A few weeks ago I recently had the chance to visit Second Best during a visit to Kansas City. It’s a great shop with one of the most beautiful espresso machines I’ve ever seen. (You can read more of my thoughts and see some photos of their shop in my post about my trip.)
While there, I picked up a bag of their Kenyan Karinga Gitwe Microlot. It has a lot of the stereotypical character traits of a Kenyan coffee—it was beautifully acidic and had a really nice sharp sweetness. The flavor notes I tasted were lemon, grapefruit and some subtle vanilla. My main critique was that its body felt a bit thin and the fragrance, which was very pronounced initially with raisin and lemon notes initially, dropped off a lot after brewing.
The Bottom Line
Overall this was a great coffee that fit nicely into my favorite profile—bright, acidity and sweet. It didn’t have anything that really differentiated it from other Kenyan coffee’s I’ve tried though, so while it was good and I’ll gladly finish the bag, I won’t be rushing back to buy it again.
