Dear subscriber,
This month, I have chosen two genetically similar cultivars, Caturra and Pacas, which are both dwarf mutations of Bourbon, grown in two different countries. The idea is to give you an understanding of how these cultivars can taste when grown under different conditions.
The Caturra and Pacas were also harvested a year apart and, although most coffees will fade and develop woody flavours after a while, we have been working hard for over a decade to delay the ageing process by implementing better drying, storage and logistical protocols on the farms. This is why the Caturra from Tamana tastes as fresh as the newly harvested Pacas from Nacimiento.
As a bonus this month, we are sending out the Geisha from Jobneel’s farm, El Vikingo, so that you can taste the difference between cultivars grown more or less in the same place.
Finca Tamana Caturra (1st & 4th bag)
When Elias Roa bought Finca Tamana in 2011, most of the farm was planted with the two cultivars Caturra and Variedad Colombia. Since then, the Caturra trees have been attacked by leaf rust almost every year, and the quality and production have therefore been a bit up and down. The Variedad Colombia is resistant to leaf rust and has consistently tasted better compared to the Caturra over the years. That is why we have recommended that Elias replant most of his Caturra trees with either resistant hybrid cultivars or better-tasting traditional cultivars such as Bourbon and SL28.
There are still a few lots planted with Caturra left on the farm and probably always will be, but since the production is very small and the flavour is very similar to the Variedad Colombia, we normally blend the two based on harvest date and quality.
Last harvest, we identified six small lots of Caturra that tasted really good. They made up enough volume for it to make sense to separate them from the Variedad Colombia.
That means this lot is from six single days of picking from one lot on the farm. I found this coffee to have a really sweet and smooth texture, with subtle notes of red fruits and the classic «panela» or caramel flavour that coffees from Huila are so well known for.
Note that this coffee was harvested last year, yet, due to the production protocols we have implemented with Elias and Bellanid at Tamana, the coffee is still tasting fresh. You can learn more about why in the video we made about processing at Tamana.
Nacmiento (2nd & 5th bag)
For a long time, we have asked Jobneel to separate his coffees by cultivar and harvest date. As a result, we have not only received coffees with different flavour profiles due to variations in cultivars, but we have also noticed that the flavour intensity tends to increase from the start of the harvest in January/February towards the end of the harvest in June. This is most likely because the later pickings are harvested from the higher altitudes on the farm.
This particular lot comes from the lower part of Finca Nacimiento and is from the beginning of this year’s harvest, picked in February. The altitude in this part of the farm is around 1,500–1,600 metres above sea level, which gives a medium-intense acidity with subtle fruity flavours and a chocolaty finish.
Finca El Vikingo (3rd & 6th bag)
A few years ago, Jobneel Caceres Dios bought a small piece of land in an area not too far away from his first farm, Finca Nacimiento, which should be well known among our followers. He wanted to plant more coffee and different rare cultivars, such as Geisha. This year is the fifth year he has been able to produce Geisha coffee from this new farm, and the quality is, as expected, getting slightly better every year.
Although it is not as expressive as the Geisha coffees we buy from Finca El Puente further south in Honduras, this is still a delicious coffee with delicate and subtle floral and fruity flavours. The herbal notes that used to be quite dominant in the first harvests from these trees are less intense this year and are more in the background of the fruity and floral notes.
We are still working hard to improve this coffee for future harvests, and El Vikingo has been chosen as the test plot for our biological farming trials that we are conducting together with Biofilia. We have already tasted some of the pickings from the trials, and I can honestly say that there are already indications that we will be having better coffee from this farm in the near future.
You can learn more about the project in the YouTube video we made from Jobneel’s farms.
