Guji

For decades Guji coffee was sold as Sidamo, its identity folded into a larger regional name. That changed recently, and the region has spent the years since proving it deserved its own line on the label.

The Guji highlands sit slightly higher and drier than their neighbours, and the coffee shows it — heavier bodied, sweeter, with stone fruit where Yirgacheffe gives flowers. Naturals from here can be startling.

This is also where some of the most ambitious processing in Ethiopia is happening. Extended fermentations, careful raised-bed drying, anaerobic experiments run by station managers who cup their own work daily.