Nicaragua Cup of Excellence and Cooperative Visits, 2003

A visit to some farms and coops as well as my first time as a judge in a Cup of Excellence competition.

Eighteen fine people were invited as judges in the Cup of ExcellenceThe Cup of Excellence is a competition held yearly in many coffee-producing countries, designed to highlight the very best coffees from each origin.: The Cup of Excellence (COE)... ...more (CoE) competition in NicaraguaNicaraguan coffees from the Segovia, Jinotega, Ocotal and Matagalpa regions are nice balanced cups. They often possess interesting cup character along with body and balance, outperforming many other... ...more in 2003. The judges were from Nicaragua, U.S., Holland, UK, Japan, Denmark and AustraliaAustralian coffee bears resemblance in the cup to the soft "Island Coffee" flavor profile. Coffee cultivation began in Australia in 1880 and continued through 1926, but was found... ...more.

Our job was simple compared to the National Jury that prescreened the coffees for us: they started with 400 samples and reduced it to 52, we simply reduced that to 37.

Everybody, Nicaragua. I think this was in managua and was my first COE. I was nervous… – Nicaragua – Nicaragua Cup of Excellence trip 2003

Yours truly, after a long day of cuppingCupping is a method of tasting coffee by steeping grounds in separate cups for discrete amounts of ground coffee, to reveal good flavors and defects to their fullest.... ...more. If you cup 50 coffees in a day, you do flights of 10 at a time, with 4 judges at each table. Each coffee sample has 4 cups, and consistent character between those cups is part of the judging. So really on a day like this you taste and judge 200 cups of coffee.
Judging starts with examining the roasted coffee samples and recording any variations that might affect the cup. In Nicaragua, the roasting was excellent, but there were problems with the crust of grinds that forms on the cup falling to the bottom of the cup too soon. The cupperOne who cups, or tastes and evaluates, coffee.: A cupper is a person who performs the somewhat formal analysis of coffee quality, called cupping. See the definition of... ...more “breaks” this crust at 3 minutes after pouring, but some were falling at 2 minutes. This could be the R.O. water, the way it was poured, or the air conditioning in the room … who knows.

We had a non-human cupper one day. Here he is getting a sense of the dry fragranceIn the cupping procedure for tasting and scoring coffee, this is the smell of the dry, ground coffee before hot water is added. The term fragrance is used... ...more of the cup, before the water is poured.

The support staff for the CoE was excellent. It was decided that at this even the water would be heated in percolators, with water temperatures always being closely monitored. But I don’t think we’ll be seeing percolators used at cupping events any time soon.

After the water is poured, cuppers judge the aromaAroma refers to sensations perceived by the olfactory bulb and conveyed to the brain; whether through the nose or "retro-nasally": The aromatics of a coffee greatly influence its... ...more from the crust of the cup, then sink the crust while smelling (called “breaking”) after 3 minutes. Actual tasting, which involves annoying sucking sounds of varying intensityWe have a simple scale to rate intensity in our coffee reviews, from Mild to Bold. Low intensity does not mean low quality!: We have a simple scale... ...more and spitting, happens as soon as the cup is cool enough, for most people around 8 minutes.

Cupping is really quite disgusting and thanks to Soren from EstateA "coffee estate" is used to imply a farm that has its own processing facility, a wet-mill. In Spanish this is called an Hacienda. A Finca (farm) does... ...more Coffees, Denmark, for the lovely picture of the bottom of a spittoon. (This is what happens when you hand over your camera to a stranger! You want to spray the coffee into your mouth, your throat, up your nasal cavity, and then do some retro-nasal breathing for aftertasteAftertaste refers to lingering residual sensations in the mouth after coffee has swallowed. It might be distinguished from "finish" which is the final sensations of the coffee while... ...more. Sometimes I wear earplugs because the sounds are deeply irritation if you happen to lose your concentration on cupping, and start to listen.

After scoring the flight of 10 coffees, the judges retreat to share scores and comments in a separate room. In the meantime, the tables are cleared and the next flight of coffees is prepared.
After the panel had cupped the coffees rated over 85 twice, we recupped the top 10 to rank scores, then recupped them again using a “descriptive cupping form.” In this case, the silence rules were set aside and we discussed the coffees while cupping them.

