Four Barrel Ethiopian Yirgaceffe Kocherie

Four Barrel in San Francisco's Mission District just opened less than a month ago and is repackaging beans from Stumptown Coffee Roasters in Portland, Oregon, until they start roasting their own. I couldn't find this particular coffee on Stumptown's site and was wondering if someone had simply misspelled Koratie, which both stores sell. But I did some Internet searching and found other Ethiopian coffees with the name Kocherie - apparently it's a region in Sidamo in the Kore district (I'm cribbing here from Victrola's description of a similar coffee). It's washed, unlike the Koratie, which is natural, or dry processed.

In a pour over, the Kocherie was a dead ringer for Darjeeling tea, with a lithe mouthfeel and astringent and spicy flavors in the mouth. On the nose I got that black tea scent as well as a candied fruit, something like those chewy, sugar coated orange slices candy that you pick up from a convenience store, two for $1.

In a french press, the coffee was largely the same, with a rounder mouth feel. I pulled this as a shot, but wasn't really blown away by it.

There was no obvious signs of a roast date on the package. I say obvious because there are two lines on the bottom that could, could be "11" though there's no month next to it. The guy at the desk said they got a shipment of coffee on the 17th, so that's when he thought they were roasted. The beans seem fresh, so it wasn't an issue, but it's still nice to know when they were roasted.