What's in a coffee bean? A journey to Guatemala, from farm to cup
Day 1: Here we are!
After a grueling, 20+ hour journey with several stops, we landed in the capital city of Guatemala City. From there, it's just a short drive to to the historic city of Antigua, which will be our retreat for a week. Seven of us are waiting for a taxi: head barista Ondra Štökl from Ambiente, baristas Eliška Syrovátková from Esky Karlín and Matěj Pína from Kuchyně na Hradě, Karel Kozel and Jakub Smolka from Nordbeans and me, Anna Kolářová, to document everything.
The seventh member of the expedition was already waiting in our new home. General manager Tomáš Hánek from Myšák confectionery arrived by plane from Mexico a few hours earlier, and because it was rush hour, it took him over three and a half hours to get there. Fortunately, we already have free roads, so the journey to our accommodation will take about an hour. At the gate, Tomáš is waiting for us with a smile on his face.
Even though it is after dark and we are all exhausted, we are not going to sleep yet. We want to share our first impressions, have tacos for dinner and, most importantly, meet Felipe. Felipe Contreras owns a farm called Finca Gascón and we're going to spend every day with him. Instead of awkward introductions, we all spontaneously fall around each other's necks and then talk about what's ahead and who's expecting what from our trip.
And what's the plan? Felipe will guide us through all the stages of growing and processing coffee on the farm, and we'll get to experience everything for ourselves. He will show us how the coffee trees are cared for, we will taste many coffees and choose some to take back to our establishments. The programme also includes a trip to the larger La Labor farm and a tour of the dry mill. In addition, we learn that just this Sunday a large parade will be passing through town to celebrate the Feast of St. Bartholomew, which is definitely worth seeing.
Day 2: The first coffee cherries
First thing in the morning, Felipe picks us up in a pick-up truck, which (as we'll soon learn) you practically can't do without in Guatemala. We drive through the sun-drenched city, the streets playing with all colours, the decor dominated by purple - a colour that has a deep religious meaning. We stop a short distance from the main square, with a fountain in the centre and flowering trees lining it.
We have our first coffee of the trip at the nearby Café Alegria. We order espressos, cappuccinos and a "filter", as if perhaps we are tasting coffee for the first time. We watch the work of the baristas with fascination and admire how precise and consistent it is. And the coffee? It's straight from Felipe and it tastes great. Before we head to the farm, we'll have breakfast.
We pile into the car and drive through through the town, which is surrounded by volcanoes and mountains. At the edge of it, we go up steeply and climb up to the farm Finca Gascón, which is on one of the mountains. We drive slowly along a dirt road and a hand dug corridor, without a pick-up truck such a thing would be unthinkable. The higher we climb, the deeper we dive into the farm. We notice how the climate is changing - it's getting colder and wetter thanks to the increasing altitude and thickening vegetation.
Felipe suddenly stops, rolls down the window and holds out his hand: "This is Orange Bourbon, take a sip." he urges us. And since for many of us these coffee cherries are the first we've ever had the opportunity to taste so fresh, we pluck a whole handful. They have a full, juicy, fruity, sweet taste, and they are definitely not sour.
Before we reach the centre of the farm, where the processing plant is located and the facilities a short distance away, we pick and taste many other varieties, such as Typica, Pacamara, Red Bourbon, and above all the most precious of all - Geisha.
About Finca Gascón
Area: 40 hectares, but only 15 hectares are occupied by coffee trees.
Area: San Juan Gascón, Antigua
Altitude: 1250-2050 metres
Varieties: Geisha, Typica, Yellow Typica, Pacamara, Bourbon, Orange Bourbon, Orange Geisha, SL-28, SL-24, Catuai
Processing methods: Washed, honey, natural, anaerobic, carbonic, macarace, oxybean, lactic, nitromaceration, koji, kombucha
Have you ever imagined a coffee plantation lined up in neat rows and bathed in sunshine? Finca Gascón looks very different. The coffee trees grow quite wild here among the giant avocado or mango treeswhich provide the shade they need, and the farm processes the fallen fruit and leaves into fertiliser. The farm prides itself on maximising diversity.
