Peru Vista Hermosa

Farm: Vista Hermosa
Varietal: Pache, Caturra, Bourbon
Processing: Fully washed and dried on raised beds in a solar
Altitude: 1850m – 2000m above sea level
Owner: Lorenzo Cruz Garcia
Region: San Ignacio, La Coipa

We’re so excited to have such a delicious organically grown Peruvian coffee back in the roastery for the winter. We’ve been buying from Co-operativa Agraria ‘Union y Fe’ Coipa for a few years now and this micro-lot has been produced by one of the co-op’s founding members and key advisors, Lorenzo Cruz. As well as helping to establish a superb cupping lab, Lorenzo was the first person in the cooperative to install a solar dryer equipped with drying beds. This part of the Andes is high and humid and drying can be a big obstacle to achieving quality. Drying methods can vary across rural Peru, but after witnessing the improvements to Lorenzo’s coffee, as of 2016 cooperative members have now voted that all members will be required to use these solar dyers as a means to ensure better quality and to preserve the hard work cooperative members have put into their production up until that point.

Union y Fe for the most part only produces ‘group lots’ but Vista Hermosa’s coffee is so exceptional that it has been separated out into this very special, single farm lot. Lorenzo admits that his harvest and post- harvest activities play a big role, but he also acknowledges that nature plays a part. He has expressed that his biggest secret is his Caturra plantation, which is meticulously maintained. These trees produce coffee of exceptional quality, particularly at the high altitudes that Lorenzo’s farm, Vista Hermosa, is lucky enough to have.