I was fortunate enough to secure a place on this year’s El Salvador Cup of Excellence international jury. The hard work had already been done by the national cuppers whittling down all entries to a shortlist of 60 coffees representing the pick of this year’s crop. By the end of a week’s intensive cupping, the decision was near-unanimous and all but 6 of the judges selected a fabulous and fruity Bourbon from Ernesto Menendez’s La Ilusión as their winner (92.67). These 6 all had it as a very close second to the other stand-out coffee in the Top Ten, a fabulous a delicate pacamara varietal from Eduardo Francisco de Jesus Castro’s Pacamaral farm (90.88).
During the International Jury week, we visited Sergio Ticas Reyes atLos Planes in Citalá (Chalatenango). This farm is planted out with Bourbon and Pacamara varietals – both exemplary – and we purchased much of the Bourbon from the 2005/06 crop. Much of Sergio’s crop now goes to the USA. On the Saturday following the competition, we had the chance to visit the winning La Ilusión farm with owner Ernesto and the COE judges. This small farm of just over 3 hectares is located high up at 1,750m on the slopes of the Santa Ana volcano around an hour and a half northwest of San Salvador and borders a national park. The farm is set above the more common local tree species and at the start of the pine forests. Ernesto was a popular and very deserving winner having finished 8th in the 2007 competition with Alaska (bought by Mercanta and shipping to our Portland warehouse for arrival in July/August) and also a skilled national cupper. We also visited the dry milling facility at Cooperativa Cuzcachapa in the afternoon where the Cup of Excellence lots were being held for milling and export to buyers after the auction on June 5th. With the Cup of Excellence week over, arrangements for the field trip proper now got underway. The group comprised 3 of the Cup of Excellences judges and another 8 specialty coffee roasters from Europe and the Far East. Our Mercanta Central America representative, Christian Schaps, had taken care of local arrangements and we were all set for and we were all set for a very busy week traveling by road through El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua visiting many of the farms and mills that we buy from. We rendezvoused at the Crowne Plaza in San Salvador for an early start on Sunday morning. Those who’d been on the Cup of Excellence visit to La Ilusión missed out on a presentation and welcome by Ricardo Espitia at the offices of the Consejo Salvadoreño del Café (Salvadoran Coffee Council) on Saturday afternoon but we managed to get together for dinner at Fiesta Mexicana along with the last of the judges who had not yet departed.
Day 1: The High Mountains…
Rafael and Carmen Elena Silva picked us up at the hotel for the drive northwest towards Santa Ana. We transferred to 4x4s for the long and bumpy 30km journey climbing 800m up to Siberia Estate. We were welcomed by the farm ‘mandador’ (foreman), Santiago. The air was thick with the high pitched drone of fat chicharras, a giant cicada, and the temperature already climbing in the mid-morning. The farm is breathtaking and dotted with banana and peach trees and sweet wild tomatoes. With the harvest all collected in a few weeks ago, pruning was now taking place to encourage new growth for the coming year. Many of the Bourbon trees were also being bent over and staked to the ground and lateral branches neatly lopped off with machetes to force stronger growth on the upward shoots. The Pacamara trees, however, are not supple enough for this treatment. Bending existing trees is more efficient than planting with new stock as the established root system is preserved and labour costs lower. We headed on up the same road towards La Fany, also located around 1,400m. We have been buying 100% Bourbon from La Fany for several years and this coffee has a well-established following with many roasters in Europe and indeed was the highlight of the trip for one of our party. After a relaxing lunch in the garden at Rafael and Carmen’s house, we walked through the farm which has recovered remarkably quickly from devasting winds which stripped the leaves from trees in many of the coffee growing regions in Alotepec Metapan mountains in the north and the Apaneca-Ilamatepec mountains in the west (where Siberia and la Fany are located). The farm entrance opens onto a nursery and worm-culture facility where cherry pulp is broken down for use as fertiliser on the farm. We returned to the house before setting off for the Hotel Alicante Montaña and a dinner of the local corncake pupusas.
