Colombia
La Roca, Geisha Lot
250g
Terroir Best Lot
QUALITY SCORE: 88.75
Cup Notes
Jasmine / Lemon / Honey / Peach / Toffee
Suggested for espresso and filter
when we roast
We freshly roast to order all coffees on Monday, Wednesday and Friday (excluding national holidays), and ship the same day! Cut-off time is 11:59pm (UTC+1) of the day before the roast day. *We only ship whole beans*
Details
- Quality Score
- 88.75
- Series
- Terroir Best Lot
- Producer
- Jorge Rojas
- Country
- Colombia
- Terroir
- Tolima
- Altitude
- 1900 masl
- Process
- Anaerobic Washed
- Arabica cultivar
- Geisha
- Picked in
- August 2021
- Arrived in
- February 2022
- Shipped in
- Box + Vacuum pack
- Roast profile by
- Rubens Gardelli
- Roasted on
- Customised solid-drum roaster
THE STORY BEHIND
Tolima is situated in the west of Colombia. It sits between Huila, Cauca and Valle De Cauca and is bordered by Caldas to the north and west. This region is one of the least inhabited ones in the country and is quite difficult to reach. The department of Tolima is known for the high productivity of farming and for the outstanding quality and unique profile of specialty coffee produced here.
This lot comes from Finca La Roca State owned by Jorge Rojas who inherited and took on the farm helping his mother when he was only 12. Due to this loss in the family at that time it was difficult for Jorge to finish his studies as his work was needed for the family's survival. Now, with 20 years of experience in coffee farming, Jorge has been developing the farm by planting rare varietals, such as Pink Bourbon and Geisha. Jorge has especially focused on the post-harvest processing, for he realises the importance of processing for making the most of the coffee grown.
THE VARIETY
Rare, exclusive and fetching a heavy price tag, Gesha is often associated with coffees from Panama, while, in fact, the cultivation of the Gesha varietal began there as late as in the 1960s.
Gesha is an original variety of coffee that was discovered in the 1930s in the mountains around the Southwestern town of Gesha, Ethiopia. Gesha trees grow tall and can be distinguished by their beautiful elongated leaves. The quality of this coffee can be drastically improved when grown at extremely high elevation.
The Geisha revolution brought about an intense search for Geisha among coffee buyers and a primal pilgrimage to Ethiopia to find the source of that flavor. The roads those buyers traveled brought them in a wood in far western Ethiopia near a small town called Gesha in the forests where coffee was born and still grows wild.
Gesha 1931 comes from this place.
Its name reflects the place and year it was collected by scientists who fanned out on a research expedition in Ethiopia to catalogue its coffee varieties.
THE FERMENTATION PROCESS
As producers give increasing consideration to the effect of fermentation on the quality and profile of their coffee, they are adopting different and interesting techniques to their repertoires in order to diversify their offering. One method that is becoming more popular is fermenting coffee in a controlled anaerobic environment, meaning that the coffee is held in a vessel without any presence of oxygen for a part of the fermentation process. For this lot, the whole cherries underwent anaerobic fermentation in covered barrels for 36 hours.
After fermentation, the cherries undergo the first drying phase at 26 degrees. The second phase is parabolic drying where the cherries are dried at the maximum temperature of 34 degrees during four hours per day for 28 days.
