by Isabella Vitaliano
Welcome to our Specialty Green Coffee Cupping Series on Thursdays where we highlight recent arrivals. We select several coffees to cup at The Crown and provide more in-depth tasting notes, coffee background, and usage recommendations.
30698 Ethiopia Sidama 3 Natural FT-FLO/USA Organic Hache
Apple, clean, dried strawberry, and mild fruit can all be found in this natural Ethiopian. A solid G3 option with a classic nutty finish, this is not ideal for picky light roasters but will handle medium to medium-plus roasts with grace. Pop it in a blender to add some fruit to your profile and develop a little more sweetness in the roast, which may elevate the chocolate-fruit experience this coffee has to offer.
This lot comes from the Oromia Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union (OCFCU), an umbrella organization established in 1999 by 34 individual cooperatives interested in centralizing resources and gaining leverage in the export market. As of 2020, OCFCU supports more than 400 individual cooperatives, comprising more than 400,000 households, making it by far the largest unionization of farmers in the country. OCFCU has established a central cupping lab to support quality control and is a founding shareholder in its members’ bank, the Cooperative Bank of Oromia, providing pre-harvest financing and crop insurance. OCFCU has been Fairtrade and Organic certified since 2002 and is one of the world’s largest suppliers of Fairtrade coffee.
31242 Guatemala Huehuetenango Txol Witz
A plethora of flavor offerings from this Huehuetenango lot: the team got notes of apple juice, coconut sugar, lemon warhead, Meyer lemon, peach, raisin, and mild florals. Great for a light to medium roast, we recommend putting this on espresso to liven up the profile even more. As it cools, you might notice a touch of dryness present, which on espresso will be a non-starter due to using espresso shots before they die. Also, a great option for pour-over; this coffee may be a touch subtle but nonetheless charming and delicious.
Bella Vista, a wet/dry mill based in Antigua, works with targeted smallholder groups in other departments throughout Guatemala, often overseeing processing and lot building from cherry to export. In this case, the Bella Vista team has been advising a select farmer group in San Pedro Necta for the past 8 years, transporting their finished parchment to Antigua, and then carefully building highly traceable lots for buyers.
30920 Guatemala San Juan Sacatepéquez Finca Concepcion Pixcaya SHB EP
On the first pass, you’ll notice that this coffee is bright, clean, and creamy. Although a little simple when hot, this coffee cools beautifully and has some great acidity with light orange notes, along with milk chocolate, orange rind, salted peanut, citrus, and caramel. A darker roast on this coffee may become a little imbalanced, so we recommend keeping it a light to medium roast. This could be a very classic batch brew for a year-round staple or even a single-origin pour-over option. The profile might be a little timid at first, but let it open up to some of the complexity and nuances it has to offer.
The Concepcion Pixacya Farm is located in the municipality of San Juan Sacatepequez in the Department of Guatemala, Guatemala. Maria Cristina Miron de Zaghi owns the coffee farm, and her son, Manuel Zaghi Miron, supervises the operations, ensuring they produce high-quality coffee. In 2012, the farm produced a coffee lot that won 10th place in the Cup of Excellence. They are well-known for their diversity, including macadamia and avocado cultivation, as well as a pine and cypress forest. In 2003, the farm was nominated by the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations for its efforts in reforestation.
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