Day 2: Mills, Volcanoes & Crater Lakes…
Early roll call for an 7.00 a.m. start and off for the first visit to see the milling facilities at El Borbollón just off the highway from Santa Ana to San Salvador. We toured the mill with Eduardo Alvarez and then all crowded round for a cupping of selected coffees. We set off for La Reforma and El Cerro farms. These neighbouring farms provide the coffees which make up the El Borbollón 100% Bourbon that we have been buying from Eduardo for several seasons now. Access to the farms is up a very steep and rutted track and a good 30 minutes beyond the highway. La Reforma is located at 1,370 to a little over 1,400m. Planting density is around 2,000 plants per manzana (1 manzana – 7,026 square metres) and yield last year was approximately 41,000lbs/manzana. La Reforma offers excellent working conditions and the farms has a full-time staff of 12 workers year-round as well as a team of seasonal workers during the harvest. Shade tree cover at the farms was also being pruned back. This is typically carried out before pruning the coffee trees due to the inevitable risk of damage from falling branches on the larger shade trees. It is also done ahead of the rainy season (which starts in late May/early June) to allow sunlight to penetrate the canopy and to reach the ground where it helps to kill off and prevent the growth of funguses. We headed on for lunch at the Santa Ana national park on the slopes of the volcano for a the classic Salvadoran pan con pavo sandwich, a baguette filled with roast turkey lettuce and hot gravy! We took the long way round, along the mountain range and past a deserted hotel build in the clouds on neighbouring Cerro Verde to provide perfect views of the Izalco volcano…but since just shortly before the day the hotel was completed, the volcano has been virtually dormant and the hotel now provides no more than a vista of the mountain and a home for swarms of black flies and many fat lizards. And as Izalco is known as a ‘cinder cone’ volcano, it is unlikely to become actrive again and the austere hotel on Cerro Verde now stands as a ‘white elephant’ built by the state and forgotten like the volcano. We descended towards Lake Coatepeque, a large crater lake on the eastern slopes of the Santa Ana volcano and formed some 5,000-6,000 years ago. The lake is 6kms wide and 120m deep and has been nominated as one of the natural ‘wonders of the world’. We stopped in at Eduardo’s house on the shores of the lake for a cold beer and the end to another wonderful day before returning to San Salvador and a fabulous farewell dinner at Tucson Bar & Grill in San Salvador with Eduardo and Juan Andres, Jorge Pacas, Karla Perla and Ricardo Espitia from the Consejo and also our host Roberto Bendaña and two drivers from Nicaragua.
Day 3: Road to Nicaragua…
The day had been set aside to drive from San Salvador through Honduras and on to the Ocotal region in northern Nicaragua. We made fairly good time and completed the trip in around 8 hours with the inevitable delays at customs entering steamy Honduras and laid back Nicaragua. We had hoped to visit Finca Linda Vista – a farm we’ve been buying from for many years and placed 5th and 7th in this years Nicaragua Cup of Excellence! – but it was already 3.30 p.m. when we arrived at reached Las Segovias dry mill. (Linda Vista lay a half hour drive and a further 1 hour walk(!) from here). Our sincerest apologies to Antonio Gala Sanchez and family and we promise to visit when next in Nicaragua. Las Segovias is a highly efficient and well-organised mill. Many of the classic manual sorting tables (known as mesas escogedoras) have now been replaced by colour sorting machines. These Costa Rican-built machines have been brought in from the large Atlantic milling operation and, although second-hand, this investment will take 6-8 years to pay itself back. Las Segovias mills around 100 containers of coffee a year. Manager Luis Alberto is himself an excellent cupper and sources many excellent coffees from the surrounding Dipilto and Ocotal regions. He also provides vital financing for these smaller farmers which is essential to keel them in production. The average lot size delivered to Las Segovias by these small farms (wet-pulped, dried, in parchment) is less than 100 bags. We cupped several tables of coffees in the cupping room including Linda Vista and many smaller lots and it was well after sundown before we headed on to Roberto Bendaña’s farm at El Quetzal. We were sharing 4 to a room at the farm and the bunk beds – built from sturdy coffee wood – had only just been finished the day before the 13 of us all descended on Roberto’s home. There was an excellent meal to welcome us, more cold beer, the local Flor de Caña rum, a dart board and wireless internet to entertain us and we settled in immediately!
