Colombia Tierradentro

Tasting Notes: Dark Cherry, Baker’s Chocolate, Marzipan

Region: Inzá, Cauca, Colombia

Growing Elevation: 1,800 – 2,080 masl

Producer: Asorcafé — community lot

Varietal: Typica & Caturra

Process: Washed

10% of every bag goes to earthquake relief in Colombia

On the morning of August 10, 2026, a powerful earthquake struck Colombia, hitting many of the same coffee-growing communities this coffee comes from. We are donating 10% of the proceeds from Colombia Tierradentro to Together for Origin, a relief fund run by Fundación Apuna, the nonprofit arm of Siruma Coffee, the Manizales-based exporter we've worked with since 2022. The fund delivers direct emergency support to smallholder coffee families in Cauca, Caldas, and Tolima, and to their relatives in affected towns and cities.

Donate directly or learn more →

Who is Fundación Apuna?
Apuna is the foundation started by Siruma Coffee, a specialty exporter in Manizales founded by Valentina Duque. Siruma partners with producer associations and cooperatives across Cauca, Caldas, and Tolima, keeps agronomists in each region, and pays for quality so that growing coffee stays a livelihood worth choosing, including in areas where farmers are moving away from coca. Apuna carries that work past the sale of coffee into direct community support. 

After the earthquake, Apuna and Siruma launched Together for Origin to get help to the families they buy from. Roasters, importers, and individuals across the specialty coffee community contributed more than USD $16,000 in the first ten days, and Apuna is publishing updates on how the money is being used as recovery continues.
Buying this coffee contributes automatically. If you'd like to give more, or just see where the funds are going, visit the campaign page.

More about the coffee

The dry fragrance is deep and dessert-like, with dark cherry, baker's chocolate, and a lift of lime cutting through it. Once water is poured, the aroma softens into cashew and ripe cherry. The first sip carries that cherry forward alongside marzipan, and the baker's chocolate settles underneath as a backbone. The acidity is medium and pointed, giving the cup real clarity, and the body is silky with medium intensity. We love how much fruit this one delivers while still tasting unmistakably like a classic washed Colombia. 

This coffee comes from Inzá, high in the department of Cauca in southwestern Colombia. The region takes its name from Tierradentro - "inside the earth" - the UNESCO World Heritage site whose underground tombs and tunnels were carved by the ancestors of the Guanaca people who still live here. Farms sit between 1,800 and 2,080 meters on slopes fed by the volcanic soils of Puracé. Cool mountain temperatures slow cherry maturation, and that long, patient ripening is where the sweetness and structure in this cup come from.

Inzá spent decades off the specialty map. Remote geography, limited infrastructure, and the presence of armed groups in rural Cauca meant that exceptional lots were routinely blended away into commercial exports with no recognition for the people who grew them. The 2015 peace agreement changed what was possible here, and growers who had held onto their standards through all of it finally had a way to sell coffee under their own name. Asorcafé, the association behind this lot, has been working toward that outcome for over twenty years — organizing growers, tightening quality control, and building the direct relationships that turned a region nobody could name into one worth seeking out.

Farms here average about 1.8 hectares, so this is a community lot in the truest sense: many small deliveries, each one cupped and analyzed before it is approved. Fermentation is done in open tanks for 16 to 22 hours depending on the weather, followed by careful washing and drying — generations of practice showing up as consistency in the cup.