What are "Washed" Coffees?

[Billy Kangas]

After a coffee is harvested it has to be processed so it can be shipped out and used. There are three major ways this is done

1. washed or water processed
2. dry or natural processed
3. honey, pulped natural, or semi-washed processed

Reccently I wrote an article for Coffee Ambassadors talking about the process a coffee goes through when it is "washed". I thought I would share some of what I wrote with you:

1. First the coffee is picked off the tree. The fruit you see is ripe. The fruit of an unripe cherry will be green, not red. How this is done is a story for another day.
2. The main difference between wet and dry processed coffee is how the fruit is removed from the coffee bean, which is the seed inside the fruit. A washed coffee will have had it's fruit removed either by a ferment and wash method or by a machine assisted method.
   
   -Ferment and Wash removes the fruit by first immersing the cherries in water. This causes the good coffee to sink, while the bad coffee floats. The good coffee is then pushed through a screen which removes a good portion of the outer fruit. The coffee then either sits in water or it's own juices causing the remaining fruit to loosen up over the next 12 to 60 hrs. This fruit is then washed off by putting the coffee in water tanks.
   
   -Machine Assisted is similar to Ferment and Wash but instead of letting the coffee sit for two or three days while the fruit loosens up. Instead the coffee is placed in a mechanical scrubber which scrubs off the remaining fruit. This process is more reliable then Ferment and Wash, however the fermentation process adds flavors to the coffee that many roasters would like to keep intact.
   
3. After the fruit is removed the coffee needs to be dried. It is dried by using a machine, or by spreading the coffee out on large patios to dry in the sun (if it is placed on patios the drying is often finished by machine). This brings the coffee down to a moisture content of 10% which makes the bean stable.
4. The drying process not only makes the bean stable it also drys up a coating on the outside of the bean called parchment. This makes it easy to remove this outer layer. The parchment is generally removed by a machine, this process is called hulling. After the hulling is complete some folks have an additional step called polishing where the bean is rubbed to improve the way the bean looks and to decrease the about of chaff that comes off in the roasting process. However polishing is looked down on by many people since the process heats up the bean which can be detrimental to the overall flavor of the coffee. 

Now the coffee has been processed! It now just needs to be cleaned, sorted and go through grading.

 

 

[Billy Kangas]

I'd love to hear what roasters, Baristas, and growers view as the relative advantages and disadvantages are to this method in their own experiance....

[Josue Morales]

Advantages dependo on the type of coffee you are going to wash, and the type of soil. I can talk from my experience that Guatemalan Coffees, for example, are better off washed than dried. The reason for this is because you have a coffee that is growing at a higher altitude, hence the beans harvested will have a much greater density and a more intense flavor in itself just because of growing and climate conditions. Having a dry processed coffee that has so much detail and quality to start with, is very unnecessary. On the contrary, coffees at lower altitudes and different plant varietals are boosted with flavor when left to dry. Even when I say this it does not imply we shouldn't experiment, I've had great results over the years when using naturals from higher elevations, but one must be very perceptive on the process and have very good ideas on how to experiment. It is very easy to ruin coffee, but if you manage to innovate and do something different in a perfect way, it does make a big difference.

[Billy Kangas]

have you found washed to be more consistant as many argue?

Josue Morales said:

Advantages dependo on the type of coffee you are going to wash, and the type of soil. I can talk from my experience .

[Josue Morales]

Absolutely. Washed coffees tend to remain consistent year after year. Dried coffee on the other hand depends on more variables that can't be controlled with accuracy (at least not with the same accuracy).

[Joona Suominen]

OIOIOI what a nice thread.

In my opinion both the dry and the washed (and the pulped natural versions in between) have their own places.

It is true that washing is more consistent process. The defected beans can be sorted at the washing and getting rid of the flesh surrounding the bean greatly reduces the risk of fermenting the bean inside. Washed coffee doesn't place that much requirements on the processing environment when compared to dry processed coffees. On the other hand setting up a wash station is an expensive investment especially for small farmers and they require a lot of water which is not easily available on some of the producing areas.

Dry processing is extremely vulnerable. A small rain or some stinky surprise can ruin the whole lot. Even if there's no everyday disasters, the beans can still start fermenting. It's also a lot harder to sort out the defected beans when the skin is still on them.

I'm absolutely stoked that we are currently stocking both a natural and a dry processed ethiopian sidamo. They both taste amazing but very different. The washed has a lemon/buttery/bright feel where as the dry version is more sweeter and has blueberrylike tones.