Honduras Finca Las Quebraditas Filter Roast
Honduras Finca Las Quebraditas
When I brewed this coffee for some of the team, they couldn’t believe where it came from or what it was. Part of me feels that this is the business that we are in. When you have a sample from a small producer that makes you stand back and go “Wow!” you just have to enjoy the moment and share it.
This is the first of a number of wild and exciting coffees we have from Honduras this season. The next is The Oak, or El Roble
Top Trumps:
Owner: Merlin Hernandez
Farm: Finca Las Quebraditas y La Montanita
Translates to: The broken ones on the small mountain.
Farm Size: Two small plots totaling 7 hectares
Altitude: 1,250 to 1,300 meters
Process: Fully Washed
Varietals: Parainema, pacas, lempira, and IH-Café 90
Roast: Filter
Cup Potential: 🍜
Aromatics: Ripe fruits and chocolate| Body: Light when hot, becomes denser on cooling| Acidity: Peach, White wine, citrus|
With good water, Finca Las Quebraditas y La Montanita is a thing of sensory beauty. Depending on your recipe, it can be ripe, peachy, and deeply sweet. As the coffee infuses a citric finish and a flourish of white fruit sugars. Lower-dosed, finer ground brews have been more like a Yirgacheffe, with a white wine/champagne-like acidity.
I know, much ambiguity above. I have been brewing this at 65g per litre and found lots more ripeness and body, although this faded faster than the next recipe.
55g per litre, ground a lot finer, made a more, expected, (less wild) delicious filter. The acidity is fresher and a little cleaner and lasts, all of the way down to cold.
It turns out that this fantastic coffee also works in espresso.
In our standard Mahlkonig e65 Grind by weight, the finest I could get from this was a range of 26-28 seconds. In a Niche Zero, it worked consistently on 13.
90z milk-based drinks. The acidity from the espresso cuts through in a mineral way. You know it is there but it isn’t in your face.
6oz milk-based drinks. Subtle ripe fruity notes, cocoa, and more of the mineral acidity. If I was pushing for edgy words, maybe flinty?
Espresso. If you like sweet acidity, you might just love this too. Beautiful, juicy, clean white winey acidity dominates and makes sense of all of the other espresso drinks.
Espresso Recipe:
17g of coffee into 34g in 26-28 seconds for milk-based drinks.
17g of coffee into 45/50g of espresso liquid 26-33 seconds.
We start brewing coffees at 93.5C (in espresso) and increase or decrease as necessary.
Farm Stuff
Merlin is one of those people who is horribly good at many things. Currently, she is the bookkeeper for Cafesmo Coffee, which involves making sure everyone is paid the right amount for what they produce. On top of this, Merlin has 2 brothers and sisters and a father who also grow coffee. Merlin takes care of the “boring bits” as well now having graduated as a lawyer.
The family has only been focussing on specialty for a few years, and I am a huge fan of this coffee.
As always, if you want to share your brews, you can here
