Honduras Miriam Perez Natural

Where in the world?

What’s the story?

The fermentation process Miriam has used on her farm draws out some warming sticky orange notes when brewed, sweet and unctuous and refreshing at the same time. On a medium roast we can draw out the coffee’s sweetness and body, allowing the natural acidity and brightness to shine through. This incredible balance gives a very rounded cup, with the orange notes enhanced by a light brown sugar and milk chocolate sweetness. If you happen to be a fan of a negroni or any sort of bitter orange aperitif, then definitely try this coffee.

Miriam Perez and her niece, our good friend Suita Manuela are part of our coffee family. We have had Miriam’s natural process for the last five years, and it remains part of our core range. We really enjoy the fact that she has experimented with other processing techniques for the last few years, and this iteration of her natural process truly sees some delicious flavours.

All this work happens on Finca Clave de Sol, meaning the coffee is grown, harvested and prepared on Miriam’s magical farm, entirely organic, bio-dynamic and buzzing with incredible biodiversity. There are eleven varietals of coffee grown on the farm, combined into one lot, so this coffee is a true reflection of the land, the richness of the soil and surrounding forest.

For this experimental lot, the coffee cherries are placed whole in sealed containers, creating an anaerobic fermentation of the cherries for 36 hours. The cherries are then pulped and left to sun dry with the sticky mucilage layer in place, before finally being dry milled and prepared for market.

Suita has written a description of the post harvest process this coffee has to go through here. After all the nurturing of the soil and plants and careful picking of only ripe cherries, there is then a lot more work to be done!:

“The drying step of the natural process takes 18 to 26 days depending on the month in which it is harvested. December and January usually take 22 days and for the months of February and March 18 days. The hand-picking of the coffee cherries was done according to their ripening level, also using the lunar calendar and the Brix degree meter.

The next step is the placement of the coffee cherries on shaded raised beds for a double selection to extract any unripe, dried, or damaged cherries.
After the selection was completed, the cherries were bagged and transported to the raised beds and patios to be sundried. Every 20 minutes the cherries are turned while they are being sundried and at the same time, measurements of moisture content are performed frequently.When the moisture content reaches 10.5%, the dry coffee cherries are picked and bagged in polypropylene bags, which are labeled and transferred to the warehouse at the farm.

The dried cherries are left to rest at the Clave de Sol’s warehouse for 4 to 6 months.
Before this coffee was transported to the dry mill to be prepared for the export process, the coffee cherries were exposed to the sun to maintain the moisture content at a parameter of 11%.Throughout the process is monitored and registered on a daily registry, which also includes the temperature,rainfall, humidity, and winds.”

A real labour of love to make the magic in your cup possible. A longstanding coffee we are delighted to have back in stock for you.

Brewing Recipe