Fig Mood Espresso

Roselis Herrera lives in a small but privileged coffee region. In my opinion, the tiny area I like to refer to as the “highlands of El Cielito”, which makes up no more than 20 hectares of land, is where some of the most amazing Central American coffees come from. 

Roselis’ farm sits at around 1700m of elevation and is a mixture of new growth Pacas and old growth Bourbon. We have worked with Roselis since 2016 but we’ve been buying from the cielito area since 2012. We know the area well and it’s home to some incredible coffees.

While Roselis owns the land, much of the day to day operations and processing are handled by her uncle, Margarito (we also buy from Margarito). Since I first met Margarito and tasted his awesome coffee, I have been trying to get his help to convince his family to also consider producing quality coffee to sell to us. We now buy coffee from Margarito’s two sons, Evin and Kevin, his brother Pancho, his late dad Juan, and of course, Roselis!

Life in El Cielito moves at a slow pace. It is a tiny community halfway up the mountain, and coffee is the only crop grown in the region. Until 2015, the highlands didn’t even have a road. Margarito is one of seven brothers, and they all produce coffee in this amazing area. Historically, they have sold their coffee, unprocessed, to the nearby co-op. Although Margarito has been processing his own coffee and doing very well since 2012, it took until 2015 Roselis to take note. She built processing and drying infrastructure and since 2016, Margarito has looked after the day to day of the farm and the processing.

Her coffee is always so sweet and round with just the right amount of fruit. When I tasted it this year, I realized it would make an amazing Fig Mood espresso.

His brothers and his dad really helped him out and allowed him to slowly crawl out of his financial woes. Inevitably the quality of the coffee from his farm dropped, which further complicated his personal and financial situation. Fear not! This story has a happy ending! 

In 2022, Pedrito began investing tons of time in the farm, aiming and improving quality and productivity and starting in 2023, the results began to show in the cup. This past year, the coffee improved once again, surpassing the quality levels once achieved by his dad in his heyday.

So why? What’s so special? Well, the farm he inherited from his dad happens to have the best kind of bourbon (variety of coffee). They are old-growth bourbon trees - and old-growth bourbon trees are the best kind of bourbon trees! These trees are definitely part of the magic of the Moreno coffee - most of the coffee from El Cedral comes from one of the Moreno’s but it’s the old bourbons that everyone salivates over. 

Pedrito learned the care of these amazing trees from his dad but in the coffee processing he took after his brother, Elvin. He had drifted away from the traditional fermentation and has opted for a double fermented anaerobic washed process. The extent of fermentation is light - ideal for his coffees - bringing to the forefront the fruit character of the coffee without introducing fermentation byproducts.

The result is a super sweet cup, nice fruit character but lots of caramel and chocolate to create a super interesting but round cup.