Colombia El jardin Pink Bourbon special ferment
Price range: $25.00 through $115.00
plum compote - purple florals - cocoa - pink lemonade
When I visited the ASOPEP cooperative in 2018, I specifically remember seeing a young man working in the cupping lab, grinding coffee and running hot water in and out in order to fill the bowls on the table. The following year, when one of our roasters went back to ASOPEP, he ended up visiting the farm of a young producer (who also happened to spend a lot of time in the cupping lab) named Jorge Rojas. The name was familiar, as we had actually received a sample of Jorge’s coffee from the head of the cooperative on the show floor of the Specialty Coffee Association’s annual convention in Boston, of all places. Jorge was an up and comer, dedicated to producing the best coffee possible, and we were interested in the various microlots he was just starting to produce. But 2020 shot most plans to hell, you might recall, putting the kibosh on all travel, foreign and domestic, along with closing our retail shop (and delaying the buildout and opening of our second one) for, oh, a third of a year? When we re-opened we were busy figuring out the retail environment post-COVID, and let some of our other projects slide, including travel and the establishment of new purchasing relationships. And wouldn’t you know, but Jorge Rojas has turned into a superstar in the coffee growing community, winning competitions and sending all kinds of special varietals and processes to top roasters around the globe.
Since that last visit, we’ve had the opportunity to purchase his coffee, mostly by happenstance, twice. This particular lot is pink bourbon, a “mystery” varietal from Colombia that—as most of these mysteriously delicious and bright misfit coffees do—proved to be a varietal with Ethiopian genetics that found its way outside of Africa. Pink bourbon, generally speaking, is a varietal we love, because it is a varietal that shows itself in the cup. But I have to say that this pink bourbon lot is the least “pink bourbon-y” high quality lot we’ve encountered. I chalk it up to Jorge’s interest in processing. The lot underwent extended dry fermentation—we’re not quite sure for how many hours, or days—before being washed, resulting in a very fruity cup—you might mistake it for a natural if cupping it blind—with dark purple notes, of both the fruit and floral kind. There’s also a rich cocoa flavor that I might associate with anaerobic fermentation (though we have been told that this is not an anaerobic lot, per se). Still, the varietal makes an appearance with a little bit of the pink lemonade acidity that we often identify as a pink bourbon attribute, and the coffee itself is not clunky or overly goopy, which (aside from a skillful hand in processing itself) can probably be attributed to the pink bourbon base coffee.
Location: Planadas, Tolima
Elevation: 1800 MASL
Varietal: pink bourbon
Process: extended ferment, washed
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
When I visited the ASOPEP cooperative in 2018, I specifically remember seeing a young man working in the cupping lab, grinding coffee and running hot water in and out in order to fill the bowls on the table. The following year, when one of our roasters went back to ASOPEP, he ended up visiting the farm of a young producer (who also happened to spend a lot of time in the cupping lab) named Jorge Rojas. The name was familiar, as we had actually received a sample of Jorge’s coffee from the head of the cooperative on the show floor of the Specialty Coffee Association’s annual convention in Boston, of all places. Jorge was an up and comer, dedicated to producing the best coffee possible, and we were interested in the various microlots he was just starting to produce. But 2020 shot most plans to hell, you might recall, putting the kibosh on all travel, foreign and domestic, along with closing our retail shop (and delaying the buildout and opening of our second one) for, oh, a third of a year? When we re-opened we were busy figuring out the retail environment post-COVID, and let some of our other projects slide, including travel and the establishment of new purchasing relationships. And wouldn’t you know, but Jorge Rojas has turned into a superstar in the coffee growing community, winning competitions and sending all kinds of special varietals and processes to top roasters around the globe.
Since that last visit, we’ve had the opportunity to purchase his coffee, mostly by happenstance, twice. This particular lot is pink bourbon, a “mystery” varietal from Colombia that—as most of these mysteriously delicious and bright misfit coffees do—proved to be a varietal with Ethiopian genetics that found its way outside of Africa. Pink bourbon, generally speaking, is a varietal we love, because it is a varietal that shows itself in the cup. But I have to say that this pink bourbon lot is the least “pink bourbon-y” high quality lot we’ve encountered. I chalk it up to Jorge’s interest in processing. The lot underwent extended dry fermentation—we’re not quite sure for how many hours, or days—before being washed, resulting in a very fruity cup—you might mistake it for a natural if cupping it blind—with dark purple notes, of both the fruit and floral kind. There’s also a rich cocoa flavor that I might associate with anaerobic fermentation (though we have been told that this is not an anaerobic lot, per se). Still, the varietal makes an appearance with a little bit of the pink lemonade acidity that we often identify as a pink bourbon attribute, and the coffee itself is not clunky or overly goopy, which (aside from a skillful hand in processing itself) can probably be attributed to the pink bourbon base coffee.
Location: Planadas, Tolima
Elevation: 1800 MASL
Varietal: pink bourbon
Process: extended ferment, washed