Back for a third year, we’re excited to share with you this beautifully vibrant and sweet Kenyan coffee. Kanda comes from the estate of Amos Ndatakiura, who runs his family farm on roughly 5 acres in the Kirinyaga area of central Kenya near Mount Kenya. On this small estate also lies Amos’ home and his processing facility, where his family conducts all of the coffee milling and processing themselves.

Most Kenyan coffee comes from either cooperatives, which can contain hundreds to thousands of farmers, or from very large estates. And more often than not, these coffees will contain a blend of coffee varieties, namely SL 28, SL 34 and Ruiru 11. On the Ndatakiura farm, Amos and his family grow chiefly the SL 28 variety. It’s very rare to find a coffee from such a specific terroir that features exclusively a single variety such as Kanda.

I mention this because Kanda hits on a topic that coffee enthusiasts (myself included) find particularly appealing: drinking coffee that isolates the flavors and nuance of a very specific location, variety and moment in time. The work and energy the Ndatakiura family put into their coffee is very apparent. Kanda is super clean, with notes of fresh orange juice, cinnamon and plum and such a balanced structure. Kanda comes to us from our roasting partners at Madcap Coffee, and we expect to carry this coffee for a short time over the summer.