[14] Peru - Finca La Productiva [CROP 23/24 ARCHIVE]

Raul's double fermented yellow caturra ran from 24/01/24 to 17/04/2024. 

Our second Peruvian release of the season is from Raul Flores, who grows exclusively Yellow Caturra in his farm Finca La Productiva. Thanks to his focus on a single variety as well as meticulous iterative quality testing, this two-stage anaerobic washed lot shows a top example of the quality this variety can express. We’re finding it very clean, jammy & fruit forward!

Brew Guide:

Best Brewed with: Filter

We found this coffee to present a juicy, jammy acidity with lots of purple notes - we’re roasting it to keep the high acidity the coffee holds balanced with sweetness; while keeping the overall roast influence low.

We recommend a 60-62g/L ratio and 98c water when brewing this as filter, for espresso we recommend a rest time of 3 weeks and 18g in, 45g out in 28-32s.

We’re tasting: Sweet aromatics akin to strawberry foam hearts. In the cup - ripe green apple, the tangy sweetness of purple and red wine gums, and a jammy texture. There’s sweet and light pistachio crème note in the finish

Traceability:

The Story

Peruvian coffee is a shining diamond in the winter months - freshly landed with distinctive profiles, high altitude production in this South American country can produce microlots with acidity and complexity on par with the “best” coffee producing countries in the world. Our second release is a well known variety - Yellow Caturra (a mutation of the traditional Caturra variety that produces yellow fruit instead of the traditional burgundy colour) grown and processed by producer Raul Flores.  This lot landed a little more open and expressive, so we're releasing it now so that it runs at the peak of flavour. 

Raul owns the 1.5 HA Finca La Productiva in the San Ignacio province of Cajamarca, in a village that Raul’s family helped co-found. Following the Agrarian reforms of the 1960s (as we touched on in copy for Consuelo Rubio) large estates and landholdings in Peru were broken up and the land redistributed to smallholders. 

Raul’s father alongside three others established El Diamente on one of those allocations, clearing land and building houses as well as farm plots, and campaigning successfully for the local government to both recognise the nascent hamlet and provide utilities for it. Nearly 50 years later the community has become firmly established, with the principle economy of speciality coffee production. 

Raul’s father gifted him a small isolated plot of land that was destined to become Finca Productiva. The plot is hard to reach - access is by foot only and all equipment and supplies has to be hand transported up to the farm, which also means all dried parchment must be taken back the same route. 

Raul has fully embraced speciality production - he is training in cupping so he can take ownership of the value of his coffee. Being able to evaluate and determine quality at the point of production is one of the key things needed to decolonise the coffee supply chain - moving the balance of quality and price discovery from being solely in the power of importers and roasters such as ourselves. It’s a topic we intend to talk about more as part of our green coffee series on the Behind the Scenes blog.

As part of his quality focus, Raul  keeps meticulous notes and follows feedback loops to iteratively improve his production, a process we know well from our own roasting plans. He keeps his day lots separated during the harvest, and every two weeks as lots are drying on the beds, he takes samples to the local lab in Jaén. 

Thanks to this quality feedback, he can isolate higher and lower grade outturns - both improving the consistency and quality of his export grade coffee, as well as separate out lower grade lots for co-op blending. 

He rigorously monitors both the internal conditions of his fermentation as well as the external conditions, with a key eye for temperature - he ensures his fermentation tanks do not get too hot, as stressed yeasts can contribute off flavours to coffee. This lot - which we have UK exclusivity on - has nearly 5 days of fermentation in 2 stages, but tastes remarkably clean and transparent, which is a testament to Raul’s skills and one we’re excited to share.