About This Coffee
This Fully washed lot is produced by smallholders in Huila who farm Castillo and Colombia varieties on their farms. Farms at typically between 0.5 and 10 hectares in size and sit at 1,650 to 1,900 meters above sea level.
Harvest & Post-Harvest
Coffee is processed on individual farms. On the farm, farmers float cherry to remove any underripe cherry. Then, they pulp cherry and ferment it in tiled tanks for 16 to 24 hours. Following fermentation, the wash parchment in clean water and lay it to dry on patios, elbas (the flat roofs of their houses) or marquesinas. They rake parchment frequently to ensure even drying. It takes approximately 15 days for parchment to dry. Once dry, farmers deliver their parchment to Sucafina in Colombia’s milling plant in Palermo, Huila where it is blended, hulled and prepared for export.
Supremo Grade
Screen sizes remain fairly uniform across countries but grade names are often unique to the country of origin. In the Colombian grading system, Supremo is the largest size bean.
The process of separating beans by size is a crucial stage of the dry milling process. A screen grading machine has a series of screens stacked on top of each other. Green coffee is fed into the machine, and as the screens are shaken, beans that are smaller than holes on a specific screen will fall through to a lower screen until they reach a screen with holes too small for them to fit.
Supremo is typically screen sizes 17 to 18.
Coffee in Colombia
Colombia has been producing and exporting coffee renowned for their full body, bright acidity and rich aftertaste, since the early 19th century.
Colombia boasts a wide range of climates and geographic conditions that produce their own unique flavors in coffee. This also means that harvest times can vary quite a bit. In fact, between all its different regions, Colombia produces fresh crop nearly all year round.
The increasing focus on the specialty industry is changing the way traders and farmers do business. It is becoming more common for farmers to isolate the highest quality beans in their lots to market separately. These higher-quality lots are often sold under specific brands or stories.
Besides its wide variety of cup profiles, Colombia has quickly expanded its certification options over the past 10 years. The most common certifications available are Fairtrade, Rainforest Alliance and Organic.