Panama Premium Boquete – Mama Cata Estate – Typica ASD

Description

Mama Cata is a very top notch award winning farm that very seldom makes it to the US. Located in some of the best growing territory in Panama, Jose’s highest elevation and most renowned farm (he owns Garrido Estate as well as some other smaller fields).  Some of the biggest names in Panama coffee are also located in this prime territory, Hacienda Esmeralda and Elida Estate are neighbors.  Since his coffee is always obtained by foreign markets, many in the US have not heard the name Mama Cata before.

Founded in 1911, one of the original premium Panama farms, currently owned by Jose David Garrido Perez (who also owns Garrido, and just happens to be decent friends with our Panamanian farmer buddy, Keith Pech).  Jose has won the Best of Panama competition many times in the past, he knows how to grow and process some of the worlds best coffee.

This is an ASD processed (anaerobic slow dry natural) Typica strain from one of the lower fields on Mama Cata, still considered very high grown coffee but the top fields he reserves for his Geisha strains. A wonderful offering, definitely a fruit bomb lighter roast coffee!

Tasting Notes: A light to medium roast, very jazzy fruit forward offering. Medium bodied with a bit of crisp citric acidity upfront, this is the smoothest of the fruit bomb coffees. The red fruit overlays a nutty and chocolaty undertone wonderfully. Sometimes with this much fruitiness the cup leans towards hints of a boozy character but not with the ASD processing, crisp clean and clear tones. Although we consider it a jazzy lighter roast coffee, these beans do work very well at medium to dark roasts as well, richer and darker toned moving the fruitiness to the back end of the tastes.

Roasting Notes: High chaff and a bit uneven roasting, we would still consider this one of the easier natural processed Panama’s to roast. Tasty from light to dark, on this one, we would error a little darker than lighter for it is a tasty treat even if you get a little darker than you thought. Setup time is just as important though, for the best cup possible, try to wait 3-4 days. Tasty after 24 hours though, with the aromatics coming from these beans, it is hard to wait to drink it!

Keith Pech has become a good friend over the last couple of seasons. He has some family in the U.P. (Michigan) and passes by our warehouse from time to time when visiting his family. Keith is really on the cutting edge of Panamanian coffee, he places in the the Best of Panama every year he enters.

He really hooked it up with some nice high-end Natural Processed Catuai and Typica from his farm, as well as playing our eyes and ears on the ground in Panama.  His mom is actually part of the Ruiz family who we sourced a ton of awesome Panama coffees from in years past.

Turns out Keith is buddies with all the other Panama operations we have dealt with in the past as well. Elida, HI-U, Esmeralda, Mama Cata, Nuguo, Ruiz. Quite the guy to have befriended, with being able to piggyback on his containers, we now have easy access to the best of the best.  Not only that, but with Keith playing nice and being very well-liked by these other farmers, we were able to snag top lots from the best farms in Panama, primo beans that normally never make it to the US.  Nothing else on the block like these offerings!