It would seem logical that the smallest Central American coffee-growing country would produce microlots, but historically, much of the coffee was blended and sold to mills, without much lot differentiation and separation. The rise of specialty coffee in El Salvador has inspired many producers to start to identify and isolate individual varieties, and to experiment with sorting and processing, as a way of attracting buyers and getting higher prices, but access to those resources can still be difficult for smaller growers.
For the past few years, Café Imports green buyer Piero Cristiani—who is from El Salvador, and whose mother has a long history in coffee there—has embarked on a project designed to identify, reward, and bring to market the exceptional results of the hard, innovative work that producers are increasingly interested in doing here.
Focusing on the region of Chalatenango, Piero has partnered with a cupper and a local mill to buy small, select microlots from producers—some separated by variety, some by process, and some by both. We are buying the coffee in parchment and doing the ruling and final sorting and bagging ourselves, which allows for more quality control as well as the ability to package some of these very special small lots in custom 35-kilo Pequeños bags, to create more widespread access to these coffees to roasters.
José Francisco Recinos grows Pacamara and Pacas on 1.5 manzanas of farmland, about 4,500 trees total, with just 28–35 quintales of production every year. Though he is a very small producer, he says to the roasters who are interested in his coffee, "Keep working,and always buy our whole harvest, and I will always give you good quality." He has sold his coffee as specialty to us for the past 4 years, and his coffees have won the Salvadoran Cup of Excellence compeition in the past.
This lot is a Honey process of Pacamara, which is picked ripe, depulped, and fermented in sacks for 14–18 hours before being laid out on beds for 13–20 days.
We are proud to offer these micro-microlots, and can’t wait for you and your customers to experience the delicious stuff that comes in these small packages.
For more information about coffee production in El Salvador, visit our El Salvador Origin Page.
