ON GRADE ZERO

April 14, 2023

Every so often, coffees come into our world at Summit that cause us pause, that just hit different. For a coffee team that tastes hundreds of cups weekly, thousands each month, it takes something special to stand out and become a point of conversation long after we've moved on. Essentially, coffees so remarkable that we have to keep talking about them.

In years past, we've shared some of these coffees with y'all -- Variety Unknown in 2018, Finca Las Marias in 2019 -- but more often than not, we find ourselves unsure how to fit these into our lineup of everyday remarkable coffees. Y'all love Basecamp so much (and so do we, tbh), and our relationship coffees like Rutas del Inca, Koke, Jairo Quiñones seem to resonate with our more adventurous drinkers.

Our first core value at Summit, however, is to stay curious. So in recent months as we've come across a few more WOAH coffees, our conversations about sharing them with our customers have gained more traction in the office. How might we share these moments with more people? Do our customers want to go on this adventure with us? Is it worth the time and energy to figure this out? We decided, ultimately, that yes it very much is.

Introducing The Summit Series, an occasional and very thoughtful collection of coffees.

I'm a huge fan of audacity, of taking chances and exploring what are new or better ways of doing what we already do so well. This series is just that, a bridge to connect some of the moments we have behind closed doors at our roastery with the coffee moments you have in your kitchens all around the U.S. More often than not, these coffees are limited in a way that won't allow us to feature them in our cafés -- the harvest is too small, the price is too expensive, the taste is too funky (in a good way). So, sometimes The Summit Series will only be available online, or only for a few weeks.

Or, in the case of our first Summit Series No. 01, only available for three days.

We're kicking things off with Grade Zero, Summit's take on a partnership between Royal Coffee (our California-based importer) and the Adame Washing Station in Ethiopia. Coffees from Ethiopia are sorted by their quality, from Grade 1 (what Summit typically sources, the highest that's sold globally) to Grade 4 (not as good). Royal Coffee, however, decided to shakeup the coffee industry by asking: how can design a near-perfect rendition of top microlots from southern Ethiopia, presenting a better-than-Grade-1 result?

Former Summit barista (and Day 1 manager of our Outpost café circa 2013) Spencer Ford offered us samples of these Grade Zero Ethiopians earlier this year, and we jumped at the opportunity knowing very well we wouldn't actually buy them. As I like to ask around the roastery, "who is going to buy this coffee?" At first examination, it was evident that these coffees were meticulous -- uniform bean size, clean and processed beautifully. When we sample roasted and cupped (fancy word for tasted) these Grade Zeros, it gave us pause. I think I, in fact, even audibly exclaimed, "Woah." I've probably tried 300-400 different Ethiopian coffees in the past decade, so a cup that makes me want to jump up and down and reminds me how fun it is to drink coffee, now that's worth sharing.

So here's the deal: we sourced two Grade Zero Ethiopian coffees, from Adame Kebele and Aricha Kebele, and are selling them as part of a packaged deal. We intend to roast these two washed process coffees a little bit differently, to give y'all a different drinking experience. But we only have about 70 pounds of each, and after we use some to profile and maybe just a little bit to enjoy ourselves (coffee is fun!), we're only selling 60 packages, roasted one day only.

How did Royal and Adame create grade zero? As they explain: "Once dried and rested, the parchment coffee is treated to extra sorting steps at the dry mill, including additional passes through the optical sorting machine and slower, more meticulous hand-sorting by the mill’s highly skilled team. These extra steps produce an exceptionally clean coffee."

If you like Ethiopian coffee, then this is a must-try. Trust us -- we wouldn't put the time and energy into this launch unless we were super confident these coffees are gonna knock the socks right off your feet. Pre-order starts April 16, Parker will roast these coffees on April 20, then we'll immediately bag and package them to head on their way to your kitchen. Once we've sold all 60 packages, they're gone for good. Save the date, y'all, and enjoy some woah coffee.