Day 4: Gardens, Waterfalls (and Coffee)…!
Erwin Mierisch was looking after us today and we started with a visit to the family’s dry mill at La Pita. Again, there was no cherry being processed as wet milling was over for the season and the pulpers and tanks were being cleaned and maintained. Dry milling, however, was still underway and sorting on the mesas escogedoras in full swing. Inside the mill. The removal of parchment and sizing is set up to make best use of gravity and saves on unnecessary belts and electricity. A cupping had been put on for us in the mill and the stand out coffees were the washed ‘Java Nica’ varietal (placed 2nd in this year’s Cup of Excellence) and the Mama Mina Estate, a farm which belongs to Erwin’s grandmother, Mina McEwan. After lunch of fresh mangos off the tree and some fun and games riding horses in the paddock, it was about an hours drive from the mill to El Limoncillo farm in Yasica Norte, Matagalpa. The stunning farm is set on steep hillsides and has botanical gardens and a waterfall running close to the farmhouse. Several social initiatives are underway on the farm including a 15kw hydroelectric plant which provides electricity for the farm and workers, bio-digestors to process waste and create gas for cooking and a day-care facility for infants as the harvest months of December to February coincide with school vacation. We had time to hike up to the highest part of the farm and walked for half an hour through the forest and coffee where there were spectacular through the native trees views of whole hillsides of coffee under shade returning past the waterfall and through the gardens. A truly breathtaking farm!
Day 5: Mountains & Mountains of Coffee…
El Quetzal farm is a large and immaculately well-managed operation at an altitude of around 1,200-1,300m. The far5m is planted out with Caturra (40%), Catuaí (40%) and Catimor (20%) varietals. There is also an experimental 1-hectare lot of a Javanese varietal (which will produce around 25 bags). In the late 1960s, Roberto’s parents inherited the farm from his grandfather, Stephen McEwan, a Scottish émigré. Of these 280 manzanas, an area of 190 manzanas would become the farm that is now known as El Quetzal. Back then, the trees were planted sparsely with just 2,500 plants/manzana in the belief that this would yield more coffee per manzana with all plants producing. Roberto’s father was the first in Nicaragua to challenge this method and instead planted (sun-grown) coffee at a density of up to 6,800 plants/manzana (almost 3 times as many!). Half of the plants were kept in production while the other half were rested. Planting density is now optimised at around 3,500-4,500 plants/manzana yielding an average of 1lb (454g) of finished green coffee per plant. As at El Limoncillo – Roberto and Erwin are cousins – extensive infrastructure projects are also underway. Construction of additional high-quality housing for both the 150 permanent employees and 450 seasonal pickers has been completely recently at El Quetzal and is being rolled-out at neighbouring Los Altos farm. These facilities include running water and a separate washing and kitchen blocks. The old latrines have been replaced with toilet blocks and a septic tank and bio-digestor now provide methane gas for cooking. It also keeps any waste water from entering the river system. There is a school, library, newly-completed day-care centre and hydro-electric generator. The school provides places for the children of permanent workers and also runs a summer camp during the vacation months for the children of seasonal workers. The day-care centre offer much-needed childcare and means than mothers no longer have to take their infants to the fields during harvest time or leave them alone at home. Sports and music facilities are also available. El Quetzal borders the El Arenal national park which is part of the protected bio-corridor which is being set aside for the quetzal, an exotic Central American native bird species and a revered national symbol in Guatemala. Adjacent to El Quetzal lies Los Altos farm, the newest farm to come under the ownership and management of the Bendaña family. Los Altos was bought in 2002 and is currently being replanted. The farm was devastated by the ojo de gallo (or ‘chicken’s eye’) rust which wiped out much of the earlier Catimor varietal which covered 90% of the farm. This has now been replaced with more resistant Caturra (10%) and new planting with see the