Ethiopia Sidamo Bansha ELTO AtoCoffee Bean Intro:

Ethiopia · Sidamo · ELTO Mofa

Region: Ethiopia Sidamo

Processing Farm: Mofa

Altitude: 2360~2400 meters

Variety: 74158

Process: Anaerobic Washed

Flavor: Citrus, Lemon, Nectarine, Green Grape

Ethiopia ·Sidamo ·ELTO Mofa

Region: Ethiopia Sidamo

Processing Farm: Mofa

Altitude: 2360～2400meters

Variety: 74158

Process: Anaerobic Honey

Flavor: Sweet Orange, Strawberry, Cream, Oolong Tea

Ethiopia ·Sidamo ·ELTO Bare

Region: Ethiopia  Sidamo

Processing Farm: Bare

Altitude: 1920～2300meters

Variety: 74112、74110

Process: Anaerobic 72Hour Sun-dried

Flavor: Rose, Blueberry, Cantaloupe, Passionfruit, Fermented Aroma

In recent years, there’s been a saying in the coffee community: Ethiopia has two hottest figures, one is the founder of Alo Coffee(Allo Coffee), Tamiru and the other is Elto Coffeefrom Eliyas Dukamo(Ato Coffee). Whenever people talk about high-quality Ethiopian coffee, these two brand representatives are inevitably mentioned.

As for Alo, last year, Pioneer Coffee purchased a sun-dried batch and shared the story behind its founding. The wonderful floral and fruity acidity of the coffee also won the hearts of many. With the arrival of the new season, demand for Eltohas grown, so this time Pioneer Coffee bought three different batches to take you behind the story of this brand.

Brand Story

EltoThe full name of “Elto Coffee Export PLC”(Ato) is ·, a green bean trading brand founded in Eliyas Dukamoby husband and wife Elias ·Dukamo ( Atiklit Dejene) and Atiklit 2022Degenie ( 5). It is therefore a very young coffee enterprise.

According to Pioneer Coffee, the husband Eliyascomes from the long-established Bensafamily in Bansha town ( Dukamo) and is a true second-generation coffee farmer. He once served as the operations manager at Daye Bensa Coffee, a well-known local coffee industry leader, so he is particularly familiar with international green bean trading practices.

His wife Atiklit Dejenenot only holds a bachelor’s degree in agriculture but also served as the head of green bean processing at the famous Gesha Village Estate. She later joined Daye Bensato manage experimental micro-lot processing, giving her extensive experience in post-harvest processing and management.

The couple met at Daye Bensaand, driven by their shared vision for innovation in specialty coffee, co-founded ELTO COFFEE. The brand’s rapid recognition in the coffee world shortly after its founding is undoubtedly due to the couple’s deep expertise in coffee.

Regarding the brand name, the word “Elto”comes from the ancient Sidama language widely used locally. It has two meanings: first, Cushitic“beyond passion” “, and second, ”“abundance” “. The brand chose this name to symbolize its core mission of ” and Eliyas’s desire to convey the terroir genetics of coffee, along with their pursuit of the highest quality coffee. AtiklitGeographical Location “Like ”introduced by Pioneer Coffee last year,

’s headquarters is also located in the high-altitude area of the Sidamo region, situated in the central part of Bansha town, with core planting bases mainly near

and Alovillages. EltoVillage has approximately Kokosesmallholder coffee farmers who cultivate on Gangohectares of land, often intercropping coffee with banana trees. Gango Currently, 600operates four processing farms. The first is the Sangae Processing Station ( 1～2) in Hamaseu (

), which sits at the highest altitude and is managed by the brother-in-law of Elto. The ultra-high altitude of nearly Hamashometers creates significant diurnal temperature variations and a unique microclimate, along with fertile volcanic ash soil, forming a rare coffee-growing ecosystem. It also attracts cooperation from many smallholders in the surrounding two villages. Songo StationThe second is the Airora Processing Farm ( Eliyas), named after the eldest daughter of 2350and

, located in Abegna village ( Eliyas). Its altitude is slightly lower than Sangae Processing Station but still reaches Atiklitmeters. When viewed from above, the distinctive feature of this area is its pinkish-purple rooftops. Elora StationAdditionally, there are the ArbegonaProcessing Station ( 2250) and the Bole Processing Station (

) located in the Magic Forest ( Mofa mountain) area, where fresh coffee cherries are primarily sourced from nearby native highlands. The three batches purchased by Pioneer Coffee this time come from these two green bean processing farms. MofaGreen Bean Processing Methods MOFA StationTo ensure green bean quality, Bare Stationrequires all workers to hand-pick only uniformly red coffee cherries, and each batch undergoes a different post-processing method to fully showcase the coffee’s flavor. The batches purchased by Pioneer Coffee this time were slightly adjusted from traditional processing methods, using  

hour anaerobic natural, anaerobic washed, and anaerobic honey processes respectively.

Take the Eltohour anaerobic natural process as an example—it adds an anaerobic fermentation step to traditional sun-drying, allowing the fruit to develop richer tropical fruit notes and fermented aromas before drying. 72For this process, workers first place the sorted fresh cherries into clean blue plastic buckets for anaerobic fermentation for

hours. After fermentation, they are spread on African beds to dry, with a layer thickness controlled at 72to ensure proper airflow. To achieve even drying, farmers manually turn the cherries every

minutes, and after about 72days, they begin checking the moisture content. 3-5cmCoffee Varieties 20-30Frequent drinkers of Ethiopian coffee may have noticed that coffees from this origin were often labeled as 10-14“heirloom varieties”

in the past. Nowadays, however, we often see a string of numbers under the variety column, affectionately referred to by baristas as the

“74” family. “Although the 74 series varieties frequently rank in green bean competitions and are loved for their wonderful aromas, their development is more focused on improving disease resistance than cup flavor. ”In 74xxx, a widespread outbreak of coffee berry disease ( “74) destroyed nearly ”。

tons of coffee beans. As a result, between 74 and

1971, agricultural research institutions began experimenting with breeding disease-resistant coffee seedlings. They collected samples from Coffee Berry Diseasecoffee trees and eventually developed 200varieties effective against coffee berry disease, as well as being drought-tolerant and high-yielding. Thus, the “74” represents the year 1974, when the variety was cataloged, and the last three digits are the experimental sample numbers. For example, 74158 refers to the sample variety numbered -1975released in 639. 13On Pioneer Coffee’s menu, in addition to previously offered 74and Santa Vittoria, which let us taste the 1974, the newly acquired 74110also includes two numbered varieties: 1974and 110. Observing the green beans, Pioneer Coffee found that these batches are mostly small in size, round and compact, with screen sizes around

. Alo HatessaTo highlight the elegant floral and fruity aromas of Bansha coffee while emphasizing its caramelized sweetness, Pioneer Coffee uses a medium-light roast and adjusts slightly based on the flavor profiles brought by different processing methods. After roasting, Pioneer Coffee still follows its usual practice of cupping the three beans. 74158elto-anaerobic-washed-cf20.jpg Eltoelto-anaerobic-honey-2d8a.jpg 74112elto-sun-dried-395.jpg 74110elto-washed-3619.jpg 10～12elto-processing-station-27.jpg

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