Our processing Methods

At Dimtu, we prioritize harvesting only the ripest cherries, meticulously picked by hand. Our skilled pickers rotate among the trees every eight to ten days, ensuring they select cherries at their peak ripeness. It generally takes two to four years after planting for coffee plants at Dimtu to yield beans ready for harvest.

After collecting the coffee beans from farmers, we meticulously record the weight of each harvest in the farmer's logbook, serving as a receipt for their daily delivery. Subsequently, the cherries are spread out on a mesh table where our team meticulously sorts out any under-ripe or overripe cherries. Following the triage process, the selected coffee cherries are carefully placed in a large bucket and then hoisted onto a hook connected to a scale, ensuring precise and accurate measurement.

After harvesting, the cherries undergo meticulous sorting and cleaning to separate the unripe, overripe, and damaged cherries, as well as to remove dirt, soil, twigs, and leaves. This process often involves winnowing, where a large sieve is used by hand to achieve this separation. Any unwanted cherries and materials are carefully picked out from the top of the sieve. Ripe cherries can also be separated using flotation in washing channels located near the drying areas. Once sorted, the coffee cherries are spread out to dry in the sun, either on brick patios or on mats raised to waist height on trestles. Throughout the drying process, the cherries are regularly raked or turned by hand to ensure uniform drying and prevent mildew. Depending on weather conditions, this drying process can take up to four weeks to achieve the optimal moisture content.

Once the cherries are fully dried, they are stored in bulk in special silos until they are ready to be sent to the mill. At the mill, the cherries undergo hulling, sorting, grading, and bagging. The hulling machine efficiently removes all the outer layers of the dried cherries in a single step.

Once the coffee arrives at our station, we first separate it by hill and then depulp the lot. The depulper, a machine that removes the coffee cherry from the coffee bean, is the only machine used at our washing station. Every other step is done by hand or with rubber tools. After depulping and quality separation, we ferment the coffee for 9 to 12 hours overnight. This fermentation process loosens the mucilage around the coffee seeds. Once the fermentation time is up, we agitate the coffee while workers sing their traditional stomping song, ensuring a thorough and uniform process.

After the sing-and-stomp process, the fermentation is halted by pushing the coffee into channels flooded with fresh water. In these channels, our workers use rustic wooden paddles to thoroughly clean the parchment, ensuring the highest quality in the final product.

After the coffee finishes its final bath, we transfer it to pre-drying tables located under shade. This controlled environment ensures the coffee does not dry too quickly and crack. While the coffee is drying, workers meticulously pick through it by hand to remove any defects. Next, we move the beans to drying tables, where they dry in the sun for eight days to three weeks. During this time, we frequently turn the coffee to ensure even drying and to prevent mold growth.

Most fine coffee goes through an extensive sorting process using a series of machines that classify the beans by density and size while removing debris such as sticks, rocks, nails, and other miscellaneous items that may have mixed with the coffee during drying. Initially, machines blow the beans into the air. The heaviest and largest beans fall into bins closest to the air source, while the lightest and potentially defective beans, along with chaff, are blown into the farthest bin. Additional machines then shake the beans through a series of sieves, sorting them by size. Finally, a gravity separator machine shakes the sorted beans on a tilted table, causing the heaviest, densest, and best beans to vibrate to one side of the table, while the lightest beans move to the other side. This meticulous process ensures that only the highest quality beans are selected.