Cupping Always August’s Ethiopia Harmufu Coffee : Is the Hype Justified?
I recently bought beans from a specialty coffee company that’s been getting a lot of buzz lately, so I could cup them properly. I picked the beans up in person yesterday, from a cafe called Always August.
A Visit to Always August
Always August runs three locations — two in Mapo and one in Samgakji. I bought my beans from the Mangwon branch, tucked away in a residential neighbourhood.
The space was a little over 30 square meter, with a charming, wood-forward interior. The espresso machine took up about half the bar, while hand drip coffee seemed to be brewed and served from the back of the counter.
Small as it was, the shop also offered cookies and other desserts, which looked to be brought in from elsewhere rather than made on site. Three staff members were working, which felt like a generous number for the size of the place. Seating looked to be around 25 spots, and every one of them was taken.
On the walk over, most of the other cafes I passed had plenty of empty seats. It struck me that a genuinely popular cafe really is a different animal. I liked the interior, and during the time I was there, the drinks being made and sent out all looked well put together. New customers kept arriving, only to turn away when they saw there was nowhere to sit.
Choosing the Coffee
The bean selection included one seasonal blend, two standard blends, and four single origins. Since my current interest is Ethiopia washed coffee, I went looking to see whether they had one.
A coffee called Ethiopia Harmufu caught my eye. Checking the processing method, it was listed as modified washed. Reading the details, I learned it was a washed coffee with an extended fermentation stage — exactly the kind of coffee I was after, so I bought it. It came to 16,000 won per 100 grams, which isn’t cheap.
A Closer Look at the Details
A day after buying it, I went back and read the product page more carefully. The coffee is grown above 2,300 metres. That’s the kind of altitude the pricier Ethiopian green coffees arriving in Korea lately tend to come from, so the price made more sense once I saw that.
The bean size is small — small even by the standards of Ethiopian coffee generally, which is typical of coffee grown at this kind of altitude. Looking at the beans, they didn’t appear to have been hand-picked. The roast colour sits towards the darker end of the light-roast range. The ground coffee smelled excellent, both in strength and in the range of aromas present.
Cupping the Coffee
I poured hot water over the grounds and, four minutes later, broke the crust at the top of the cup with a spoon. I skimmed off the floating foam and waited until the ten-minute mark to begin cupping.
I run my cuppings in three time-based stages, starting at 10 minutes and moving in ten-minute increments. At each stage, I focus on catching the different characteristics the coffee reveals as it cools.
In the first ten minutes, the coffee is still fairly hot, and this is when I get an overall impression and check the sweetness. The 20-minute mark is the core of the cupping — this is where I assess the coffee’s central character and acidity. From 30 minutes onward, I assess the clean cup, texture, aftertaste, and overall finish, and draw my conclusions.
The Verdict
Always August’s Ethiopia Harmufu modified washed coffee turned out, in cupping, to be an excellent coffee — strong floral and jasmine character, sweet acidity, and distinctive spice notes, all working well together. The quality and flavour justified the hype.
What would I have done differently? I’d have paid closer attention to hand-picking, at both the green bean and roasted bean stage — the one finishing touch this coffee was missing. Fix that, and there’d have been nothing left to add.
