Espresso: Brazil Caixa de Fruta Natural

Falcon provides us with our second Brazil of the season. Seasonality is very important for us and we try to buy coffees in season as much as possible. The last harvest in Brazil was not good, resulting in low quality coffees and raising overall coffee prices. This one is perfect for our house espresso, with notes of cherry and plums, cocoa and vanilla hazelnut praline.

The Cocatrel Cooperative was founded in 1961 in Tres Pontas and has now grown to the second largest Cooperative in Brazil. There are over 6000 members who are part of the cooperative and they have 11 different buying points across the region. All the coffee are electronically tagged and recorded on delivery with a unique QR code giving full traceablity on all the coffees for the growers to know exactly where their coffee is. Over 50% of the members of the cooperative grow coffee on land that is less than 10 Ha in size.

Falcon Specialty works with a branch of the Cooperative called Cocatrel Direct Trade who work to source the best coffees and promote these for their members.

Caixa De Fruta which translates as "Box of Fruits" is a blend of made from mainly from one particular area called Carmo De Cachoeira. The coffee is selected for its red fruit and creamy milk chocolate profile by the cupping team in the Cocatrel Direct Lab who assign it to this profile blend. The coffee must have a clean profile and be scoring 83+ on evaluation.

All the coffees that are part of this blend are dried in static boxes. These are 1m deep boxes with capacity for 15000 litre volume of cherry which equates to 25-30 bags of green coffee. The boxes have a vented grill at the bottom to allow for air to be circulated from below up through the drying coffee. There are two thermometers at different depths to ensure a safe temperature always below 40c. They are referred to as static due to the coffee remaining still in the boxes and not being turned or rotated during drying. After it is dried the coffee is then left to rest for approximately 1- 2 weeks before being milled. This method has allowed the production of more fruity and prominent profiles from the usual profile we associate with Brazil natural coffee.