Coffee on the tree

100% Kona Coffee
The Best in the World

Kona coffee has few rivals on this planet. 100% Kona has an extraordinary flavor that evolved from a perfect microclimate and over 170 years of a unique style and culture of growing it. The volcanic slopes of Mauna Loa on the leeward side of the island have bright morning sun and afternoon rainshowers year round, creating the perfect conditions for growing coffee. A spring bloom in the 'dry season', called Kona snow, leads to a bountiful fall harvest of coffee cherries.

Kona Snow and Kealakekua Bay

The Japanese introduced coffee into Kona on land considered too rocky to farm. They worked small family farms (2-10 acres) which they hand cultivated and harvested. They pulped the cherries with low tech grinders and water fermented it. They dried the coffee in the sun on hoshidanas: drying racks with rolling roofs to protect coffee from rain. These were often situated on top of the coffee shack where the farmer was living.

The Japanese were followed by Chinese, Filipino, Portugese, Micronesian, European-American and Mexican farm families and workers. The children had their 'summer vacation' during fall coffee harvest until the 1960s. Today, the same traditional process is followed, but the advent of the internet has allowed these farm families to sell directly to you and bypass larger processors and loss of quality. These small family farms label their coffee Estate Grown, so you know that the coffee comes only from that one farm. Estate is a mix of all grades of beans, including peaberries and you are assured the same quality care for all your beans.

100% Kona coffee is hard to find on the mainland. Large processors blend using only 10% Kona and 90% lower-quality, Central American beans. This produces a completely different taste. For the fantastic, mellow , rich flavor that has world class tasters flying in for cupping competitions, it must be 100% Kona.We have benefitted from the worldwide expresso boom, but Kona tastes even better as a plain black cup of coffee, without its flavor burnt off by a french roast and unadulterated by chocolate, syrups or whip cream.

We are certified Organic, so our coffee is free of chemical pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers. Clearly this is better for your health and our planet. It also affects flavor. In recent years, several of the winners of the Kona Cupping Competition have been organic. However, only 10% of the farms are organic. Healthy, balanced soil gives an entirely different flavor to food. Consider your delicious backyard garden tomato vs. your shiny, thick skinned, tasteless supermarket variety. Our farm has been organic for over 15 years, so our soil and trees have had the chance to create a balanced micro-climate.

Our Kona coffee sun-drying on the hoshidana

Kanalani Ohana Farm
Melanie & Colehour Bondera
P.O. Box 861 • Honaunau, Hawaii 96726
(808) 640-1643 • colemel@ kanalanifarm.org