Kona coffee grown ‘traditionally’ provides real value for your money. In the cup, the estates we’ve chosen mirror the attributes of our best organic farms, but they are priced much lower. The cherries cost us less so we can pass the savings on to you. We’ve purposefully selected traditional farms where spraying is limited to the borders surrounding the farm and, like our organic farms, picking must be ‘tight’- only red. At our central mill ‘traditionally grown’ cherries are treated with the same care used for all of our estates.

At our ‘traditional estates’ Kona coffee is grown the way it has been for 150 years. They are located in Honaunau, or nearby Captain Cook, where the coffee fields are known as "rock farms". Here, coffee trees are often planted in-between chunky lava rocks where weeds cannot be mowed. Instead, weed spray is carefully aimed at only the weeds. After a few years the trees form their own leafy canopies providing a dense shade to stop weed growth underneath.

Carol Carroll picks an early round


Carol with Coffee Bags

AVAILABILITY. IN STOCK. The recent crop of jumbo sized cherries was larger than we expected. Our green coffee storage area is now packed with a supply that should last until the new crop is harvested this fall.

THE ESTATE. Mauka Fire shares a common border with Gevalia’s 2006 Cupping Contest Winner - Pearl Estate Organics. They both occupy a valley at 1700 ft. up Old Telephone Exchange Road, that is steep and rocky with pockets of deep, rich soil.

In the late 1970s, owners Charlie and Carol Carroll, came to the big island for adventure and surf. The coffee farm was perfect to support their aspiration. It came with 50 year old coffee stock terraced on one acre around the house. The Carrolls terraced and planted a second acre. While Charlie tends to the farm, Carol works as an associate coffee roaster at Pele Plantations. Carol competes in team long-distance outrigger canoe paddling and spins some treasures at the Kona Potters Guild.

OUR CUPPING NOTES. Everything about this coffee reflects the qualities of its1st place neighbor - Pearl Estate. The aroma is sweet toned with notes of orange citrus. In the cup the orange tones join with floral notes to combine with its full-bodied classic Kona profile: sweet, full-bodied, and smooth with a finish that seems enveloped in honey.

AWARDS. Finalist 2005 and 2008

Terry


Deck

AVAILABILITY. IN STOCK. We are very proud to add this highly esteemed estate to our list of estates for you to choose from. Terry Fitzgerald, owner, assures us that he can continue supplying us with dark green beans until the current crop on his trees are ripe, a typical annual crop is 5,000 lbs roasted. Then we will continue buyi8ng cherry from Terry’s farm.

THE ESTATE. Terry and his wife, Susan, purchased this 4 ½ acre estate at an elevation of 1500 feet in 1972. It was planted in the 1920s by Korean farmers and by 1972 had returned to a Hawaiian jungle for Terry and his wife to recover, a new adventure for Terry, a former geophysicist from Ontario. Da Kine estate lies almost at the top of a paved road called Filipino Clubhouse Road. Sprawling down the slopes of Mauna Loa, the soil and rocks here are perfect, proven by the fact that his uphill neighbor is Pearlman’s estate, winner of the Gevalia Cupping in 2006. His pickers pick only the dark red cherries, leaving the yellow and green cherries time to mature.

CUPPING NOTES. Gus, our in-house cupper, described that its’ roasted aroma is as inviting as the flavor - rich, robust, satiny smooth. Terry says his secret is that he uses mulches and fertilizers - including crushed macadamia shells to keep moisture in the a’a (volcanic rock) dirt. He commented that Honaunau has perfect conditions - altitude, volcanic soil, good drainage, and the “right” rain and cloud cover during part of each day.

AWARDS. Competing with 43 coffee estates, Da Kine won 1st place at the Gevalia contest in 1997, the one and only time Terry entered it. We think you will agree this is one of the all time great Kona coffees.

Here's a fun way to sample a variety of our coffees to help determine your favorite(s). Our sample includes a map of the Big Island plus four, four-ounce pouches of coffee from four different estates. All estates will be roasted exactly to the same degree, our Madam Pele roast, so the difference you detect is the estate, not the roast. These fresh roasted whole bean samples are perfect gifts for your coffee loving friends. The estates that are included in each tour will vary depending on availability when the tour is packed. We will attempt to include a cupping contest winner and an organic sample in each tour and to include estates with detectably different cupping characteristics. If your tour order includes separate pounds of coffee, we will attempt to choose other options to create your tour.

TOUR PACKAGING. Your four ESTATE TOUR SAMPLER  pouches will be packaged, with a Big Island map, in our NEW Pele Logo Jute Bag.  By using this bag we can fit your tour, along with up to two more pounds of coffee, in a FedEx or Flat Rate box, reducing the cost of shipping. 

You can save an additional $2.00, if you do not need your tour packed in our jute bag.  Just enter the words “PLEASE DO NOT PACKAGE MY TOUR” in our ‘Special Instructions’ box during checkout.  We will pack the tour with the map only and deduct your savings before charging your card.