Country: Nicaragua
City: Matagalpa
Farmers: Roger & Isabel
Farm: Las Mercedes
Altitude: 1330 meters
Varieties: Caturra, Bourbon, Pache, Javanica, Gesha
Processing: 80% natural & 20% carbonic maceration natural
Roger & Isabel’s Tropical Fruit Symphony is a delightful departure from our usual menu. Produced by coffee legends Doña Isabel & Don Roger at Finca Las Mercedes, this coffee lives up to its name. Don Roger has a degree in agronomy and loves sharing technical knowledge and tips with visiting roasters. Their farm has a clean water source that supplies the community below with drinking water. In collaboration with Finca Idealista, a percentage of the lot is sorted all night and then put into anaerobic fermentation tanks as a carbonic maceration in whole cherries, fermented twice, then dried for a month as a natural in the valley below. The use of borrowed wine-making technique, carbonic maceration, imparts more fruity characteristics in the cup. The result is a sweet, clean, and vibrant flavor. We notice kiwi, melon, cherry, and lime.
As a gentle nod to the festivities of Beaujolais Nouveau, we’re releasing the last of our natural and carbonic maceration natural process coffee —Tropical Fruit Symphony. Agronomist Roger Mairena and his wife, Isabel, worked closely with Gold Mountain Coffee Growers to process about 20% of their harvest as a carbonic maceration natural.
Carbonic maceration in coffee is relatively new and it is a technique borrowed from winemaking. Coffee cherries are sealed in anaerobic fermentation tanks with air traps. The cherries soon emit carbon dioxide, which flushes the tanks of oxygen. The CO2 causes the cherries to ferment in a more predictable way, which imparts an intensely fruity and clean flavor without any additives.
Once fermentation is complete, the cherries are left intact and dried in the sun, preserving the unique flavors developed during the process. The result is a vibrant, fruit-forward cup that’s as refreshing as it is delicious—just like a glass of Beaujolais.
Imported by our friends and neighbors at Gold Mountain Coffee Growers
