Fig Mood Espresso

The tiny region of Tarqui is a particularly special place for me. It’s a small region on the west side of the province of Huila, tucked between Pitalito and La Plata and it sits high, overlooking the famous Magdalena river that runs through much of the coffee producing regions of Colombia. His farm, Finca La Esperanza, sits near the top of the local mountain range that overlooks the town of Tarqui.

The variety is “variedad Colombia”, which means Colombian variety and is simply referred to as “Colombia” in the coffee world. The next little bit might bore you, but I’ll take my chances and walk you through the background of this famous variety. Colombia is a hybrid coffee variety developed by Cenicafé in the late 1960s, during a period when coffee leaf rust (dangerous fungus) posed a serious threat to producers across the country. By crossing Caturra with Timor Hybrid, researchers aimed to create a plant that balanced disease resistance with yields and plant structure suitable for Colombia’s farms. The variety was released widely in the early 1980s and quickly became one of the most commonly planted in the country. Its compact growth allows for higher planting densities, helping farmers increase productivity per hectare, and it adapts well across a range of elevations and climates. While it was originally selected for agronomic reasons, improved farming and processing have shown that Colombia can also produce expressive, place-driven coffees when managed carefully.

While I think the variety had an overall positive impact on Colombia’s coffee production, I believe the way the variety was planted and grown did long term damage to Colombia. The plant’s ability to grow in full sun, along with the high planting density transformed agricultural practices in Colombia, resulting in excessive use of synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, fungicides and various other agrochemicals. Amongst higher quality producers, around 2012-2014 I started to notice a shift back to more biodynamic agriculture, lower densities, more shade and far less reliance on agrochemicals.

In Ever’s farm, at 1900m of elevation, his Colombia is planted under the shade of high canopy trees and the cooler conditions help the trees ripen slower and allow complexity (i.e. nice flavours) to develop in the fruit.

Ever’s approach is very traditional. He picks the cherries when their colour reaches rich burgundy, then he floats the cherries to remove low density (i.e. bad tasting) cherries and clean the coffee of dirt and debris. Then he ferments for 48 hours and then fully washes the coffee before drying it on traditional Colombian raised beds under the canopy.