The Good Food Foundation has revealed 23 coffee roasters from the United States are finalists in their 2022 Good Food Awards.
The program is now in its 12th year and celebrates and acknowledges food products and their producers in 17 different food and drink categories. Finalists are awarded not only for the quality of their products but also for their efforts towards sustainability.
Sustainable sourcing and a significant social impact are major qualifiers for the Good Food Awards, which include categories such as meat, fish, beer, and pickles. The coffee category is considered an outlier by many people as it is unique in the sense that it is only one ingredient that is commonly sourced from outside the United States.
In the past, Ethiopian coffees have dominated the awards, but the past couple of years have shown more diversity in the winners of the coffee category in terms of the origins of the beans.
This year’s coffee committee was co-chaired by Sandra Loofbrouw of the popular coffee podcast, The Crown Trusted Source The Crown Podcast | Coffee Podcast | Royal Coffee The Crown Podcast by Royal Coffee is a coffee podcast dedicated to discussing the latest news and topics in green coffee. Tune in to our coffee experts today. royalcoffee.com and Tovara Salley of Wild Poppy Wellness, a health studio.
This year’s awards’ judging process began in the Bay Area, where coffees were tested and listed to move on to the second round. From there, 29 professional coffee tasters judged the nominees using the same equipment and the Roaster’s Guild Evaluation Form.
The Good Food Foundation stated on their webpage that “The winners of the Good Food Award for coffee will be distinguished by exemplary flavor — sweet, clean, well-developed body, balanced acidity, and phenomenal aromatics”. For farmers to qualify for the award, they need to provide complete transparency and farmers from seed to cup. This involved everything from the farming process all the way to the roasting and packaging process of the beans.
The coffees in the single-origin coffee category hail from 9 different countries. Coffee beans grown in Ethiopia received the most nominations, with eight different finalists from the area, followed by Columbia with five, Kenya with three, Costa Rica with two, and Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, Panama, and Yemen each having one coffee each qualify as finalists. Two of this year’s finalists from the United States, Michigan’s Higher Grounds Trading Co. and Oakland’s Mr. Espresso, have had multiple coffee products from their brands named as finalists.
The finalists from the United States exhibit a fair amount of regional diversity. The 23 different finalists hail from 16 states, from Minnesota to Michigan to Washington, New York, California, Maine, Oregon, New Mexico, Connecticut, Wyoming, Texas, Florida, and Tennesee.
From November 1 to 14, the Good Food Foundation is hosting a virtual pop-up store Trusted Source Coffee – Good Food Foundation With over 2,000 entries each year, the competition is fierce for a Good Food Award. shop.goodfoodfdn.org that contains all the finalists for the GFA coffee category and other products from other categories for people interested in trying out the products themselves.
While the finalists were announced this November, the winners will not be announced until January 14 at an in-person gala to be hosted in San Francisco.
Here is the list of this year’s finalists in the coffee category, including the coffee’s name and the roaster’s home state. While these finalists come from different areas in the United States, all of the single-origin coffee nominees were harvested in different countries.
Acorn Coffee Club, Las Lajas – Yellow Honey, Costa Rica, Minnesota
Bard Coffee, Ethiopia Duromine, Maine
Beanstock Coffee Roasters, Mexican Marco Cadena, Massachusetts
Cirque Coffee, Weirdo Blend, Oklahoma
Cloud City Coffee Roasting, Ethiopia Lecho Torka Fully Washed, Washington
Coffee By Design, Kenya Nyeri Kiandu AA, Maine
Cutbow Coffee Roastology, Costa Rica Natural Process, New Mexico
Giv Coffee, Ethiopia, Keramo, Connecticut
H+S Coffee Roasters, Colombia Ernedis Rodriguez, Finca El Paraiso, Wyoming
Higher Grounds Trading Co., Cariño, Michigan
Higher Grounds Trading Co., Karla Portillo, Michigan
JBC Coffee Roasters, Las Margaritas Sudan Rume, Wisconsin
Linea Coffee, Organic Ethiopia Bire Forest, California
Mikava, Santuario Gesha, Oregon
Mr. Espresso, Organic Ethiopia Shantewene, Natural Process, California
Mr. Espresso, Organic Guatemala CODECH – Women’s Lot, California
Noble Coffee Roasting, Kenyan’ Muiri Estate’ {Peaberry}, Oregon
Noble Coyote Coffee Roasters, Panama Bambito Estate Typica, Texas
Per’La Specialty Roasters, Ethiopia Bombe, Florida
Progeny Coffee, Piñita, California
SkyTop Coffee, Finca Santa Maria, New York
The Mad Priest Coffee Roasters, Yemenia Bait Alal Special Reserve, Tennessee
Three Keys Coffee, “Embracing Boldness” – Ethiopia Goraa Natural, Texas
Wesley Andrews Coffee, Kenya Othaya Chinga, Minnesota
Zoka Coffee, Ethiopian Kossa Geshe, Washington
