Start the year with delicious coffee from our January 2025 edition

January 1, 2025

Start the year with delicious coffee from our January 2025 edition

January 1, 2025

Jam-packed with exquisite coffees from talented roasters, this edition will help you get January off to a flying start.

Greetings and happy new year!

I hope you are as excited about the year 2025 as I am. I feel like this will be a good one. So many great things in the pipeline. So many ideas waiting to be turned into reality. And what better way to kick off the new year than with an expertly selected batch of super yummy coffee from six brilliant roasters? Exactly. The January 2025 edition will be your special treat during the first weeks of this year. It will keep you warm and comfortable and it will take your senses to far away places.

Let’s discover who our roasters are and what they’re going to roast for you.

EUROPEAN ROASTERS FOR JANUARY

PasoPaso from Hanover, Germany

Over the past decade, countless roasters and importers have been working hard to build transparent and fair supply chains. Coffee is famously a murky business. I vividly recall watching a documentary some years ago in which a Guatemalan farmer told the interviewer that he had no idea what happened to his coffee. Let alone for how much his coffee was being sold to European consumers. These days producers are much more involved and present but PasoPaso from Hanover took matters a step further by setting up a producer-owned roastery.

Co-founded by Bram de Hoog and Jasper van Gils together with five coffee growing families from around the world, PasoPaso aims to bring producers into the entire supply chain and offer them a seat at the table on all matters regarding the final product. This unique approach really attracted my attention. It’s innovative initiatives like this that are truly pushing the industry forward.

I invited Bram to send over some coffees for our cupping last month and I was pleased to see that one of the lots came from Diego Baraona of Finca Los Pirineos fame. He is also a co-owner in the business and his rare Bourbon washed lot made the cut for this edition.

Available with a single profile for filter and espresso.

Miche Brûlerie from Cap Ferret, France

When Californian transplant Mel Taylor moved from the US to France with her young family, she didn’t know that her future career would be as a coffee roaster. Used to getting coffee on every corner in her native Los Angeles, she was shocked to find not a single decent coffee place in her new home in Cap Ferret. To be fair, in her own words, Cap Ferret is a seasonal town that is super hectic in the summer and sleepy off-season.

After a while she came round to the idea that coffee roasting could be a rewarding and exciting carreer move for her. She took a course with fellow Coffeevine partners Moxka in Lyon and set up her roastery in the small industrial part of Cap Ferret. What I found most striking was the stunning packaging. Mel picked a few of her favourite art works from different artists and created really elegant brand identity that makes Miche stand out.

For her debut in a Coffeevine box, Mel will roast a super yummy natural-processed Rwandan lot from Muhondo.

Available with a single profile for filter and espresso.

Rush Rush from Antwerp, Belgium

One of the very first cities I ever visited after starting The Coffeevine blog in 2013 was Antwerp. Already then, Belgium’s second city had an enviable specialty coffee scene that just kept getting better and better over the years. One of its most prominent members these days is Rush Rush. Founded by Simon Derutter and Nanigui Patel who ran a small coffee shop for a couple that was on sabbatical, Rush Rush eventually morphed into a fully-fledged roastery and café.

In 2022 Simon won the Belgian Aeropress Championships and came second in the World Aeropress Championships. That was incidentally also the year Rush Rush was first featured in a Coffeevine box. Now, after welcoming their first child and pushing their business forward for two years, Simon and Nanigui are back with a fabulously floral honey-processed Ethiopian lot from Koke.

Available with separate roast profiles for filter and espresso.

GLOBAL ROASTERS FOR JANUARY

OneHalf from Pelang Jaya, Malaysia

Over the past two years, I’ve championed many South East Asian roasters, from Thailand, Vietnam and Singapore. I love that the Global roasters selection allows me to collaborate with so many talented people from around the world and Asia is definitely one of the most exciting places for specialty coffee. When I learned about Onehalf in Malaysia, I had to reach out to them to see if they would be keen to get involved with The Coffeevine. Luckily, their answer was yes!

Founded in 2016 by three-time Malaysian barista champion Keith Koay, Onehalf is known for its exceptional sourcing and expertly crafted coffees. All of the coffees that it submitted for our cupping in December were standouts but only one could make the final cut and that was a elegant washed Ethiopian lot from Nensebo. Onehalf is our first-ever Malaysian roaster!

Available with a filter roast profile.

Modus from Vancouver, Canada

In 2019, I put together a one-off country special that showcased three brilliant Canadian roasters. It was a first attempt at bringing in more global roasters before I made this an official and monthly offering starting in May 2023. One of the roasters featured then was Modus. Incidentally, I then met it’s co-founder Sharif Sharifi in Amsterdam a few months later when he paid a visit to the now defunct Public Space. Since then, Modus has been on a incredible upward trajectory that recently saw it open its brand new roasting space and second café.

I love Modus and wanted Sharif & co to be back in one of our boxes so I reached out to him. He gladly sent over some coffees to consider in our cupping. The one that made it was a juicy Pink Bourbon from Colombian producer Jose Burbano. This coffee is a joy to brew and drink every day!

Available with a filter roast profile.

DECAF ROASTER FOR JANUARY

19 Grams from Berlin, Germany

You might have heard all the fuss about James Hoffmann’s latest giant cupping event. This time, it was all about decaf. If you know me a bit, then you will know that I have been obsessing with decaf for quite a while. After scouring the Decaf Project website, I noticed that our friends from 19 Grams in Berlin were also participating. Thus, I reached out to my friend Sarah Losemann who is 19 Grams’ head of sales and asked if she would be keen to be our decaf partner for January. She said yes but only if 19 Grams could also be a partner for our regular box in 2025. Watch this space.

For this edition, 19 Grams will roast for us their lovely Huila blend decaf that it the ideal coffee to drink when you’ve already had 6 cups and just fancy that one extra cup. You know what I mean.

Available with a filter roast profile.