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For a lot of us Norteamericanos, Señor “Juan Valdez”, the mustachioed caricature who stood for Colombian coffee (“he” is actually still around, amazingly, apparently doing a good job for the country) told a good quality story. Today's Colombia still produces more Arabica coffee than anywhere else but the vast majority is “normal”; clean, bright and light-bodied, and frankly not always exciting. For a few years now we've been excited to work with Direct Trade partner Traviesa (based in Manizales) to acquire really fantastic microlots from small farmers, many of whom push the edge of the envelope in varietal selection and processing.
One such “outlier” is Finca La Suiza in Alto La Paz, Chinchina, Caldas Department. Sitting at nearly 1500 meters, this 11-hectare farmstead
features mostly exotic (AND hard-to-grow AND low-yielding!) varietals among their 32,000 coffee shrubs: Gesha, Wush Wush, Tabi, Pink Bourbon
and lastly (and least, less than 5%) Caturra, which is among the most commonly-produced coffee crops in the country. The Gesha here represents close to 40% of the crop and flourishes in this Chinchina microclimate. We chose to roast the natural process version (whole cherry raised-bed sun-dried) Gesha varietal, which has
ancestral Ethiopian provenance, "migrated" to Panama just over 20 years ago, and has been selectively planted in much of Central America. It is a fabulously
complex coffee, showing notes of cherry,berry, jasmine and brown sugar. Heavy body and a long, sweet finish in the recommended pourover and drip method.
Very often only Ethiopian natural process coffees offer this kind of sensory palette, so we're thrilled to share this coffee and encourage all Gesha-producing farms to keep raising the bar even higher. Light roast for best expression of the fruit and body in pourover and drip.