TASTES OF:

Lime, plum, butterscotch, milk chocolate

COUNTRY: Mexico

REGION: San Mateo Yoloxochitlán, Oaxaca
FARM: Independent smallholders and Terra Coffeas México, Galguera Gomez export company
VARIETIES: Bourbon, Marsellesa and Typica

PROCESS: Washed
ALTITUDE: 1450-1850m

DESCRIPTION:

This producer group is utilizing uncommon multi-stage fermentation prior to washing. With coordinated processing efforts, this coffee has achieved a level of quality uncommon in such group efforts.

Collaborative Sourcing

When coffee is cultivated and harvested from small family owned farms, exporters play a critical role in ensuring quality and fairness. The collaborative sourcing team of Terra Coffeas México and an export company called Galguera Gomez hits the mark on delivering high quality community lots with traceability and transparent pricing for farmers. Galguera Gomez has been preparing and exporting coffee since 1985 and specializes in preparing traceable Oaxacan lots and paying producers higher incomes for the quality of their coffee. Terra Coffeas México provides post-harvest strategies and cupping expertise that has brought many talented producers into the specialty coffee fold. The model is the perfect hybrid where individual farmers take responsibility for farm management and the post-harvest process with support from Terra Coffeas México, ensuring that each farmer has access to best practices.

Growing Region

This particular lot comes from families living near the town of San Mateo Yoloxochitlán who cultivate coffee on farms with just a few acres. Known as the Sierra Mazateca de Oaxaca, this growing region is located in the northernmost corner of Oaxaca where the local population still wear traditional indigenous clothing and intercrop coffee with bananas, corn, beans, and fruit trees.

Processing details

During the harvest, each producer follows a strict protocol which includes picking cherries at optimum ripeness, hand sorting, and floating in a salt solution to remove damaged, undeveloped beans and inoculate the cherries before macerating for 48 hours. Next the beans are depulped, and fermented for 24 hours while submerged in water. After fermentation, the parchment is washed and placed on patios or raised beds to slowly dry to 11%.

Exporting preparation

Dried coffee is transported to the Galguera Gomez dry mill facility where coffee is received and stored in GrainPro bags, cupped and selected for export. The Galguera Gomez preparation ensures traceability and quality control throughout the post-harvest process, which is a vital process for establishing higher prices for producers.