Jairo Arcila | Colombia | Decaf Espresso

TL;DR: like coffee? love naps? this is for you! The decaf you never knew you were going to love.

 

This coffee is from a very very special producer: Jairo Arcila - owner of Finca Buenos Aires and third-generation coffee grower - is married to Luz Helena Salazar and they have two children together, Carlos and Felipe Arcila, who are the co-founders of Cofinet, our import partners for this coffee. Jairo’s first job was at Colombia’s second-largest exporter, working as their Mill Manager for over 40 years until his retirement in 2019.

 

Jairo bought his first coffee farm, Finca La Esmeralda, in 1987 and this is where he planted his first Caturra lot. He was fortunate enough to earn money by producing coffee on his farm in addition to working full time. Using his savings, Jairo slowly managed to purchase five additional farms. After Esmeralda came Villarazo, Mazatlan, Santa Monica, Maracay and then Buenos Aires. Now, during the harvest period, Jairo can provide jobs to the locals generating an economic impact in the community. He received great insight and expertise from his sons’ in the picking, sorting, and processing of his coffees. This insight has empowered Jairo and given him the tools needed to showcase fantastic coffees with amazing profiles from the region.

 

This Castillo lot was naturally processed before being sent off for sugarcane decaffeination treatment, in order to strip away the caffeine - more on that in a sec - but for now, let's celebrate that Cofinet has taken something that is usually an afterthought, and have turned it into something truly special. If you, like us, want to keep drinking coffee into the evening, but also REALLY enjoy naps, this is for you.

 

A little about the "sugarcane/EA/Ethyl Acetate" process: this involves giving the coffee a good steam before plunging it into a bath of Ethyl Acetate and water.

 

Something to note, Ethyl Acetate might sound scary and like something you don't want near your coffee, but you can sleep well (get it?) knowing that it's a naturally derived solvent that comes from fermenting sugarcane.

 

We'll save you the chemistry lesson, but suffice to say that after an EA bath and a fresh water rinse cycle, the coffee is ready to be steamed one last time to remove the last of the EA, then dried and prepared for export.

 

The result is a sweet and juicy coffee, that maintains more of its original flavour, as well as some additional sweetness. It's a fantastic way to allow producers to sell more of their coffee, and it honestly tastes fantastic - not like the decaf we've been forced to drink for years!

 

This coffee has been through a lot… it has seen things, so we’ve been super gentle and nice to it in the roaster. We’ve aimed to keep things light and to let the truly top notch processing shine through and to really give you a decaf that you could trick your mates with. It’s a much shorter roast than usual, and with a fair amount less heat, but loads of concentration to make sure it doesn’t go too crazy.

 

We start with the same recipe for all of our espresso coffees:
 

• 20g dose
• 45g yield
• 30 seconds

 

From here we will tweak things to get the flavours to highlight things we like. Use this as your starting point and go wild!

 

Note: some domestic espresso machines can’t use a 20g dose. Please always follow your manufacturers instructions to avoid damaging your equipment.