A few years ago, Felipe thought he'd try to farm organically. His father bought the land back in 2012, and found it ideal for growing coffee trees. First they planted Bourbon and Typica varieties, soon Geisha followed. This opened up the market for Felipe's choice coffee. Then in 2019, the conversion to an organic farm took place, along with many innovations.
In a short period of time, Felipe has managed to establish the farm as a a progressive producer that is not afraid to experiment, offering roasters completely unique nanolots and microlots. He is able to provide exceptional coffees with a clear flavour profile - often for competitions or as seasonal or special editions. For example, working with French roaster Terres de Café, Dutch Uncommon and of course our partners Nordbeans.
What is a nanolot and a microlot?
These are coffees that are extremely special in volume and taste. They tend to be more expensive because they require the greatest care in growing, harvesting and processing. The result is a coffee with a clean, distinctive flavour profile, but also with a clear origin and a specific story.
A microlot has a total volume of approximately 600-6000 kg. By comparison, a normal bag of coffee weighs 60 kg.
A nanolot is even smaller, up to 600 kg, i.e. up to ten regular coffee bags.
We went to Guatemala in March, as this is the ideal time to visit the farm. The harvest is still underway, so it is possible to see nature in all its beauty and diversity and at the same time taste ripe cherries. But it is also in the process of processing the coffee, so you can see the fermentation or drying. Some of the coffee samples from the beginning of the harvest have already progressed to the final stage of processing: they are dried and newly roasted.
Thanks to this, we were able to taste and order, before Felipe sends the samples out into the world or goes to trade fairs with them. And we can even influence the processing of the coffee that is yet to be harvested. For example, a roaster can say that he is interested in a particular variety and wants to process it using the natural method. That's why Jakub Smolka from Nordbeans describes our journey from the beginning as a "farm to cup experience". The reality is as expected - we have the opportunity to see, taste, experience and try everything. We are here! It doesn't get any closer than this.
A year at Finca Gascón
January - May: Coffee harvesting, processing and drying season
April - June: Contracting with buyers/roasters
May: First flowers and first rains
May - October/November: Rainy season, farm work, tillage, landscaping
June-September : Export of grains
June - July: Coffee cherries start to grow.
From July onwards: Ripe cherries until harvest
The cherries are harvested several times as they gradually ripen. Pickers usually return to the plant two to four times. Thanks to the altitude and shading, the grapes have a higher proportion of sugars, which helps further processing. Both are positively reflected in taste and quality. The longer the cherries grow, the better.
Throughout the day we explore different parts of the farm, tasting more cherries and trying to absorb as much of the atmosphere as possible. We can see for ourselves how much work and effort goes into growing cherries and harvesting them in difficult conditions. Moreover, everything requires a lot of patience. It takes three to four years for a coffee tree to bear fruit, and the first harvests tend to be smaller.
Even the life of the bushes is not infinite. Each variety only produces for a certain period of time, so the farmer must think about diversity and plan the planting well. "We have two to four harvests a season. In standard conditions, you can pick maybe thirty kilos in an hour, but in our difficult terrain the pickers can manage twenty kilos in the same time," adds Felipe.
At the small processing plant at Finca Gascón, which includes a wet mill, we get a peek into the post-harvest process. We are shown how the the cherries are sorted from the floats, or defective pieces and how they are peeled or fermented whole - in a stainless steel tank, with yeast in a tub or under a tarp. A good opportunity to rehearse what such a process entails.
"After the harvest, I have to think about what to do next - whether to leave the cherries whole, in the flesh, or wash them - that is, whether I choose the natural, honey or washed method. And then, at various points, fermentation is added," says Felipe. We stop by the tub, where he is currently aerobically fermenting whole Pacamara cherries in water with selective yeast. The vat is constantly being oxygenated by an air pump, so Felipe calls this method oxybean.
