The sweetness stands out from the first sip with a mouthful of light caramel, toffee and milk chocolate. A vanilla note runs through that creamy sweetness before a gentle peach on the aftertaste wraps it up.
This lot brings together three classic Arabica varietals: Typica, Caturra, and Catuai. Typica is recognised as one of the most important varietals in the world for its high cup quality and cultural significance. Caturra, a natural mutation of Bourbon discovered in Brazil, is generally recognised for being crisp, complex, and sweet with bright acidity. Catuai, a cross between Caturra and Mundo Novo developed in Brazil in 1949, is characterised by great vigour and a compact growth habit. Together, these varietals produce a balanced cup that showcases the distinct terroir of Bolivia's Yungas region.
To ensure only the very ripest coffee cherries are picked, it's not uncommon for producers in the Sol de la Mañana programme to do seven or eight harvesting passes across their plants. This is very labour-intensive and yields smaller amounts each harvest, but ensures great quality.
The processing method used here is Dry Fermented Washed, which builds upon Bolivia's traditional washed approach. After selective picking, cherries are depulped and transferred to large, sealed stainless steel tanks where fermentation is carried out anaerobically for careful control. This anaerobic environment provides producers with the flexibility to extend the fermentation timeline, giving rise to the development of new and interesting flavours. The sealed environment also makes it easier to monitor different variables such as temperature and pH level. A full harvest at Agricafe's wet mill generates about 3,000 unique lots of coffee, which are then recombined by their cuppers or buyers to create larger lots, or in many cases marketed separately as microlots.
- FILTER RECIPE
- Suggested method: V60
Dose: 15g
Water: 250ml / 97
Time: 4 mins
To find the method that suits your kit, check out our Brew Guides.
- Country: Bolivia
- Region: Caranavi
- Colonia: Uchamachi
- Producers: Gutierrez family
- Elevation: 1,700 m.a.s.l.
- Varietal: Typica, Caturra & Catuai
- Processing method: Dry Fermented Washed
The Gutiérrez family are participants in the Sol de la Mañana programme, an initiative developed by the Rodríguez family of Agricafe. Sol de la Mañana (Morning Sun in English) started in 2014 with the aim of transferring knowledge developed at Fincas Los Rodríguez to the families involved in coffee cultivation in the Caranavi region. The objective is to allow farmers to obtain sustainable profitability in the long term through better quality coffee and higher productivity.
When the programme began, the average production of a single producer was 2.5 bags of green coffee per hectare. Given the average producer has one to three hectares of land, this meant they were only producing around 10 bags of coffee to survive. The programme functions like a school, using a 10-year curriculum focused on best practices for nursery and farm management, plant nutrition, renovation, specialty harvesting, and biodiversity. When the first commercial harvest was sold in 2017, the success of the programme attracted more producers. It currently has 100 contributing farms, and production for most has increased from a per-hectare average of two to four bags to over 20.
The Uchamachi colonia is located a short distance east of Caranavi, where our exporting partners Agricafe operate the Buena Vista mill. Uchamachi is one of Bolivia's oldest coffee-growing regions. In the 1950s and 1960s, sawmills came into this land and constructed roads that later assisted with agricultural production. Coffee production soon took off, reaching its peak in 1990.
Sol de la Mañana producers deliver their freshly picked coffee cherries to the Buena Vista mill at the end of each day. As each sack arrives, it is unloaded and checked, with samples taken and detailed information recorded. This allows the lot to be tracked and quality results fed back to producers. Due to small individual lots, all deliveries are combined for processing.
Agricafe was founded by Pedro Rodríguez, who entered the coffee industry in 1986, leaving his banking career to pursue his passion for coffee. Today, the family, including Pedro's children Daniela and Pedro Pablo, own 12 farms in total: eight in Caranavi and four in Samaipata. The Rodríguez family aim to keep 60% of the land at their farms as nature reserves, with the plots themselves planted amongst the trees as an agroforest.
The innovation at the Buena Vista mill extends to the fermentation vessels themselves. More commonly seen in breweries or wineries, the stainless steel tanks allow the absolute highest level of control in managing this process and enable the team to deliver incredibly consistent quality. Supported by the onsite lab and resident microbiologist, samples are taken and measured daily to monitor the fermentation.