ONA Coffee
Malaysia My Liberica, Liberica Experimental Natural

Roaster Location: Flag of Australia Canberra
Rated 5 stars out of 5

5.00(1)

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Bean Source Country: Malaysia
Varietal: Liberica
Process: Experimental Natural

ONA source some seriously rare coffees, in part because they need them for coffee competitions, in part because their founder also leads the Project Origin green coffee buying company. In this case, they sourced a temperature-controlled natural liberica from Jason Liew’s My Liberica’s farm in Malaysia and roasted by ONA in Australia. Hugh Kelly won third place in the 2021 World Barista Championship using an earlier season of this coffee. While this coffee has a fair bit of funk if not brewed correctly, this can be controlled reasonably well if dialed in. It is very very sweet, very fruity, and very unique. It is exciting to have such an impressive coffee grown at 0-20 meters above sea level. In order to better understand what the future of specialty liberica could be, I had this coffee many ways - cupped and as espresso, filter, flat white & iced latte (as well as blended with various specialty arabicas, as ONA suggested trying). As a black filter and iced latte were my two favourites. Dialed-in, the filter really lets you focus on the complexity and richness of the brew - not like any arabica I have ever tried and way better than any specialty robusta I have ever had. I get intense notes of tropical fruit (jackfruit?), bacon smoke (without it being heavily roasted and not like dark roasted arabica), and a long aftertaste. As an iced latte, the intensity really shrines through the milk, giving a surprisingly complex and aromatic iced latte. While I don’t drink that many iced lattes, the iced lattes I have had with this liberica are probably the most memorable iced lattes I have ever had. Blended with washed coffees as per ONA suggestion, the liberica tended to dominate, but I could see this as being a good option for someone who wanted some of the good features of the liberica but toned down a little. As espresso, this was too intense for me and I think some of its distinctiveness was lost as a flat white.

Reviews(1)

Rated 5 stars out of 5

5.00(1)

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Latest Reviews and Tasting Notes

  • Avatar
    Gerard Geggsy

    5 roasts rated, avg score of 4.90

    Rated 5 stars out of 5

    5.00 - Average

    Rated 5 stars out of 5

    5.00 - Aroma

    Rated 4.5 stars out of 5

    4.50 - Value

    Rated 5 stars out of 5

    5.00 - Finish

    Rated 5 stars out of 5

    5.00 - Flavor

    Rated 5 stars out of 5

    5.00 - Acidity

    Rated 5 stars out of 5

    5.00 - Balance

    Super ripe jackfruit, bacon smoke (not a dark roast smoke), booze

    Cupping Method:Filter, espresso, flat white, iced latte

More Details

Bean Source Country: Malaysia

Best Rated Roasts of ONA Coffee

ONA Coffee is a coffee roaster from Canberra, Australia. We have 2 cataloged roasts with 2 total reviews with a score of 5.00.

International Rank: #171 out of 1136