Your Coffee Subscription – December 2023
Dear coffee subscriber,
Holiday season is upon us and by tradition we like to choose some of our very best coffees of the year to be featured as a “Christmas edition” coffee. The first one is a Pacamara from our friend Diego Baraona which is in my opinion the best Pacamara I have ever tasted from Los Pirineos.
If you subscribe to 3 bags or more you will also get to taste the Geisha produced by Diego, which is also tasting better than ever. The increase in quality from this farm is not only because of the favourable growing conditions in the 2022/23 season. It is also the results of many years of hard work in order to make the farm and coffee trees healthier and a constant improvement of their processing techniques.
But this work is not over yet, it has only just begun. In November I spent a week in Guatemala with Diego and the other farmers we buy from in Latin-America. The purpose of the trip was to learn about organic coffee farming. My goal is that we within the next 10 years only buy organically grown coffee. This is because I believe it is better for quality, longevity and the economy of the farms. Since we are all about working long term with the farmers we buy from, we have to make sure they are able to change their practices away from mineral fertilisers and agrochemicals towards regenerative farming practices. They are all positive to the changes and we will start working towards achieving this goal already next year. However it will take several years before we reach the goal.
Lastly I would like to thank you on behalf of my whole team, the coffee producers we buy from and myself. Thank you for your continued support and for making our jobs so meaningful and joyful. We will work hard to make sure you get to taste some delicious coffees also in 2024.
Happy holidays.
– Tim W
Los Pirineos Pacamara (1st and 4th bag)
Flavour notes: Winey, red berries & dark chocolate
Producer: Diego Baraona
Harvest: February 2023
Origin: Tecapa-Chinameca, Usulutan, El Salvador
Process: Semi-washed
Cultivar: Pacamara
This is by far the best Pacamara coffee I have tasted from Los Pirineos in many years. In fact I believe it is one of the best coffees I tasted in 2023. With a complex winey ripe red fruit flavour, medium intense acidity and rich mouthfeel, it is a coffee that keeps on giving while you are drinking it. There is a reason why Los Pirineos has won so many awards for their Pacamara coffees and this is a prime example of how good these coffees can be.
Often times you hear that Pacamara coffees can be a bit herbal or oniony in flavour, and I don’t disagree, but this coffee has none of those off-flavours. There are so many versions of Pacamara being planted as the cultivar is not uniform, probably because it was released before it was stabilised as a new hybrid cultivar. Maybe that is why there are so many different flavour profiles of this cultivar as well. Still, the Pacamara coffees from Los Pirineos always taste good and rarely have any of those herbaceous flavours. I believe this is because Los Pirineos was in fact one of the farms involved in the development of the cultivar, and today Diego produces high quality certified Pacamara seeds that he also sells to other farmers. That means he is able to produce a very stable type of Pacamara trees.
Fortunately this lot was big enough to be able to offer it as one of our selected “Christmas Edition” coffees this year. I don’t really have any particular criteria for selecting Christmas edition coffees other than that the coffee itself needs to be among the best we have in stock. A perfect coffee for the holidays and also a perfect gift to someone who loves coffee.
Karinga (2nd & 5th bag)
Flavour notes: Floral, blackcurrants & rose hips
Producer: Several smallholder farmers
Harvest: December 2022
Origin: Kiambu, Kenya
Process: Washed
Cultivar: SL28 & SL34
This coffee is grown at around 1900 masl in Kiambu where the climate is cool and makes the coffee ripen slower and develop more flavour, sweetness and acidity.
Most of the members who sell their coffee cherries to this wet mill grow mainly the SL28 cultivar (with some growing SL34) because of good yields and exceptional quality in high altitudes. The majority of the farmers in this area have therefore been reluctant to plant the newer rust tolerant hybrids Batian and Ruiru 11 which are becoming more common in lower altitudes in Kenya.
For me this coffee has been a standout for several years when I have been tasting coffees in Kenya because of its intensity of flavour. It has a crisp acidity and an intense fruity and floral character that makes it both intense and elegant at the same time.
One of the reasons why I selected this lot as one of our Christmas edition coffees is not only because of it’s high quality but also because I love drinking coffees with more intensity and bright acidity after eating a lot of heavy foods, like one often does during the festive season.
Los Pirineos Geisha (3rd or 6th bag)
Flavour notes: Milk chocolate, floral & tangerine
Producer: Diego Baraona
Harvest: February 2023
Origin: Tecapa-Chinameca, Usulutan, El Salvador
Process: Semi-washed
Cultivar: Geisha
Diego’s father Gilberto started planting Geisha from a handful of seeds many years ago. In fact he started with just a few trees in his garden outside his house in San Salvador before transferring the trees and planting more on his farm. This was because back then it was really hard to come across good Geisha seeds and Gilberto wanted to personally guard his trees to make sure they grew up well. Since then we have been waiting patiently for the trees to produce enough of the good quality to be able to offer this coffee in our selections. I have already have tasted this coffee for a few years now and every year it has had a very distinct and unique orange and tangerine flavour that reminds me of eating orange flavoured milk chocolate.
Last year this coffee was more subtle with low flavour intensity, but this year Diego has made sure to process the coffee really well and has managed to produce a much more flavour intense Geisha coffee. It is quite different from the famous Geishas you can get from Panama that tends to be more delicate with a lighter body and a more floral cup profile. This is a completely different style of Geisha with a heavier body, dense mouthfeel and loads of tangerine flavour with some orange blossom aromas.