Brazil, Prima Qualita

Single Origin Coffee

Notes: Chocolate, Dried Apricot, Tangerine, Heavy Body

Roast: Medium-Dark (Full City +)

Varietal: Mundo Novo, Yellow Catuai, Red Catuai, Icatu

Process: Natural, Pulp Natural

Farmer: Guaxape Cooperative

Altitude: 914-1828m

Prima Qualita is a premium blend of three Bourbon varietal coffees farmed by Brazil’s Cooxupe cooperative: a traditional dry process coffee, a pulp natural, and a tree-dried coffee.

Dry-process coffees start as ripe coffee cherries that are picked from trees by hand and laid out on patios to dry. The outer pod and inner parchment layers are removed in a single milling process that reveals the green coffee seed or bean. The pulp natural process removes the skin but not the sugary, sweet mucilage. Millers control how much mucilage is left to dry around the coffee. Pulped naturals are cleaner and more balanced than their dry processed equivalents; they have more body and less acidity than washed coffees.

In Brazil the practice of tree-drying coffees predates the dry process patio method. Coffee cherries are left to raisin on the tree. Tree-dried coffees tend to be more “wild” in flavor and uneven in the cup. In Central America, a tree-dried coffee is often referred to as Sangre de Toro or Bull’s Blood. Only the best developed, mild, tree-dried Bourbon coffee seeds are blended into Prima Qualita to add depth and complexity without dominating the cup profile.