemeni coffeesthis year, this is the most generic. Wow, that's not a great selling point, but it is the truth. It is not traceable to a specific region, as are our other Yemeni coffeesare, but it is still a stellar cup, and it is still milled to a much higher standard and produces a clean cup that still has the terroir of Yemen. Please compare this Yemen in the cup to any other Yemen out there to make your decision based on cup, and if you are intersted in more specific Yemeni coffees, please look at the other coffees on our offer sheet. - Jason