remaining 90% planted under Maracatu (a Maragogipe and Caturra and hybrid, also known as Maracaturra) and Bourbon. Wet milling of coffees from Los Altos is carried out at El Quetzal. New housing for permanent workers is being built with the aim of bringing Los Altos up to the model standards of El Quetzal. The farm borders the Cerro Frio national park, also part of the migratory corridor for the quetzal. After an excellent home-cooked lunch back at the farm, we headed on to El Paraíso farm at 1,100-1,250m and planted out with Caturra (90%), Catimor (9%) and the new Maracatu hybrid (1%). This is where the family’s interests in coffee began and the farm as it was then originally covered a total area of over 900 manzanas though now occupies just 100 manzanas but produces around 2,000 bags a year. Roberto currently has a 15 year lease on El Paraíso and plans to plant a further 50 manzanas in the coming seasons with Bourbon and Maracatu varietals. Under Daniel Ortega’s Sandinista-led government (1985-1990), Nicaragua experienced considerable land reform and redistribution of wealth. This directly affected many of the large established coffee estates. In 1991, following the fall of the regime, ownership of these lands reverted to the original landowners. The transition to the old hierarchies was not smooth and there was great resentment amongst the dispossessed smallholders when the original owners returned. Roberto’s uncle and aunt, Lionel Marin and Mirna McEwan moved back to the farm but one morning soon after were shot when delivering the payroll to the workers. There was suspicion of robbery but the family feared a politically motivated attack. Mirna was shot in the arm and managed to walk for help but Lionel was shot 3 times and died in his car at El Paraíso. In spite of this tragedy, Mirna continued to manage the farm for a further 15 years though she did set foot again on the land for the next 5 years. Ortega has since returned to power after winning the 2006 presidential elections though the political environment in now widely considered to be more stable than during his earlier in government.
Day 6: Managua & Lake Cocibolca…
After a week of farms and mill visits, cupping, trekking, and chatting with the farm managers and workers, we had scheduled Friday as free time. It was 2 hours to Managua and a further hour on to colonial Granada on the shores of Lake Cocibolca (also known as Lake Nicaragua). We set off over the lake in a launch for a lunch of the local lake fish, guapote, on one of the many tiny islands. The lake was teeming with tiny fish and egrets and monkeys were just visible in the trees high up in a protected reserve on the lakeshore. We had a brief walk across the central square and ceramic shops before heading back up to Managua for a farewell dinner at El Tiscapa. We were guests at many fine farms throughout our stay and were looked after and entertained wonderfully by hosts. Special thanks go to Rafael and Carmen Elena Silva and family at La Fany and Siberia for a fabulous day and a wonderful lunch in their garden, to Eduardo Alvarez and his son, Juan Andres, who spent the whole day with us at El Borbollón mill and at La Reforma and El Cerro farms before inviting us to their home by Lake Coatepeque for a cold beers at sunset, to Erwin Mierisch, cousin Ernesto and his father Dr Mierisch for exceptional hospitality, lunch and horse-back riding at their home and mill, and to Roberto Bendaña and his staff for looking after us for 3 days at his home at El Quetzal and for a day at Lake Cocibolca. Our welcome was always warm and our hosts could not have done more for us. We will be forever grateful for their kindness and generosity. I’d like to add my personal thanks also to my traveling companions who provided many laughs and great memories and to my colleague, Christian, for all his assistance in bringing the trip together and keeping things on schedule. We look forward now to the arrival of the new crop Bourbon coffees from La Fany, Siberia and El Borbollón and to the various brand new arrivals from El Quetzal, Los Altos, Siares and Limoncillo. These will be arriving during June/July along with selected lots from the Cup of Excellence auctions in Nicaragua (taking place on May 27th) and El Salvador (June 5th). We are looking at new crop coffees from El Salvador and Nicaragua all the time in our ongoing efforts to explore the variety and quality in these fabulous producing origins.
Grant Rattray