Cupping is exhausting -very hard work! But it’s fun too. Kentaru Maruyama has a smile to share even after a long day at the cupping tables.

One cupper has the habit of going barefoot (you know who you are!) I have seen other people wear sandals. Frankly, I would not recommend open-toed shoes with all that spitting going on (see the floor around the spittoon).

Nicaragua, Nicaragua Cup of Excellence trip 2003

Selva Negra Farm: Matagalpa, Nicaragua, 2003 Visit

Selva Negra is a unique, model farm in the Matagalpa region of Nicaragua. It’s really part coffee farm, part mountain resort, part utopian colony! Coffee brings in most of the money to fund a host of sustainable agriculture projects. Walking the farm is a process of finding one thoughtful innovation after another…

Did I mention that it is very beautiful? This is the bungalow we stayed in, draped in vines and nestled in a bed of ferns. The farm is a sort of retreat-resort and has many small habitations like this, as well as a full restaurant with homemade breads, cakes, cheeses … all vegetables and meat coming from the farm

One of the most beautiful buildings is the Chapel. It is a fairly recent addition, at the quiet end of the farm, after all the cottages. In fact it looks like it has been there forever, and is on the edge of the towering native forest.

Speaking of the forest, it is vast. Much of the farm has been set aside as old-growth protected habitat, with a rich plant and animal life (including howler monkeys).

And here is one of your hosts at Selva Negra. Mousie, a nickname that stuck, and her husband Eddie Kuhl, operate the farm. The Kuhl family emigrated from Germany and are part of the European community that came to Matagalpa in the late 1800s. This is the garden adjacent to the Kuhl house on the farm.

Another picture of the farmhouse garden. You can find out a bit more at www.selvanegra.com A basketball court at the end of a drying patio for coffee.

Eddie Kuhl is a farmer, a historian, and a bit of an artist. My favorites were his paintings in the coffee millA coffee mill might mean a coffee grinder, but we usually use the term to refer to a coffee processing facility, either a Wet-Mill or a Dry Mill.... ...more explaining the farm and its processes.To the right, a diagram of their non-contaminating coffee-pulp/mucilage system. MucilageMucilage indicates the fruity layer of the coffee cherry, between the outer skin and the parchment layer that surrounds the seed. It readily clings to the inner parchment... ...more is the fruityIn some coffee taster’s lexicon, “fruity” means the coffee is tainted with fruit, and “fruited” means a coffee is graced by positive fruit notes. We don't exactly see... ...more layer under the skin of the coffee cherryOriginally coffee literature referred to the fruit of the tree as a "berry" but in time it became a cherry. It is of course neither. Nor is the... ...more. It was traditionally washed into the streams after the wet-processing of coffee, but this is a natural contaminant of the water supply. Eddie’s system takes care of this in a clever way.

The pulp is recovered for use in compost and organicGrown without the use of artificial fertilizers, herbicides, etc.: Organic coffee has been grown according to organic farming techniques, typically without the use of artificial fertilizers. Some farms... ...more fertilizer on the farm. Not only is the mucilage kept out of the water supply, it is actually used in a bio-gas recovery system that provides cooking and heating power for the farm! And when it’s not coffee processingThe removal of the cherry and parchment from the coffee seed.: Coffee is either wet-processed (also called washed or wet-milled) or dry-processed (also called wild, natural or natural... ...more season and there’s no mucilage, they capture gas from the manure of the cattle herd!

A bio-gas collection tank where bacteria degrade the mucilage and create usable gas.

They roast coffee on the farm … mostly they use it to barter with suppliers for foods not grown on the farm, or other supplies they can’t produce themselves. This is a handmade primitive roaster, really amazing. And just think, it’s roasting coffee with gas collected from coffee itself, or cow manure!

They have a larger roaster that comes from GuatemalaGuatemalan coffee is considered a top quality coffee producer in Central America. Due to our proximity to Guatemala, some of the nicest coffees from this origin come to... ...more, still quite crude. The entire chamber tilts to dump the batch, like a huge Jabez Burns sample roaster. And notice the unique roast chamber door.

