Stumptown Coffee Roasters Colombia El Jordan
Prior to us going on our totally awesome and relaxing vacation, most of the coffee that I had been drinking I had roasted myself. This past Christmas Erin had gotten me a home-roasting machine and a few pounds of green beans. But it wasn’t until July that I really got the hang of home-roasting and felt like the coffee I was making was pretty good. And since green beans are so inexpensive relative to roasted coffee, a few pounds went a long way.
Next thing I knew, I hadn’t bought coffee from any of my favorite roasters for a while. But when we were in Portland I couldn’t resist the chance to pick up some freshly roasted coffee from Stumptown. And since we were on vacation, I decided to branch out from my recent African-coffee-obsession and picked up this Latin American coffee. I couldn’t really resist Stumptown’s tasting notes.
The beans making up this lot of coffee are all from farms that are members of two cooperatives, APCEJOR and ACEDGA. The farms are located in central-western Colombia in the municipality of Planadas, in the Tolima province, just a bit south of the Nevado del Tolima volcano, a 5200 foot tall mountain that last erupted in 1943. The lot includes beans that were harvested from each day of the harvest season, all of which were grown at an altitude of 1500-1800 meters, and includes the Caturra, Typica, and Colombia varietals.
After harvesting, the cherries are de-pulped using hand-cranked machines. They are then left to ferment for 12-16 hours before being washed and laid out to dry on parabolic drying beds. These are long, rectangular structures mildly similar to greenhouses, except that they are open on both ends. The beans are laid out on raised plastic mats that have holes in the bottom to allow the moisture to escape. The drying process typically takes 7-14 days, until the moisture level in the beans reaches 10-12%. This drying system is common on all but large-scale farms in Colombia, and has the unique benefit of freeing the growers from having to move the coffee in the event of rain.
Because I hadn’t had any Latin American coffees, with their typically brighter more citrusy flavor profile, in a while, I was looking forward to digging into this bag of coffee. And let me tell you, a cup of this first thing in the morning really woke up my senses.
The nose has flavors of figs, toast, cinnamon. The palate leads off with bright, sparkling acidity that complements the flavors of cherry stones, orange rinds, lemongrass and – curiously – toasted marshmallows. Underscoring these flavors is a slightly heavy undercurrent of caramel. The finish is the where the citrus flavors really blossom though, carrying bright notes of oranges and lemons through a long, slow crescendo.
A very nice coffee, highly enjoyable and a perfect complement to the cooler mornings that we’ve had of late. As obsessed as I’ve been with African coffees, I wasn’t too far gone to really enjoy and appreciate this lot. Definitely recommended.
P.S. This is my 100th post, which I think is pretty cool. I began writing this as a lark almost a year ago, and while it really still is a lark (I don’t think anyone reads it but me), I get a real kick from writing here. And I think it’s especially cool that a Stumptown coffee was the subject of my 100th post, since it’s companies like them that really inspire to think so much about these topics!
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