07/06/2026
To celebrate our coffee arrivals from Kenya, here is a little Kenya coffee knowledge drop:
Anyone who is a fan of Kenya coffee has probably noticed a pair of letters on your bag of coffee next to the coffee description.
These letters represent the grade of coffee that you purchased. While there are several grades of coffee that are produced in Kenya, there are three grades that are most common in “Specialty Coffee”: AA, AB, and PB.
Contrary to popular belief, these grades have little to do with cup quality but, instead, denote the coffee bean size/appearance of the green coffee after it has been carefully sorted.
AA - the biggest coffee bean size of the three. Screen size 18.
AB - a mix of screen sizes 16/17
PB- Peaberry — a natural mutation that produces rather small beans, screen size 12.
While we can assume that larger bean sizes can produce more desirable flavors, this simply is not always the case. Yes, one can certainly find excellent AA lots, but there are a lot of average ones out there too. And while you may think ABs are never as good as AAs, well, that is a fallacy as well. Great ABs exist, Great AAs exist, Great PBs exist while, at the same time, average AAs, ABs, and PBs also exist.
Want a taste an AA microlot? Follow our “Buy Coffee” link in the profile.
