Hello and greetings from Lofoten. The summer vacation has officially started here in Norway and due to Covid19 travel restrictions I am spending my holiday traveling through the North of Norway. In this month’s video I am in the beautiful Lofoten islands tasting the coffees we are sending to our subscribers.
The original plan this month was to send you fresh crop Kenyan coffees but due to unfortunate shipping delays the coffees did not arrive on time. However, the first container from Central-America just arrived with fresh crop coffees from the Caballero family and I am very excited to be able to send these to you. These coffees were harvested in February this year and are tasting really sweet and fresh. The quality of the Caballero’s coffees have improved a lot in the recent years and these ones are a real treat and a pleasure to drink. I hope you will enjoy them as much as I do.
Caballero Catuaí 1 + 4 bags
Flavour notes: Chocolate, dried fruits & apples
Producer: Marysabel Caballero & Moises Herrera
Harvest: February 2021
Origin: Chinacla, La Paz, Honduras
Process: Washed
Cultivar: Catuaí
Since we started buying coffees from Marysabel and Moises we have focused a lot on perfecting the process together in order to make their coffees taste clean, consistent and have a long shelf life.Two years ago, Moises started working a bit more on the fermentation stage when processing his Catuaí coffees. His wet mill is equipped with Penagos de-pulpers that have mechanical mucilage removers. This means that fermentation is not really necessary because most of the mucilage is removed from the beans mechanically, before they get dried. Still, Moises wanted to see if he could improve the quality slightly by letting the coffee ferment with the small amounts of mucilage still left on the coffee. It means the coffee is now fermented over night before washing and drying. I must say that I have noticed more fruity flavours in the coffee in the last two years and also the quality in the last years have greatly improved. The coffees are sweeter, have more concentration of flavour and the best lots have a delicious dried fruit, plum and red apple like flavour to them.
Although Marysabel and Moises produce a lot of the Catuaí cultivar, not all lots are produced the same way. Some are dried on patios and others in mechanical driers or on raised beds under shade. Over the years I have developed a protocol in cooperation with Moises and Marysabel on how to separate, process and especially dry and store the coffees. In the last 5-6 years they have been producing a lot of Catuaí coffees especially for us to choose from. This means that all the lots we buy are dried on raised beds in shade and are hand sorted and milled with extreme care and attention. It really makes a difference in the final cup. In fact Moises was the one who let me experiment with shade dried coffee in the first place and we found that the green coffee will stay fresh for a longer time and taste much cleaner than the patio or mechanically dried coffees they produce.
Caballero Java 2 + 5 bags
Flavour notes: White chocolate, green tea & almonds
Producer: Marysabel Caballero & Moises Herrera
Harvest: February 2021
Origin: Chinacla, La Paz, Honduras
Process: Washed
Cultivar: Java
Marysabel and Moises grow very little of this rare Java cultivar. We have been fortunate to be able to buy most of their Java coffees since they started their production and for some of us it is a little highlight of the year. This is kind of a controversial coffee. Some people love it while others don’t get what it is all about.
I personally really like how different it is to all our other coffees. With a very distinct green tea or Oolong tea flavour and its creamy mouthfeel it reminds me of eating the green tea flavoured white chocolates that are so popular in Japan. The Java from the Caballero family is definitely very recognisable on a cupping table because of its distinct flavour profile. Try to open your mind before tasting this coffee and enjoy the richness and tea like flavours of this Java.
Caballero SL28 3 + 6 bags
Flavour notes: Black tea, red berries & chocolate
Producer: Marysabel Caballero & Moises Herrera
Harvest: February 2021
Origin: Chinacla, La Paz, Honduras
Process: Washed
Cultivar: SL28
We have had quite a few SL28 cultivars on the menu recently. I guess it is not a secret anymore that the SL28 is one of my favourite coffee cultivars with its distinct fruity cup. Most of you know that this is commonly grown in Kenya and a big reason why Kenyan coffees are so fruity and intense. Still, we have found that when planted in other countries, the profile can change quite a bit. Like the SL28 from Finca Tamana in Colombia, the SL28 from Marysabel and Moises is quite subtle in the flavour profile. I can still taste subtle flavours of red berries, and delicate floral notes but they are not as intense as in the SL28 coffee from Jobneel and his farm Nacimiento further north in Honduras. The Caballero’s SL28 coffee has a lighter body and some tannins like you find in black tea. It reminds me a lot of drinking berry flavoured black tea. The Caballeros only produce small amounts of this coffee from seeds that I gave them a few years back. This year we bought their total SL28 production of 240 kg and most of it will go out to our subscribers.
Thanks for reading and as always, we hope you enjoy the coffees and learning from our monthly videos. If you need some brewing tips, visit our website.
I hope you will enjoy the coffees
Tim W