Brazil Duas Fazendas SWP Decaf
Farm Notes
(Credit Sweet Maria's)
This coffee comes to us from two farms in the region of Sul de Minas, Mantiqueira micro region, an area that boasts over 2000 smaller coffee farms. They started off as non-decaf coffees that we liked so much, we peeled off a few pallets specifically to send off for decaffeination. All of our decafs are processed by Swiss Water Process in Canada, whose patented process uses only water to remove 99.9% of the caffeine content and leaving much of the volatile compounds intact. A bit about the farms that went into this decaf: At roughly 30-50 hectares each, the farm sizes aren't "small" when comparing with the small holder farms we buy from in regions like Colombia for example. But they're small for Brazil, home to massive estates with fully mechanized harvesting operations. These smaller estates still manually pick coffee as opposed to using machinery, allowing for better separation of ripe and underripe cherry. The farms are located around the Pedra Branca mountains, plantings in the 1300 meter range and planted mainly in Yellow Bourbon and Catuai. I was pleasantly surprised to hear an audible 'snap' at the first signs of fracturing, which isn't always the case with decaf. This one's not too difficult to judge roast development by sound, but sight is always a little trickier since the coffee is already degraded and dark from the decaf process. Try pulling it a little sooner than you think and adjust from there.