Ondra Stökl will help prepare the second batch of this unique coffee - and it's time to go. We've accomplished more in the first day than we expected to experience in the whole time.
Natural: The whole coffee cherries are washed to get rid of impurities, the defective ones are removed and left to dry in this way, whole. After drying, the skin and flesh are removed. The resulting coffee is full-bodied, higher in complexity and lower in acidity, and tends to be sweet and fruity.
Honey: After harvesting (and sorting out the defective pieces), the coffee cherries are put into a peeler, which separates the beans with the pulp from the skin. The coffee is then further processed and dried together with the pulp. This gives the drink honey, caramel or stone fruit notes and a milder acidity.
Washed: After harvesting and removing the florets, the cherries are peeled in the same way as in the honey method. They are then left to oxidise (ferment) together for about 48 hours, after which they are washed completely, thus separating the rest of the pulp from the grain. The kernels are then dried perfectly washed, without any residual husk or pulp. The aim of this process is to emphasise the notes of the terroir and the variety. The flavour profile tends to be clean, elegant and light, with an emphasis on varietal character. The coffee often has citrus, floral or tea notes.
All coffees are left to dry evenly on 'African beds' or concrete surfaces at the end.
Day 3: Under the radar
The next day we head to Felipe's lab in Antigua. He has an office, a roaster, barrels of selective yeast and kombucha, a microscope to watch his experiments come to life and, on the roof, African beds (a bed-shaped wooden structure covered with a fine, sturdy net) on which the samples dry.
These facilities allow Felipe to test the experiments on small amounts of coffee and compare the results. Feli has prepared a few for us to taste straight away in the form of cupping - the beautifully succulent Pacamara Honey Kombucha has been the biggest success. Since yesterday we have been thinking about Orange Bourbon cherries, which we would like to pick ourselves - they were the first cherries we tasted here. This variety carries notes of tropical fruit and would certainly be great in combination with Honey Kombucha.
And since it's Sunday, our steps lead us to the centre, where where the St. Bartholomew's procession is passing through. The decorated streets are full of people, colourful carpets of flowers, herbs and spices everywhere, the procession is marching through the city to the sound of a band and a cloud of incense hovers above it all. The statue of Jesus of Nazareth is carried on a wooden altar by hundreds of worshippers dressed in traditional purple robes known as cucuruchos. Women, called cargadoras, carry the statue of Our Lady of Sorrows.
Coffee production by Felipa
- Picking cherries knowing what variety they are.
- Separation of floaters or defective cherries.
- Deciding whether to choose the natural, honey or washed method, depending on the expected result.
- Experimental dimension - adding yeast, kombucha, fruit, etc. The value of the coffee can be increased but also decreased.
- Checking that everything is working as it should.
- Drying on African beds.
Day 4: Harvesting
On the fourth day of our coffee journey, we return to the Finca Gascón farm. We tie plastic baskets around our waists and head to "our" coffee tree.which is already glowing orange in the distance. We pick cherry after cherry until the bush is stripped bare. But that was just practice on the straight, now we have to move to the other end of the farm where the Orange Bourbon bushes are planted.
We don't shy away from the steep terrain, however, and pick what we can. There aren't many ripe cherries on the bushes, so we scatter and everyone picks on their own. When it comes to weighing, the half-empty baskets say it all - in two hours, seven of us picked about 18 kg of cherries.. The most successful was Tomáš Hánek, he managed almost 4 kg.
How much coffee can we get from this? "Divide it by seven - that's approximately the yield after peeling, fermenting, drying and roasting," explains Jakub Smolka, adding: "So we get about two and a half kilos of roasted coffee, which is roughly two hundred espressos."