Prodecoop in Esteli Nicaragua

Prodecoop is a “cooperative of cooperatives” located in the state of Esteli, Nicaragua. Their membership is comprised of 40 coffee-growing co-ops, 2300 member-producers, which comes to 10,000 individuals with a relationship to the co-op! We have found their coffees sold under the name Sabor de Segovia (named for the coffees of Nueva Segovia adjacent to Esteli) to be consistently good, and the special lots that we cup and buy to be excellent. Prodecoop is on the web at www.prodecoop.com

On the porch of the new Prodecoop cupping facility and office.
A group of us did some cupping at their lab, which included one of the coffees in the top 10 of the Cup of Excellence competition.
We were looking over the dry-mill facility, across the drying patios from the cupping room, when the lunch bell rang and the coffee-sorters flooded in! This is the final quality stage to get the true EP (Euro-Preparation) grade coffee. Even though the coffee is density-sorted on an Oliver table, and colormetric sorted by machine, hand-prepping is key to quality. It’s a boring job but this is considered good work, and everyone received fair tradeFair trade is an organized social movement and market-based approach to empowering developing country producers and promoting sustainability.: Fair trade is an organized social movement and market-based approach... ...more wages and benefits!
My favorite sign at the Prodecoop mill. Dust is a real problem at some mills, and as in grain silos, dust can be explosive. But the Prodecoop mill is the cleanest I have ever seen, with the coffee-sorters separated completely from the hullingHulling is the step at the dry mill where the green coffee bean is removed from the parchment shell. (See Wet Hulled for the Indonesia method). ...more and sortingCoffee is sorted by size, density, and color in its preparation for export.: Sorting refers to several steps performed in the preparation of coffee for export. Coffee is... ...more equipment that kick up so much dust into the air

I realized as we walked through the facility that this was the exact shipment of Organic Segovia from the Miraflores Co-op that we had reserved coffee from. After the tour of the mill
we were off to visit one of the small member co-ops, La Union…

Atlantic Coffee Mill Nicaragua Visit Esteli

La Union Cooperative; Nueva Segovia, Nicaragua

La Union Cooperative has 27 members, and has their coffee dry-milled at Prodecoop. They also have the honor of being the #4 coffee in the auction this year (consider that this was one of 400+ samples submitted), and this is the second year they have been among the top lots! The Co-op is near the Honduran border, in fact HondurasHonduran coffee was absent from the top ranks of the Specialty market, but that has changed. It has all the environmental factors on its side: soil, altitude, climate.... ...more was just over the next ridge. They have a small communal meeting space and coffee receiving station in Dipilto, Nueva Segovia.

Visit to Ocotal Coop and Nueva Segovia area – Nicaragua

To the left: The Co-op is on steep hillsides with coffee trees planted under heavy shade … this is typical for not only organic coffees grown in Nicaragua but all coffee.

On the march up to 1600 meters, me with some of the Co-op members. They have native shade trees but also banana interplanted with the coffee (I had thought that banana couldn’t be grown at coffee elevations). The Cultivars here are mostly TypicaA coffee cultivar; a cross between Typica and Bourbon, originally grown in Brazil: Mundo Novo is a commercial coffee cultivar; a natural hybrid between "Sumatra" and Red Bourbon,... ...more, Bourbón, and some CaturraCatimor is a broad group of cultivars derived from a Hibrido de Timor (HdT) and Caturra cross, highly productive, sometimes with inferior cup flavor. The main issue is... ...more.

The entire group of farmers and foreigners visiting La Union Coop. In the foreground is the Oakland CA contingent, me and John from Mr. EspressoA small coffee beverage, about 20 ml, prepared on an espresso machine where pressurized hot water extracted through compressed coffee.: In its most stripped-down, basic form, this is... ...more.
My favorite artwork: the Nicaragua anthem next to El Tigre -for a soccer team?

At this time of the season, the first flowering of the trees was complete, and where the flower was (dried brown remnants) emerges the coffee fruit. You can see the little green cherries starting to form in this picture to the left.

Typical adobe house set into the hill side. This one is beside the wet-mill, and belongs to three generations of coffee farmers, all still living under one roof!
We stopped for a cup of coffee and enjoyed the company of some spirited, and somewhat hostile, animals. This little dog was only friendly when you had food; without that it would bare its teeth…

The hostile, hissing duck – well, she’s got good reason.

And the fiercest of all. This turkey was puffing up its feathers and chasing us visitors out of its way, much to the delight of the co-op members. But it was all good fun, and I wasn’t going to leave without a good close-up of the brute!