Kenya AA

“AA” is the grade most people reach for when they want the good Kenyan, but it has never measured taste. AA simply means the beans were retained by a 17/18 screen, roughly 7.2mm, the same sorting logic used to keep a roast batch even, not a flavor judgment: Trabocca’s own grading breakdown lists AA alongside AB, PB, C, and several lower grades defined purely by size and shape. Kenya actually runs cup quality on a separate scale entirely, a 1-10 Class rating that sits alongside the size grade, which is why a carefully processed AB lot can and regularly does outscore an average AA lot from a different mill.

What actually built Kenya’s reputation is genetics and place. SL28, selected in 1935 at Scott Agricultural Laboratories from a single drought-tolerant tree, is the variety most credited with Kenya’s blackcurrant-forward acidity at altitude, alongside its sibling SL34 and the newer, disease-resistant Ruiru 11 and Batian. Those trees grow across the central highlands ringing Mount Kenya, Nyeri, Kirinyaga, Murang’a, Kiambu, Embu, and Meru, mostly between 1,500 and 2,100 meters, then go through the “Kenyan double wash”: pulped, fermented in water for up to a day, then soaked again in clean water before drying. Almost all of it is priced and sold through the weekly Nairobi Coffee Exchange auction, the actual price-discovery mechanism for this coffee, not the size grade stamped on the bag.

The two cited Coffee Review lots both happen to be Nyeri AAs, and both score in the mid-90s: black currant, magnolia, and cocoa nib running through a syrupy, citrus-bright cup with a long, sweet finish. That is a real, sourced profile, but it is the top of what AA can be, not its average: because the grade only sorts for size, plenty of AA crosses the exchange floor every week that never gets near a Coffee Review bench at all.