Colombia Condor Decaf

Colombia - Condor Decaf

For years our house decaf has been a Swiss Water processed coffee, This Colombian Sugarcane process is its replacement.

Jon travelled to Colombia earlier this year and met with Elias Bayter in Bogotá. Elias and his brother Shady run El Vergel Estate and founded Forest Coffee, Following this we are now releasing a coffee as a permanent fixture for the future, a single farm, decaffeinated at origin, and fully traceable back to the people who grew it.

El Vergel Estate

Condor comes from El Vergel in Fresno, Tolima. The farm started out growing avocado, when the crop began to fail, Elias' mother Martha started planting coffee between the avocado trees and learned to wash and sell the coffee in Fresno, the nearest town. The family planted coffee properly at El Vergel in 2010 and took their first successful harvest in 2015. In 2017, frustrated by the local market, Martha, Shady and Elias went looking for ways to add value to their coffee and close the distance between growers and roasters. That became Forest Coffee in 2019, now a network of around 250 coffee growing families across four projects in Colombia. 

This coffee never leaves Colombia for processing, and the value stays in the producing country.

After washing, the green coffee travels to the Descafecol plant in Manizales, where it is steamed to remove the silverskin and open the pores, then moistened with high mountain spring water under controlled time and temperature. The beans are submerged in natural ethyl acetate derived from sugarcane, which circulates through and selectively removes the caffeine. Gentle temperatures and low pressure preserve the beans' natural flavours and soluble solids, and a final steaming clears any residual ethyl acetate. Caffeine ends up at 0.1%.

The result is a rounded, nutty cup with a clean citrus lift and real body behind it. 

Tasting Notes: Almond Biscotti, Citrus Acidity, Chocolate and Cane Sugar

Producer: Elias & Shady Bayter

Origin: El Vergel Estate, Fresno, Tolima, Colombia

Variety: Red & Yellow Caturra

Altitude: 1,450 MASL

Process: Washed / EA Sugarcane Decaf