Mexico

La Frontera

The first harvest from Cafeólogo’s new community project, located further south on the border with Guatemala.

A richly sweet base of almond and caramel is lifted by complex and fresh citrus notes.

Producer
La Frontera Farmers
Coffee expression
A sweet & balanced coffee

Regular price: $23.00
incl. vat/tax
Sale price: $23.00
incl. vat/tax
Regular price: ~~$23.00~~
Unit price: per

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Grown by a small community of Mayan farmers in the Chiapas region of southern Mexico.

Mexico

Cafeólogo

Cafeólogo is a project founded by Jesús Salazar, focussing mainly on indigenous coffee growers in the area around San Cristobal de las Casas in central Chiapas, the southernmost region of Mexico. San Cristobal is located rather close to the border with Guatemala, and is in fact only around 200 km or about a 5 hour drive from San Marcos Huista in Huehuetenango, where we have purchased several coffees in the past. Starting in 2010, Jesús initially worked with 4 small producers, but soon many producers in the area were curious about the project, and the prices they could be paid for their coffee through their newly found access to the speciality market. To be able to accept so many more farmers into the project, Jesús realised that quality control would be very difficult if each producer was to grow and process their own coffee. So he made it his mission to add value to each group of producer’s work through careful processing, undertaking a Q-processing course and building two community wet mills, Sibactel and San Pedro.

Processed by Cafeólogo at their new Amatenango de la Frontera community mill.

Chiapas

La Frontera

Over the past few harvests, members of the Cafeólogo team immersed themselves in the communities at San Pedro and Sibactel, learning the local Mayan dialects, understanding each farmer’s practices, their challenges and their needs. They have now also begun this process further south, right on the border with Guatemala, at their new Amatenango de la Frontera community wet mill. They have surveyed some of the more technical aspects of the land here, identifying potential pest and disease problems, and sequencing the varietals they found on each farm. Through this, they were able to present each farmer with a package of agronomic support. Cafeólogo, seeing the value of each farmer’s high quality cherry, pay the same price as for a high quality parchment coffee, so their income is not reduced, but their cost of production and level of risk is. This allows them to focus on the agronomical aspects of coffee production, with support from Cafeólogo on topics such as coffee physiology, nutrition, pests and diseases, organic practices and vitally, their own quality control.

A richly sweet base of almond and caramel is lifted by complex and fresh citrus notes.

La Frontera

Amatenango

Here in the Amatenango region, many producers are locked into long term agreements with large buyers, forcing them to sell cherry at an unsustainably low price to be blended into large regional lots. This new project hopes to keep more value in farming communities, and to hand back some control over the final product. This particular lot from La Frontera was processed using the washed method, creating a very clean and clear representation of the terroir here, similar to the lots we often purchase from just over the border in Huehuetenango. A sweet base of almond and caramel is lifted by fresh and complex citrus notes.

Technical Data

Producer
La Frontera Farmers
Region
Chiapas
Altitude
1700 masl
Varietal
Maragogype
Process
Washed
Harvest
May 2021

Washed Process

The washed process involves completely removing both the cherry and the mucilage from the outside of the parchment with the use of friction, fermentation and water. After being harvested, the coffee cherry is then sliced open by either a metal or a sharp plastic blade.

The two seeds (also known as beans) are pushed out of the cherry, which leaves the seed with mucilage as their outermost layer. It is essential in the washed process that all mucilage is removed from the seed which leaves only the flavour that developed in the cell structure of the seed prior to processing.