Description
*THIS IS A VERY EXOTIC COLOMBIAN – make sure you like Natural Processed coffees before putting this one in your cart. Very fruity with clear slow dry fermentation and a stronger winy factor. Unlike any other Colombians but a very awesome and high rated offering for natural processed fans.
Looking to support women in coffee? Mildred Muñoz has dedicated Santa María, a 75-acre family farm, to be run entirely by women. The group of 22 women control everything from leadership decisions through quality control. The project is new, but the women have support from Mildred and her husband Oscar Daza who has another farm nearby called La Pradera. The alliance gives the women at Santa Maria access to award winning processing protocols developed at La Pradera. The cherries for this particular lot were meticulously selected and fermented in an anaerobic and aerobic environment before being placed on raised beds for drying.
Tasting Notes: A lovely coffee from light to dark, very fruit forward and winy. Lighter roasts are clean and a bit higher acidity, a nice strong lemony tartness mixing with stronger semi-sweet stone fruit, one here described it as like cool-aid without enough sugar; which we think is quite the compliment for a natural processed coffee. Exotic and clean, not much else like these high rated unique naturals. Medium to dark roasts bring into the picture more traditional nutty and chocolaty tones with those lemony red fruit highlights pushing into the background. Much more balance is found in the cup from medium to dark and even though we loved the lighter roasts, medium/dark turned the cup into more of a daily drinker and not something super exotic to appreciate.
Roasting Notes: These beans can be a little tricky to roast, a bit uneven and very high chaff but a tasty treat worth the effort for natural processed fans. Reduce batch size a bit on this one. A tasty and easy to hit roast point would be to cool it right away as it touches 2nd crack, will have some roasty tones but tasty and one can work backwards for much stronger fruity & floral tones.
Glenn Squires (verified owner) –
My new “go-to” coffee, replacing, or at least sharing my top spot with Bali Kintamani Natural. Something about the natural processed coffees, I don’t have the palate to describe exactly what, has spoiled me for other coffees. Roast it toward the lighter/medium end of the spectrum for a coffee that makes “normal” processed coffees taste boring. I hope this one comes back next year, but in the meantime I am not sharing the 6 lbs I have stored.