10/9/2008

Organic Biodynamic India--first in class

 

What the deuces is Biodynamic Agriculture? It is old-fashioned and newly fashionable sustainable agriculture. The kind of farming practices our grandparents employed until they were unemployed when agriculture turned into agri-business. Now as people rediscover local foods and start showing concern about their local environments, we can resow the seeds of how things really work. In biodynamic farming, the farm is treated as a living organism and all efforts are made to ensure the long term sustainability of the farmland. Soil is the key ingredient to the success of the farm. In that vein, every effort is taken to ensure the ongoing health of the soil. What is needed are various field preparations and composts from leaves, herbs, flowers and of course cow dung. These inputs are then fermented to enrich them in growth-stimulating substances. They get the ball rolling much in the way that yeast works in bread.

Another way to look at these practices is as recycling for your specific parcel of land. In the Indian coffee fields, there are shade trees which provide shade from too much sunlight but also provide leaves for composting and strong trunks onto which other crops such as vanilla and pepper can attach themselves. Along with the leaves, green weeds, flowers like chamomile, dandelion, valerian and yarrow and coffee husks are used. Sprays are also made from cow dung buried in a horn in the ground and allowed to decompose over the winter. It is dug up in the Spring and diluted for the spray. Do these practices actually work. Who cares? How awesome is it to bury a horn full of cow crap? Life is about rituals.

Drinking coffee is one of the most pleasurable rituals we have. This biodynamic coffee is from the Nigiris region of India. You will find it, not very easily for sure, at the intersection of Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu states in the Western Ghats mountainrange. The mysterious practices of biodynamic farming are apropos in this most mysterious region. It is home to a tribal group called the Todas, supposedly descendants of a lost regiment of Alexander the Great. The estate is called Baalmaddi an Anglicized version of a Tamil word which means udder of the cow. At least it wasn’t bullocks. The biodiversity of the region is amazing. At night the animals come out. You have barking deer, marauding monkeys, elephants eating bananas, bison, panthers and towards the dawn the song of the thrush known as the “whistling schoolboy.”

I wanted to whistle when I first whet my whistle with this biodynamic coffee. The best description I can give to this coffee is that it fully expresses its’ terroir like a wine. Each time you taste the coffee you find something new. It is a seriously complex cup. The aroma is full of apricot, honey and wheat like the freshness of a wheat beer or hefeweizen. It has a delicate acidity balanced by a full body. You can taste lots of muted spices from cinnamon to nutmeg as if someone has dusted your cup in just the right amount. It is exceptionally sweet and finishes with a burst of carob, cocoa and tea like notes. When you roast it darker you pick up more of a cedar aroma with a raisiny concentration and wine-like acidity. You find marshmallow sweetness and hints of leather and roots, this is the earthiness or terroir. It is a beast of a cup and finishes with what can only be described as a Count Chocula flavor which lasts about 2 hours.

I was so impressed with this coffee that I put together a new espresso blend using it as a base. The espresso was the most persistent I have come up with. It just lingered and lingered. It had the aroma of a freshly picked blueberry, full of ripeness. When you combined it with milk it just turned into something you would swear was sweetened. The low notes go on and on like a well-played bass line drives a song forward.

Forward pioneering biodynamic farmers and let the past bury (the horn in) the pasture.

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