Finca Vista Hermosa, Huehuetenango, Guatemala part 1

Getting to Finca Vista Hermosa is not easy, unless you go with someone who works at the farm. The roads are not bad, it´s just that signs are pretty non-existent. Fortunately I had a fairly experienced guide:

Edwin Martinez, roaster and grower in the 3rd generation.


My collegue Klaus was here 1 year ago, I recommend you to read about his experiences, and I will try not to repeat too much of what he wrote.

Arriving in the afternoon we saw that activity was lower than you might expect at this time of year. We are in the middle of the harvest season, so normally the patios would be full of coffee and pickers would line up and unload their cherries to be processed.

But the last days had brought some tough weather, which even included hail. Hail is not very usual, but does occur now and then. Generally this season has been a bit dry and cold. For the farm this means that you get periods of days when there are no ripe cherries to pick, which in turn means that there´s no work for the pickers.
The pickers then go to work in other farms or on their own fields, but not necesserly with coffee. How far away they go depends a lot on if they live permanently in the neighbourhood. You would think it’s hard to gather everybody when time is right again, but no worries, many people have cellphones and the word spreads fast.

So the following morning everybody knew that there was a lot of work to do.


First you see a group of maybe maybe 5 people approach silently from one hillside, then 3 from the other side, then 3 more, by 6 o’clock the meeting point on the road is full of people. Diego or somene else permanently working at farm goes through which fields are going to be worked on and 5 min later everybody is off again. It´s time to go picking.


It might sound random who is actually working in the farm as a picker, but nothing could be more wrong. People are recommnded by other pickers to be able to work at the farm. This goes the other way around as well- farms has to provide good conditions, access, school nearby etc, there is always work to be found other places. So all in all, it´s a mutual selection process of who works with whom, that is not entirely easy to map up.

One thing is certain, coffeefarming is far from just processing methods or varieties- it´s about people.

That said, here is what you will taste in your cup this year:

Acidity.

Coffees from the Huehuetenango region and especially FVH are known to have a refined acidity. Due to the somewhat dry and cold weather this year, the cherries will mature slower. This in turn gives a more distinct acidity.


See more photos on Flickr here.

Huehue etc

Not many words from this side of the atlantic and caribbean, but there is plenty to tell. 

This month is full of fieldtrips for us, I left Copenhagen 1 day before Peter was coming home from Kenya. I  am now in Guatemala City after some intense days in the mountains of Huehuetenango. 

I am visiting Finca Vista Hermosa and the Martinez family with collegues.

Harvest this year has been a bit slower and lower than average and I will go into detail about that when I get a better chance to write more. 

I 've tried to wrestle an answer from Edwin about what this harvest will bring when it comes to taste, and I know that lovers of Guatemalan coffee will be very pleased to hear it.

...but I'll keep it to myself for the time beeing.

I'll write more about that and many things later.

Linus

Kenya 2009 - 3

After some exciting days with lots of cupping and visiting a good handfull of cooperatives, I am now on my way home (well I was at the time of writing) and can look back on a fantastic kafferejse.



We have cupped some great Kenyan coffees and met some of the amazing people who have created the potential for these coffee flavours which we appreciate so much. It was my first time in Kenya, but I have wanted to go for many years since I love the coffee of this country very much. My expactations were high but looking back they were more than fulfilled.



I learned a lot during the days in Kenya, but I will try to sum up some of the ways they work a bit different in Kenya (at least at the places I visited) than in other countries. One thing is that they have two ’rows’ of fermentation tanks (you can get a feeling of how the two rows are situated with one row lower than the other in the picture above - its the end of each row you can see). They move the coffee from one to another fermentation tank during the fermentation proces. The total fermentation time were between 36 and 50 hours. After the fermentation tanks they have soaking tanks, which they put the coffee in after washing if the drying tables are full. They flush it with clean water and can leave it there for 12-24 hours. They claim this does not affect the taste - but I wonder – it would for sure be interesting to cup the difference some time!



After finished washing (and eventual soaking) they take the coffee first to a ’skin-drying-table’ for a day or so and then they move it to the drying table where it will dry untill the humidty is below 11%. On the Picture above you can see the end of the concrete washing channel coming from the upper left corner. The drying tables next to this channel are sloping a bit down hill and are the ones for 'skin-drying'. In the background you can see a lot more drying tables which are where the coffee goes after skin-drying.

When the coffee is dry enough they put the coffee (in parchment) in jutebags. They then have two different warehouses at the mill. One open and one closed. First they put the coffee in the open warehouse (only with roof but no walls) to airate and then they put it in the closed warehouse after a while. They keep the coffee in the warehouse untill they think it is the best time to bring it to the dry mill and eventually the auction or when they have no more room.



In some of the ’open’ warehouses they have also build and arrangement to put the bags in so that they are liftet from the floor in order to get optimal ventilation.

I’m not an expert in ’drying’ but I know it is very important for quality with a good drying. All the steps they have here in the drying process should give good possibilities if used optimal I guess.

There are so many things you learn on a trip like this and it is impossible to get it all down now, but I know for sure I have have learned a lot and have to come back to Kenya soon again!




Before I end I have to thank Bridget, Kamau, Charles, Tim and Tom for making this trip this great - it was fantastic to be in Kenya with you guys!



I have brought samples of the best coffees I found in Kenya and we will cup them during the coming week and finish up things in order to buy the coffee directly. When things are ready I will get back with more info about the coffee we choose.

Asante sana Kenya!

Kenya 2009 - 2