Wet-processed, sun-dried coffee |
Coffee cherries:
Separating the beans from the pulp and skin must be done on the same day the workers pick the cherry from the branches, in order to maximize the flavor potential of good quality coffee beans. |
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Washing:
Wet processing, removes the red skin and fleshy pulp material through a process called pulping. First, they are immersed in a pool of water, to remove any twigs and stones. |
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Pulping:
Next, they go to the pulping machinery, which removes the red skin from the two coffee beans inside each cherry. The pulp is collected and afterwards reused as an ecological fertilizer on the plantation. |
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Fermentation:
Afterwards it goes into the fermentation box, where the natural process triggers a series of chemical reactions that enhance the flavor quality of the roasted coffee. |
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Sun drying:
Now it's time for the wet beans to slowly dry down to be slowly sun dryed, down to a 10 - 11% humitity level. Workers hand-distribute them on the drying floor (also called a patio, to dry in the sun. This process takes from one to two weeks, depending on the amount of sunny days available. During this drying time, workers must rake the beans many, many times to insure that they dry evenly. |
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Storing / Cleaning:
Workers bag the sun-dried beans, now called "parchment," and take them to the
warehouse. The machines then removes the parchment and silver skin from each bean. This renders a green bean suitable for roasting.
Grading gourmet-quality coffees by size, shape, density and color is the next step. |
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Roasting / Packsging:
When we receive an order for coffee, we roast the beans in a 25-pound coffee roasting machine. We watch each roast carefully, until the perfect moment the beans change to a beautiful medium roast, a full bodied dark roast, or an espresso roast, depending on each customer's preference. |
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