Kaffe Box is a monthly coffee subscription featuring select whole bean coffees from Scandinavia’s best roasters. Each month, you receive 1-4 bags of beans from a different roaster. The beans arrived in a box stamped with the Kaffe Box logo.
Everything was neatly packed in the box under this cute coffee themed paper. I am planning on reusing it as gift wrap.
Kaffe Box offers four subscription options. The price per bag drops as you order more. The one bag (250g) subscription is $20 USD for a single origin specialty coffee. With the rest of the options you receive two different coffees with each subscription. The two bag (500g total) subscription is $17 USD (per bag), the three bag (750g) subscription is $16 USD (per bag), and the four bag (1kg) subscription drops the price to $15 USD per bag. Worldwide shipping is included in this price!!
We received the 1kg box (with two coffees in a total of four bags) for our review.
The product card told us a little about the two farmers that grew the coffee, the types of coffee that they grew and the roaster.
The roaster for this month’s box was Nord Brenneri. “We in Nord care about good and fresh ingredients in everything we do. Nord consists of a handful of coffee shops, a coffee roastery, a bakery, and a restaurant with a cocktail bar. In our coffee roastery at Tveita in Oslo, Norway we roast green coffee from some of the world’s best producer. Buying the raw coffee as direct as possible, means that the money you pay for our coffee to a greater extent goes to those who cultivate it. We find that we get the best out of the beans with light, careful roasting. With strict quality routines of cupping every batch and our pure love for coffee, we always strive to bring out the best flavors in each and every coffee we introduce.”
The back of all four bags was the same. If you look closely you can see the date, “June 23, 2016” stamped on the bottom of the white section. Thanks to Google Translate I now know that Brennedato means “Burn date” or the date that it was roasted.
The other writing is the same as the product card about the roaster, Nord Brenneri, but in Norwegian.
The bags were printed with cute stick figure drawings. I like the chicken.
The first two bags were from the grower, Edgar Nunez. The beans are a type called Tabi. Tabi is a Columbian varietal and means “good” in Guambiano (a native Colombian tribe). It was first released in 2002 and was obtained by crossing Typica, Bourbon, and Tymor Hybrid.
“Mr. Edgar Nunez is from Huila, but was born and raised in Palestine. He got his own farm, Buenos Aires, in 2010 and after a long time of testing and searching for the right variety, he has been growing Tabi since then. The farm is located between the National Park Biological Corridor and Cueva de Los Guacharos National Park. Mr. Nunez lives on the farm with his wife and 3 children. Here they also grow onions, cabbage, beans, tomatoes and corriander. He also has a small patch of cassava, banana, peach, corn, and fruits such and lemon and blackberry.”
The beans are a light roast and were processed using the ‘washed’ method. There is a slight amount of silver skin left on the beans which looks like silvery flakes when the coffee is ground.
Nord tends to a light right roast and this coffee epitomizes that tendency. The taste profile (not added flavor) is dark berries, vanilla and clementine, spicy scent of almond and aftertaste of blackberries.
I definitely agree on the aftertaste of blackberries. The coffee had a bright, clean taste that tended toward a berry flavor.
The second grower featured in this month’s subscription was Gichatahini a co-operative production from Nyeri, Central Kenya. They grow SL-28 and SL 34 beans that are processed using washing and harvested in November and December of 2015.
In the 1930s the Kenyan government hired Scott Laboratories to develop stronger, drought resistance varieties of coffee. SL-28 failed at those goals, but turned out to be a delicious fluke with the beans having an intensely citric, sweet and balanced flavor.
SL-34 was also developed by Scott Laboratories, grows best at medium to high altitudes and also tends towards a citric flavor with a sweet finish.
The product information card elaborates on this coffee producer, Gichatahini, for us. “In line with sustainable and responsible farming principles the factory has adopted certification and advocates for good agricultural practices among its farmers. The factory is fair trade certified and is currently pursuing Utz Kapeh certification. In order to conserve electricity, clean water for pulping is sourced from River Ragati using channels. Additionally, coffee is sun dried on the numerous drying tables available. For conservation water is re-circulated during processing and disposed responsibly in numerous soak pits away from water sources. Pulp from the factory is collected by farmers for use as mulch on their farms to improve the soil structure and organic matter content.”
See the silvery flecks from the the silver skin that remained on the bean after processing? And don’t worry, they don’t damage the flavor of the coffee.
This coffees flavor profile is “aroma of rosehip and blackberries, flavors of red currants and jasmine, lingering, floral aftertaste.”
How’s that for a reflection? This coffee was citrusy and sweet with a slight melon flavor.
This is a high quality coffee subscription box. The cost is a little higher than what you might pay for most grocery store retail coffees, but a Mercedes cost more than a Ford for a reason. The Kaffe subscription offers the chance to try the very best coffee beans, grown by superb growers, picked at the optimal time, processed with attention to detail and roasted by small Scandinavian roasters with an eye on perfection. Rarely can you know who and how your coffee was processed in such detail. So, try it and let me know if you can taste the difference?
What do you think of KaffeBox?
Visit KaffeBox to subscribe or find out more!
The Subscription: KaffeBox
The Description: KaffeBox is a monthly coffee subscription featuring the best specialty coffee from Scandinavia’s top roasters. Every month throughout the year we feature new coffee and roaster. The coffee roasters themselves select which coffees to send out – ensuring you only receive coffee the roasters themselves are truly proud of.
The Price: $17.00 per month
See KaffeBox in the Hello Subscription Box Directory!
The Categories: Coffee Subscription Boxes. Coffee Sampling Subscriptions,Whole Bean Coffee Subscriptions.
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