Q Grader Calibration Passed!

 June 14, 2022

It's nerve-wracking, no way around it, but a dozen of us coffee professionals found our way to Atlas Coffee Importers in Seattle, Washington last Friday, June 10, 2022, for an Arabica Q Grader calibration. We submitted ourselves to scrutiny by our instructor and comparison to our peers to see if we are qualified to be dubbed again as "licensed Q Graders" -- coffee tasters who can be trusted to identify defects and describe coffees using internationally accepted language and scoring. Ultimately, to be qualified to evaluate fair prices for coffee.

The good news: I passed!! But there's a lot more behind this story.

I first attempted to become a Q Grader in 2011 with Kelly Peltier-Amoroso at SCA's (former) office in Long Beach, CA. I remember it well. She was a great instructor, but as is common on "the first attempt", I failed about 5 of the required 21 sensory tests. I paid for and traveled to re-take exams and eventually successfully passed all tests in 2013. Since you have to re-calibrate every three years to stay certified, in 2022, I am on my third calibration. I failed my first attempt in October 2021, when I tried to calibrate immediately following SCA New Orleans. I needed to practice identifying "CQI defects". The only tastes that qualify as defects at CQI are phenol, ferment, mold and potato. 

After I scheduled my re-calibration for June 10, I started practicing in April. I bought 'low grade' specialty coffees and a few commercial grade coffees. I started brewing and tasting cups next to each other. At first I used sets of two and three (for ease and speed), and towards the end, I set-up sets of five to be ready for the exam. In May I started spiking a cup with my hacked "recipes" for defects. Phenol = Maxwell House Light Roast; Ferment = brine from sauerkraut, etc. Thanks to family members for helping me with "cup mixing" to create blind tests!

I got in touch with long-time coffee friend and customer, Teresa Pilarz, founder of Espresso Elevado, who kindly leant me her Le Nez du Cafe set. I practiced intensely with eight of the vials of "bad smells". 

What helped the most was advice and tips on defect "detection, identification, description" from Todd Arnette, CQI's director of education. I wrote to him after my unhappy result in October 2021, explaining what I was pretty sure had been my downfall (defect identification), and appreciated his support.

My instructors for Q training have also been supportive. Drew Billups, director of education at Atlas, was awesome. Other previous instructors include Jodi Dowell, Rob Stephenson and, as mentioned above, Kelly Peltier-Amoroso. 

Women-owned Coffee Supply Chain Continues

Feb. 19, 2018
Second year in-a-row, micro-roaster Espresso Elevado of Plymouth, Michigan offers single-origin Rwanda Ejo Heza beans, roasted to perfection! In last year's post, click here, business owner and trainer Teresa Pilarz shared roasting notes for the Ejo Heza.

This year the package sports a new label showing not only two officers of the Rwandan Ejo Heza sub-cooperative, Olive and Therese UWIMANA, but also Ruth Ann Church, the owner of the importing business, Artisan Coffee Imports.

As with other female-owned businesses, the focus at Espresso Elevado is on quality, customer service and meeting their mission "to craft and share coffee in a way that elevates the entire coffee experience.We strive to be Connected, Artistic, Unconventional, Sustainable, and Elevated." You may or may not notice the business and some of its products, like the Rwanda Ejo Heza, have a gender-balanced story to tell. In this case, it's the entire supply chain! It's just another reason, on top of many, to love your cup of coffee!

All Female Value Chain Creates Delicious Cup of "Jane"

Feb. 24, 2017

Earlier this month Espresso Elevado, a micro-roaster in Plymouth, MI, brought a new Rwanda roasted coffee to its shelves. This coffee is labeled to highlight the women's cooperative that grew the coffee -- the Ejo Heza group of the KOPAKAMA cooperative, Rutsiro district of the Western province of Rwanda. About 300 women of the 775 total members formed their "sub-cooperative" in 2011.

Women of Ejo Heza with their coffee trees - Bernice, Therese and Olive (L to R).

Upon closer inspection, this coffee goes a few steps further than "just" being sourced from female coffee producers. The coffee was imported by woman-owned Artisan Coffee Imports and roasted by woman-owned Espresso Elevado, making it a very unique "all-female-value-chain" coffee.

The coffee tastes great in the cup. With Espresso Elevado's roast, we find the flavor complex with sugar plum and pink lemonade fragrance, maple syrup, winey, plum aroma. After the break, flavor has wine and berry, vanilla, roasted almond, butter and clove with aftertaste of butterscotch and hints of orange. Great smooth body with the familiar Rwandan ‘sparkle’ of acidity.

Teresa Pilarz - Founder & Chief Caffeinator of Espresso Elevado Espresso Elevado

 Roasting notes from Teresa:  
The first time roasting any new coffee is always somewhat of a shot in the dark.  I noticed this Rwandan seemed to lose a lot of heat after first crack began.  Our goal was to maintain a gradually decreasing rate of rise and prevent any heat spikes during the latter part of the roast. In working with this bean, we’ve figured out how to keep it quite light-roasted and still reach a solid 20% roast development.  This brings out the sparkling acidity while also allowing the complex flavor profile to shine through with hints of dried fruit, exotic spice, and butterscotch sweetness

If you'd like to purchase a bag, you'll find Espresso Elevado near the "town square" of Plymouth, MI at 606 S. Main St.  Retailing at $16/12 oz. bag you can also get a fresh pour over of Rwanda Ejo Heza.

Ruth Ann Church - Founder - Importer at Artisan Coffee Imports (also Chief De-caffeinator!)

 Sourcing notes from Ruth Ann: 

• This Rwandan coffee is from Ejo Heza, a women’s cooperative that is a sub-group of the larger KOPAKAMA cooperative. Located in the Rutsiro district of western Rwanda, there is a fantastic view of Lake Kivu from the washing station.
• I was able to visit them several times while I lived in Rwanda, Nov. 2015 – Aug. 2016.
• The washing station is recognized by others and me as one of the better-managed ones. They have processes in place to ensure quality and I observed a well-managed washing station staff.
• The Ejo Heza women receive a lot of agronomist support and other training from KOPAKAMA. For example, one of the reasons I met them is because I was giving a leadership and management training to the cooperative ("Lean at Origin" training). The president and two others from Ejo Heza were invited to be in this training. In other words, there is evidence of lots of inclusion for the women of this coop.
• The women asked me to see their trees and some of the experiments they are doing with weeding and mulching to lower their costs. (See blogpost) I was very impressed. These women are running experiments with control plots on growing techniques! Their objective is to lower their costs while maintaining the high quality coffee production that earns them a higher price than low grade coffees.

What do the women do with their “bonus” from coffee? The KOPAKAMA cooperative helped them start a microcredit savings and lending group a year ago (Jan. 2016). It is well-proven in development literature that microcredit groups are effective vehicles to enable savings and small loans in low-income rural areas. See this blog post for two stories from women of the Ejo Heza group, sharing what microcredit group has helped them accomplish. 

Therese and Olive - Leaders of the Ejo Heza group of women producers.