New arrival: Haiti Savane Zombie, a coffee that's very much alive

Regulars will remember: our last Haitian lot from the Kok Ki Chante cooperative left the shelves as fast as it arrived. Good news — Haiti is back in the shop, and this time the coffee carries a name you won't forget: Savane Zombie. You couldn't make that up: it's a real place, a coffee-growing plateau clinging to the mountains of South-East Haiti. And trust us, this coffee is anything but sleepy.

Kok Ki Chante, the rooster that crows for its farmers

In Haitian Creole, Kok Ki Chante means "the rooster that crows" — and since 2009, this organization has been waking up Haiti's coffee sector. First the technical arm of Singing Rooster, a U.S. non-profit social enterprise, it became a fully Haitian company in 2014, built on Muhammad Yunus' social-business model. Today it is the country's leading exporter of farm-direct specialty coffee.

Around Thiotte, Kok Ki Chante works hand in hand with some 350 smallholder families organized in farmer associations — including the Association des Paysans Agricoles de Savane-Zombi (APAS), which alone supports about 150 families. In concrete terms: tens of thousands of coffee seedlings distributed, warehouses, depulpers, hermetic bags to protect the beans — and above all, farmers paid 300% above the fair-trade threshold. It makes for a pricier coffee, but every bag brings real support to Haiti's coffee-growing communities.

Savane-Zombi, a coffee plateau at 1,300–1,500 metres

Savane-Zombi is a rural section of the commune of Thiotte, in the Belle-Anse district, right by the Dominican border. Backed by the Forêt des Pins, the coffee gardens grow under the shade of tall trees at 1,300 to 1,500 metres — dream conditions for slow ripening, tended by families who have been growing coffee for generations.

A quick history lesson, because it's dizzying: coffee reached Haiti in the 1730s, and by 1788 the island supplied about half of the world's coffee. In 1949, Haiti was still the world's third-largest producer. Production has shrunk since, but lots like this one prove the know-how never left — and that Haiti is carving out a fine place in specialty coffee.

In the cup

A high-grown washed coffee, clean and elegant, sitting squarely in our Floral & delicate family:

• Notes: floral, chocolate, cane sugar, good acidity
• Process: washed
• Varieties: Typica, Caturra, Catimor, Mundo Novo, Blue Mountain
• Altitude: 1,300 to 1,500 m · Region: Thiotte, South-East Department
• Harvest: 2025-2026 (October to May) — fresh crop

Our roasting tips

To keep the florals alive, aim for a light-to-medium roast: as filter, you get a fragrant, silky cup with a cane-sugar finish. As espresso, the chocolate takes the wheel and rounds everything out. Just don't push it too dark — it would be a shame to put a coffee with this much to say to sleep.

Discover the Haiti Savane Zombie — available in 5 lb and 15 lb bags while the lot lasts. A rare coffee with a real impact. Ça va Torquer!