Candelilla Mill "Palmilera"
Fans of this coffee from a few years back will be happy to know that the Candelilla "Palmilera" Gesha is back on the menu! Like before, we have an intense candy-like sweetness, dried berries and molasses. A luxurious, velvety cup.
La Candelilla was one of the first micromills in Tarrazú, opening in the year 2000, though the idea to open the mill came to the growers in 1997, during a coffee crisis. It's a collaboratively owned micromill, established by 7 smallholder producers in Tarrazú: The farmers who use it and deliver their harvests to the mill share ownership. This lot is from one of the founders of the mill, Ricardo Hernandez Naranjo, who was one of the first to suggest to his farmer mates that they should start the "mini beneficio."
Don Ricardo has been growing coffee for 32 years, and is dedicated to the process, as are many of the producers who utilize La Candelilla. Don Ricardo also worked for 10 years as a consultant at beneficios in Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, Panama, and even Tanzania, helping mills improve their processing and learning more about coffee quality.
"The production of processing specialty coffees is something I have been studying for 15 years," he says through a translator. "I have had to develop the processes as well as to identify the different varieties for special batches." He grows several different varieties and processes them in many ways, including this classic Washed presentation of a Typica variety.
His trees grow in rich ultisol, which is a type of red-clay soil that is particularly fertile in humid tropical or subtropical areas. This soil composition contains no calcium carbonate or lime. Once the ripe cherry is brought to the mill, it is processed depending on the profile and the weather.
Region Tarrazu < Costa Rica
Altitude 1400-1800 MASL
Process Natural
Varietal Gesha
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Sorting Level
5%
All our roasted coffees are run through an AI-powered optical sorter. This extra step ensures that you receive only the most nutrient-dense, flavorful coffees from each lot. The machine is also capable of removing any foreign objects (corn, metals, rope, to name a few) from the rest of the coffees.
The higher the percentage, the more coffee is being removed in order to achieve a truly pristine product. We liken this to how sake-makers "polish" during production in order to reach a higher-quality product.
Nothing goes to waste: the rejected coffees are re-roasted and sold to local markets.
Variety / Cultivar
Gesha
Perhaps the most distinguished variety: gesha represents a caliber of coffee that exists at the highest level in terms of quality. This variety was originally collected from coffee forests in Ethiopia in the 1930s.