Colombia Cauca Excelso - Fully Washed

We Taste - Spiced caramel, cocoa almond, Valencia orange

Fully washed coffees from the Department of Cauca are silky, vibrant, and sweet. Grown by twenty producers at an equatorial medium-high elevation, Cauca's Excelso grade stands out for its clean, balanced flavor and medium body. Bright and citrusy, yet vibrantly complex, this fresh-crop fully-washed lot features a little warming spice in the finish that brews perfectly for the season. 

Medium roasting highlights the sugar browning character of Castillo, Caturra, and Colombia varieties, making for a balanced cup of layered sweetness like caramel, rich cocoa, roasted almond, sweet Valencia orange, and a little warming spice. Given a week off-roast, this sweetly bright and balanced Cauca lot extracts with ease across all brewing formats.

Coffee farmers in Cauca harvest a singular crop in the March - June timeline, contrasting with their easterly neighbors in Huila, who often experience a fly crop in the off-season. Equatorial coffee climates (southern Colombia, Kenya, DRC, parts of Indonesia) often have fly crop potential, so it's interesting to note how the difference between neighboring departments highlights regional weather patterns and the impact of rainy seasons. 

Roast: Medium - One week+ off-roast yields sweet, balanced cups.
Process: Fully Washed - The coffee is picked ripe and depulped the same day, then open-air fermented in tanks between 12–36 hours. The fermented coffee is washed clean of its mucilage before being dried on patios, in parabolic dryers, or solar driers.
Varieties: Castillo, Caturra, Colombia - Popular varieties in Colombia. Caturra is Arabica, while Castillo and Colombia var. are Arabica-Robusta hybrids developed by CENECAFE, the National Federation of Coffee Growers's agronomical research center.
Elevation: 1400-2000 masl - The medium-high elevation range produces good complexity and a tart acidity.
Location: Popayán, Cauca Department, Colombia
Producers: 20 smallholder farmers
Grades / Certifications: Excelso - Size/export grade (Screen 15-16)
Harvest: April - June 2026

Brew Guides
Espresso: 1:2.2 in 25-28 sec, 92-93℃
Filter: 1:16.2 in 3:00, 94-95℃
Notes: Nice at 3-4 days off-roast, quite sweet and well-balanced at day 7 onward. Balance in approach is key here. Brew ratios in the Normale neighborhood and 1:16+ tend to do well in that regard. Density is average for specialty coffee, but you may need to fine up to slow flow to hit target brew times. Underextraction may be too silky, citrusy, and mildly herbaceous - fine up / increase brew time. Overextraction may yield a stronger warming spice that veers into rye - coarsen up / decrease brew time.