BOLIVIA COOPERATIVA SAN JUAN
Our featured coffee for February is a juicy and wild washed coffee from the Caranaví province in Bolivia. This coffee is complex with medium body, mild acidity in the front end of the cup, and mild bitterness in the finish. The cup starts with a juicy mouthfeel and the tangy sweetness of ruby red grapefruit juice and grapefruit soda. In the middle, a slight grapefruit bitterness develops and combines with sweet cinnamon notes of horchata. The second half of the cup has a drier mouthfeel and the finish is long with sweet lingering notes of salted caramel.
Roast Color: Medium
Cupping Notes: Salted Caramel, Ruby Red Juice, Horchata
About the coffee of the month: We feature a new coffee every month. This allows us to explore more of the world of coffee outside of our normal offerings. It is available this month only, while supplies last.
Story: Cooperativa Agrícola Cafetalera San Juan (San Juan) was formed in 1974 with 40 farmer members across Caranaví united in the goal of supporting small family farms and organic, chemical-free methods. In 2017, Felix Chambi Garcia joined the organization, bringing with him over 16 years of specialty experience as a cupper and member of various other Bolivian cooperatives. Since then, the coop’s total production, overall quality, and diversity of coffees has all increased significantly. Felix sees himself as part of the younger, renewed generation of coffee lovers in Bolivia.
San Juan relies on individual farmers to process their own coffee. Felix has made quality control central to the coop’s operations. Harvesting goes according to a common protocol: coffee cherry is picked exclusively ripe, floated to sort by density, depulped on small mechanical depulpers, and fermented 18-24 hours. Once fermentation is complete the parchment is washed clean in narrow basins and sundried on raised screen beds.
Bolivia is South America's only landlocked coffee producing country and is the smallest exporter of coffee on the continent. Caranaví's landscape is steep, cloudy, rugged, and remote, with natural forest making up more than 90% of the territory. Coffee farms in this high and tropical climate tend to be well-managed but small, challenged by isolation and lacking in long-term industry support. Facing each and every Bolivian coffee, especially the best ones, is one of the most strenuous overland transits in the coffee world, passing elevations of 4000 meters over the top of the Andes and west to the port of Arica on Chile’s coast. The country’s low production, select few producer groups in the specialty game, and formidable logistical challenges, means each successful arrival is something to be cherished.
