Search for caffeine's edge
| • | Planters involved from farm to cup |
| • | Chart: Creating a unique Hawai'i coffee |
By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Kaua'i Bureau
'ELE'ELE, Kaua'i — Ross Fowler and Joe Lopez visit the Kaua'i Coffee shop at Port Allen for the ice cream, but they don't drink the locally grown coffee.
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"What I heard, it was real bitter," said Lopez, who lives in Waimea. He concedes he has never tried the coffee, which grows in deep-green fields that are visible from Port Allen. "I like Lion macadamia nut."
Toma Petelo and Jim Wayman, of the Hawai'i Coffee Co., hold processed and green beans.
Fowler, a Lawa'i resident, said he drinks Kona coffee. He has never tried any of the Kaua'i-grown varieties either, because they have a reputation for poor quality.
Overcoming that reputation, established when the plantations were young and the staff inexperienced, is a challenge for the Hawai'i coffees grown outside of Kona. Today, those coffees are generally much better, but even the growers admit they need an edge.
They hope to get it within the next 10 years with the development of a uniquely Hawaiian variety of coffee — or perhaps a suite of varieties — bred to provide a Kona-quality crop that will grow on the southern slopes of Kaua'i, the saddle of central Moloka'i, the Waialua area of O'ahu, the lower West Maui Mountains and other parts of the Big Island.
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Trial plantings of nearly two dozen new varieties, selected from an initial group of about 100 cross-bred coffee varieties, are in the nursery ready for planting or have been planted on the sunny south Kaua'i slopes owned by A&B's Kaua'i Coffee.
Jim Wayman, president of the Hawai'i Coffee Co., takes a coffee taste test.
"We've gone through several stages, narrowing the field based on cupping qualities (flavor), production, yield and farmability of these coffees," said Frank Kiger, president of Kaua'i Coffee and past president of the Hawai'i Coffee Association. "We have planted the most promising ones and will continue to evaluate them and narrow the range."
Hawai'i grows many kinds of coffee in many different locations, but there essentially are two classes of Hawaiian coffee: renowned Kona coffee and everything else.
The Kona coast of the Big Island is one of the best places in the world to grow Guatemalan typica coffee, the variety that makes up the vast majority of what's called Kona coffee. The variety, plus Kona's volcanic soils, its climate and the elevations at which the coffee is grown, combine to make a world-class brew that sells for $20 a pound. Grown elsewhere, Guatemalan typica often isn't nearly as good.
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"Kona has a classic coffee climate," said H.L. "Skip" Bittenbender, extension agent for coffee, kava and cacao with the University of Hawai'i's College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources.
Catuai coffee plants spread their deep green leaves at Kaua'i Coffee's plantation near Kalaheo, Kaua'i. Kaua'i growers are trying to improve their product.
Kona growers aren't looking for a new variety, although they have asked coffee scientists to seek ways to produce the same classic flavor with a coffee plant that is resistant to the spreading nematode pest. These root worms weaken coffee plants and reduce their yields.
Plant breeder Chifumi Nagai, head of the coffee program at the Hawai'i Agriculture Research Center, has been leading the effort to breed new Hawai'i varieties, which she emphasizes does not use biotechnology techniques that create genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Many coffee growers, particularly those in Kona, are adamant that GMO plants be kept away from their crops.
"Pretty much the industry has come down opposed to those things," said Jim Wayman, president of Hawai'i Coffee Co., which produces the Lion and Royal Kona brands.
Wayman said there's room in the market for a high-quality coffee of a variety that isn't found anywhere else.
"I would love to see some new, unique, distinct Hawaiian coffee come out," he said.
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Nagai said she and her staff crossed the typical variety used in Kona with a catuai variety grown by Kaua'i Coffee, and a moka variety like those at Ka'anapali with the Kona typica, a moka with a catuai, a moka with the best Kenyan variety, and some others. Each cross produces a slightly different plant with different features. One might produce better coffee in Ka'anapali than on Moloka'i, and another might make better coffee grown on Moloka'i than on Kaua'i.
Toma Petelo, the night-shift supervisor, checks the beans coming out of the roaster at the Hawai'i Coffee Co. in Kalihi Kai.
"Coffee is like wine — so many different factors," Nagai said. "I am a plant breeder so I have got to be positive. I'm sure this will be a different tasting profile than the current varieties."
Kimo Falconer, whose Maui Grown Coffee has taken over about 120 acres of the old Amfac coffee plantation above Ka'anapali, said he is excited about the possibilities, especially for varieties that include some of the features of his moka plants.
"I'm definitely going to try some of those seedlings," he said.
Falconer has 50 acres of the moka variety, which he said produces an excellent coffee but has small beans.
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"The paradigm in the industry is the larger the bean the better," Falconer said, so he's hoping for a big-beaned coffee with the characteristic moka flavor.
Chris Bull and Nova Vanderford package bags of coffee at Hawai'i Coffee Co., which produces the Lion and Royal Kona brands.
Another feature the plantation-grown coffees require is a compact plant that can be harvested mechanically, saving the cost of hand-harvesting, said Coby Barbata, sales director of Coffees of Hawai'i's Moloka'i Coffee Co. Most Kona coffee is hand-harvested, both because the coffee variety yields a spreading plant not suited to mechanical harvesting and because Kona's small, hillside farms make any kind of machine harvesting difficult.
For Ross Fowler, one of the men eating ice cream outside the Kaua'i Coffee shop, the work for quality will pay off.
"If they could find a blend that would match Kona, they'd be 99 percent better off," he said.
Reach Jan TenBruggencate at jant@honoluluadvertiser.com or (808) 245-3074.
