Ethiopia’s premier coffee-growing regions hold a prestige akin to France’s most renowned wine origins. In regions like Sidama, indigenous heirloom varieties flourish across high-altitude microclimates and deliver distinctive flavour profiles. This lightly roasted, anaerobic natural coffee from Rosetta Roastery originates from the lush hills of Bensa, where local smallholder heritage meets modern post-harvest processing.

The Bombe washing station serves roughly 750 smallholder farmer members throughout the Bensa region, working in close partnership with Testi Specialty Coffee and acclaimed producer Faysel Abdosh. Most of these farming families cultivate regional heirloom varieties on small plots averaging 2.5 hectares alongside staple food crops. Read on to explore Rosetta’s detailed insights into the anaerobic fermentation process and its precise roasting approach.

Rosetta’s notes

Style: Progressive
Flavour profile: Floral & layered, raspberry, baked peaches

“Anaerobic processing can produce a concentrated, expressive aromatic profile that can be affected by excessive roast development. With coffees like this, the challenge is less about simply driving heat into the bean and more about controlling how quickly that energy is converted into development.

“For Bombe, we favour a roast that builds momentum early, followed by progressively more restrained heat application towards first crack. Keeping the development phase relatively short helps retain the volatile fruit and floral aromatics, while allowing enough caramelisation to bring sweetness and structure into balance. The intention is to let the origin character remain part of the coffee’s identity rather than allowing roast character to dominate, preserving its vivid fruit expression, aromatic complexity and clean finish.”

Coffee details

“Bombe is a high-altitude coffee-growing area in the Bensa district of Ethiopia’s Sidamo Zone, where coffee is cultivated by smallholder farmers at elevations reaching up to 2,400m ASL.

“This lot brings together coffee from multiple smallholder producers and is processed at Bombe Washing Station, where carefully selected ripe cherries undergo controlled anaerobic fermentation before being slowly dried on raised African drying beds. The combination of high-elevation cultivation, diverse heirloom genetics and a more experimental approach to post-harvest processing creates an expressive interpretation of Bombe’s coffee.

“The result showcases the intersection of place and process, retaining the vibrant character associated with high-grown Sidamo coffees while allowing the anaerobic natural process to add another layer of aromatic complexity.”

• Altitude: 1,900–2,400 m ASL
• Processing: Anaerobic Natural
• Variety: Heirloom varieties
• Harvest: 2026
• Country: Ethiopia
• Region: Bensa, Sidamo Zone
• Washing station: Bombe
• Producers: Approximately 750 smallholder farmers