We all realise how much time we've just invested in just one part of the chain - and it's also very clear to us that we wouldn't succeed as pickers. And at the same time, we realize that every grain counts. The work of the farmers on the other side of the world is normally almost invisible to us, but here and now we see fully how important, challenging, and yet unappreciated..
These cherries are really ours now, so we're going straight to process them. First, we separate the florets in water and then put the sorted kernels in a metal peeler to remove the skin. Both parts - the cascara (skin) and the grains with the pulp - we then take them on the back of a pick-up truck to Felipe's lab. Pour water into the bucket with the grains, add some kombucha and scobe, cover and leave to ferment. Spread the cascara in a thin layer on the African beds on the roof, where it will gradually dry out.
A successful day is over and we have something to think about. Like the role of the producer in the coffee world. - about his work before and after the harvest. We are already seeing beans arriving in Europe with a clear flavour profile determined by their origin, terroir, care in growing and processing and the subsequent processes chosen, such as fermentation and drying. However, it is only through roasting that the flavour profile opens up fully. Above all, roasters need to find the right producer, establish a relationship with them, build it - and together, they can work wonders.
How many coffee cherries must be picked for 1 bag of roasted beans?
The equation is simple: coffee cherries ÷ 7 = yield after roasting.
So for a 250g bag of coffee, you need to pick around 1.7kg of fresh cherries.
Day 5: Coffee in bulk
It's Tuesday, and so the planned excursion to the large dry mill and the La Labor farm. Both are located in the capital city of Guatemala City. We are joined by Markos Fischer, a friend of both Felipe and Nordbeans, who is also a distributor of coffee beans. So we split up into two cars and set off. After about an hour and a half we approach our destination.
We drive into a large area where, in addition to the dry mill for sorting and packaging the beans, there is a large wet mill, a brick factory and the houses of the Montenegro family. The farm and the adjacent land have belonged to this family for over a hundred years.
The dry mill is the final step before export. Here, dried coffees from all over the area meet to be cleaned and prepared for the world. The mill also includes a screen-printing workshop where the bags are labelled according to the farmer's agreed branding. We were attracted by a sack with the national symbols: a green quetzal parrot and a volcano. The hall is full of sacks stacked about four metres high and the huge machines are incredibly noisy.. With a helmet on, we walk through the space step by step.
How the dry mill works
- Cleaning
The grains are removed from twigs, stones, dust and other debris with the help of sieves, fans or gravity machines. - Peeling
In natural coffees, the outer dry skin is removed. Washed coffees (if they pass through a dry mill) are stripped of the parchment layer. This step is carried out by machines with grinding rollers. - Grading by size and density
Coffee beans are sorted by size and density using sieves and pneumatic shakers - denser, i.e. heavier beans are usually of higher quality. - Sorting by colour
Optical sensors are used to remove defective beans (too light, dark or damaged) (or manual selection if smaller quantities). - Packaging and labelling
The coffee is bagged, weighed, labelled by lot and prepared for export.
After this noisy excursion, we move on to the La Labor farm, which is the last working coffee farm in the urban areasurrounded by more than 40,000 households. It covers 70 hectares and is situated at an altitude of 1,500 metres. Just outside the gate, we meet the owner. The whole story is told by "Chespi" - Francisco Quezada Montenegro. He is a third generation coffee farmer and the quality of the produce is very dear to his heart. He therefore invests a significant portion of his income back into the farm to keep the ecosystem alive and healthy.
We drive around and notice all the ways in which this place is different from Felipe's farm. It's not just the size - there are coffee trees planted in rows as far as the eye can see. But there are also mature trees here, providing shade for the bushes. But one stands out - a 200-year-old ceiba treetowering in the heart of the farm. It is the national symbol of Guatemala and the sacred tree of the Mayan civilisation.
"I always thought that shade cultivation was common everywhere, because I knew it from my surroundings. It was only when I went to farms in other countries that I realised that this is far from the norm and that coffee trees are often exposed to direct sunlight. I realized that Guatemala, along with a few other countries, is quite unique in this regard," says Markos, who travels regularly for coffee.
