Ethiopia Sidamo

Sidamo is the origin most other Ethiopian names got carved out of, not the other way around. Yirgacheffe has traded as its own Ethiopia Commodity Exchange designation since the system’s inception because its cup was judged distinctly different, and Guji only split into its own category in 2010: before that, Guji lots exported under the broader Sidamo name. What is left under “Sidamo” today is still one of the most internally diverse origins Ethiopia ships, with both washed and natural processing well established across the region and its wide altitude band.

That diversity shows up directly in the two lots behind this entry’s cupping scores. A natural-process lot from the Charcho Washing Station (EverJoy Cafe, scored 95 by Coffee Review) reads as juicy and fruit-forward: blueberry, ripe nectarine, passion fruit, and honeysuckle over dark chocolate, with sweetly tart acidity and a syrupy mouthfeel. A washed lot (Boyds Coffee, scored 92) reads almost like a different coffee: intense floral aroma, ripe lemon and lemon zest, a lean and silky body, finishing on crisp, lemony cocoa. Both are recognizably Sidamo, but a buyer choosing on process alone will get two different cups.

Administratively, Sidamo the trade name and Sidama the place have also drifted apart. The growing area was Sidama Zone within the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples’ Region until a 2019 referendum passed with over 98% support, and Sidama became Ethiopia’s tenth regional state on 18 June 2020. Farms still sit at the same 1,550-2,200 m elevation band that has always defined the coffee, on heirloom and landrace trees that, per Trabocca’s own sourcing notes, are so mixed within a given plot that most growers cannot name the individual varieties they are picking.