White Camel Ismaili, Yemen

In the 1300’s Yemen was the first country in the world to grow coffee commercially. Today, most of the coffee grown in Yemen consists of ancient heirloom varietals of Arabica coffee that originally came from Ethiopia and which is not grown anywhere else in the world, creating coffees that are unique in taste profile to Yemen. Due to the lack of rain in this region the coffee plantations need to be irrigated but the dry air does have the benefit of creating a very small and extremely hard coffee bean. Sea Island has carefully sourced the very best Yemeni coffees produced under the famous White Camel brand by Ahmed Alhamdani. Ismaili produces tiny, rounded beans which resemble split peas. The cup profile although outstanding, is a softer, gentler and less powerful than Mattari.