The shade allows the coffee trees to fruit and the cherries to ripen more smoothly, the plant is less stressed and can produce more sugars, which are essential for fermentation and flavour development. Traditionally, coffee trees are grown under shade, particularly in regions where indigenous or more sustainable forms of agriculture are preserved. In addition to Guatemala, this type of cultivation is also widespread in Ethiopia, which is considered the true homeland of the coffee plant.
What makes Guatemala unique in terms of coffee production:
- The microclimates caused by the country's mountainous terrain,
- the growing of coffee trees in the shade,
- the volcanic bedrock.
Day 6: Choosing coffees
Every day in Guatemala is significant for us. And Wednesday? We return to Felipe's Lab, but this time with a different goal - to taste coffees from different farmers, processed differently and also at different price levels. And since we are here at the most convenient time, we can even order the selected coffees in priority. Ronald Pivaral, who owns Los Manantiales Farm, has arrived. He continues the family tradition of growing coffee with an emphasis on innovative methods and sustainability - his customers include Copenhagen-based roaster April.
Around thirty samples await on the table, and we'll spin two batches. Jakub Smolka pulls out his laptop and opens an excel spreadsheet. Together with his colleagues, he writes down all the cuppings so that they can return to the interesting items at any time. And we all prepare our cupping spoons and notebooks. After a few hours of tasting and debating, we narrow down our choices to a few favourites. The consensus is almost 100% and we end up choosing four coffees: Nitro 72 Natural Bourbon, Nitro Geisha, Washed Bourbon and Yellow Pacamara.
During the day, Markos draws in his notebook and we think of one more connection - how about we ask him to illustrate the coffee packaging? The selected ones will in fact be available in smaller and larger volumes in Ambiente stores, both at the grinder and in complementary sales. Everything fits together at once. We agree that Markos will try to invent a character for each of the selected coffees, which will be the "mascot" on the packaging.
Day 7: The circle comes full circle
It's the last day, we're leaving in the evening. We're heading back to Finca Gascón, where we'll be to dry our Orange Bourbon Honey Kombucha beans. Matěj Pína will take the scepter (bucket) and then it's off to the roof. We will spread the coffee beans on the African beds together, in a nice even, thin layer.
We look nostalgically around Antigua. For the last time we can admire the panorama of volcanoes and mountains, a landscape that has taught us everything about coffee. James and Felipe give each other a high five. We made it! We processed the coffee with our own hands. Not much, but every bean counts.
In a few weeks, our beans will arrive in the Czech Republic, Nordbeans will roast them and we'll taste how the experiment went.. They will be turned into a unique limited edition - just two kilos of coffee and about a hundred tasting portions, which we will give to our baristas, colleagues and loyal guests. And Felipe will be with us as he travels around Europe with a stop in Prague. But most of all, he'll be here the coffee that carries the story of our meeting and our shared passion for the craft.
Although our coffee will stay in Guatemala for a while, we are definitely not leaving empty-handed! Felipe has packed several sample packs for us to use as part of our education. Together with us, bags of beans processed by different methods, beans with defects and also fresh coffee cherries arrived in Prague. Most importantly, we took away a lot of experience and information. We have a head full of them. "I wish every barista could taste fresh coffee cherries, and "I will now appreciate every bean in the cup." - head barista Ondřej Štökl sums it up for our entire trip.
Probably none of us knew at the beginning how busy our trip to Guatemala would be. Thank you Felipe for showing us how he thinks about coffee and guiding us through the whole trip."from farm to cup". Thanks also to James and Karl from Nordbeans who thought up and organized this trip. Only thanks to them we could see everything as close as possible and get to know the whole story. They really put a lot of thought into the choice of supplier and the relationship with them. a huge amount of care - and now we can see it even better than before.
