COSTA RICA - LAS LAJAS - ANAEROBIC HONEY

An exciting new limited edition, showcasing the unique flavour that coffee can bring by using experimental processing post harvest! If you were a fan of our China Banka Natural coffee earlier this year, you’re going to love this one too…. This coffee brings an intense fruit profile, with rich sweet notes, and boozy undertones. The sweetness is in part thanks to the unique anaerobic honey processing of the coffee, a hybrid processing method that combines honey processing and anaerobic fermentation: Honey Process: Coffee cherries are partially de-pulped, leaving some mucilage (the sticky, sugary layer) on the beans during drying. Anaerobic Fermentation: The beans, still covered in mucilage, are fermented in sealed, oxygen-free tanks to create controlled microbial activity. Best enjoyed as a filter option to bring out the complex flavour of berry coulis and bourbon. If you're brewing it through an espresso machine, we'd recommend extending the brewing time a few seconds longer to avoid unwanted sour notes that may come from under-exctraction! We’ve roasted it lightly to retain this clarity, and have given it an intensity of '5' to indicate the punchy depth of flavour and medium body that is often synonymous with Anaerobic and Honey processed coffees. The story behind the coffee: Oscar Chacón Solano owns the farm Las Lajas. In 1988, following the death of Oscar’s father, his legacy of 50 hectares of land dating back to 1936, was left to his six children. The Chacón siblings decided to change their coffee production system, focusing their efforts on environmental conservation, providing stable employment for their workers, and keeping coffee culture alive in their family and community. In the early 2000s, Oscar Chacón and Francisca Cubillo, the third generation of coffee producers in their family, decided to process the coffee from their own farms, giving rise to the Las Lajas Ecological Benefit. During these early years, Oscar and Francisca were in pursuit of excellence, as well as offering a differentiated product within the coffee market. Their breakthrough came in 2006, when an earthquake left the Sabanilla area without light and water for a long time making it impossible to carry out the traditional washing process. They instead had to dry the coffee cherries whole, giving birth to their now iconic natural process. The farm is located in Sabanilla de Alajuela, Costa Rica. All the coffee processed by Las Lajas is produced by the Chacón family. The farm is situated at an altitude range of 1500 to 1700masl. The majority of crops grown are caturra-catuaí, but over the last five years, they have started a renovation process, diversifying the variety of crops on the farm. The coffee is pulped and left with 100% of the mucilage. It is transferred to an anaerobic fermentation tank, where it rests for 84 hours. After fermentation, the coffee is moved to raised beds for dehydration for a period of 15 to 20 days to finish the drying process.