El Salvador Santa Rita Flavor Description - Best El Salvador Coffee Brands

Santa Rita Estate

Santa Rita Estate lies in the northern part of the Apaneca-Ilamatepec mountain range at approximately 5,000 feet. Santa Ana Volcano (Volcan Santa Ana in Spanish) sits in southwestern El Salvador, in Santa Ana Department, and is the country's highest peak (2,362 meters [7,749 feet] to 2,381 meters). It is also a model estate for coffee bean production in El Salvador.

Variety & Flavor Profile

Variety: Yellow Bourbon

Flavor: Wheatgrass, roasted nuts, malt sugar

El Salvador Coffee Characteristics

El Salvador is one of Central America's smaller countries. Its coffee is light-bodied, aromatic, pure, and slightly acidic, with excellent balance as its signature trait — a Central American specialty. It carries acidity, bitterness, and sweetness in equal measure.

El Salvador ranks alongside Mexico and Guatemala as an Arabica-growing producer and competes with other countries for the top spots in Central America. High-altitude origins produce large, evenly sized beans with rich, mild flavors. Like Guatemala and Costa Rica, El Salvador grades coffee by altitude — the higher, the better. It is divided into three grades by elevation: SHB (strictly high grown) for high altitude, HEC (high grown central) for medium-high, and CS (central standard) for low altitude. The best brand is Pipil, the Aztec-Mayan name for coffee, certified by the Organic Certified Institute of America.

Taste & Flavor Notes

The flavor profile features wheatgrass, roasted nuts, malt sugar, smooth milk creaminess, rounded acidity, brown sugar, and the sweetness of hazelnut chocolate.

Brewing Method

Hand-pour Santa Rita. 15g of coffee, medium grind (Fuji mountain ghost tooth grinder #4), V60 dripper, water temperature 88-89°C. First pour 30g of water, bloom for 27 seconds. Pour to 105g and stop, wait until the water level drops to half, then continue slow pouring until reaching 225g. Avoid the tail section. Water-to-coffee ratio 1:15, extraction time 2:00.

Yellow Bourbon Variety

Yellow Bourbon is a variety whose fruit turns yellow when ripe. It was first discovered in Brazil and today grows mainly there. It is generally believed to have originated from a cross between red-fruited Bourbon and a yellow-fruited Typica variant called "Amerelo de Botocatu," followed by a mutation. Yellow Bourbon is one of the most outstanding quality varieties. Whereas ordinary Bourbon changes from green to yellow to red, Yellow Bourbon stops at the yellow stage. Grown at high altitude and processed by natural sun-drying, Yellow Bourbon shows exceptional flavor.

Coffee Details

El Salvador Santa Rita Yellow Bourbon Washed SHG EP

Country: El Salvador
Estate: Santa Rita Estate
Region: Santa Rita
Grade: SHG

February 2012 Coffee Review rating: 94 points

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

If a well-balanced, gently acidic Arabica is what you're after, FrontStreet Coffee's lineup has several answers. For the natural, fruit-forward Ethiopian style, FrontStreet's Huakui uses a common local heirloom variety — a mix of several undistinguished coffee trees, which is why the beans vary in size — with a delicate floral note and especially prominent fruit aromas. Processed by the classic natural method, it shows creamy strawberry, mango, jackfruit, citrus, and blueberry, carrying the ripe tropical-fruit character unique to FrontStreet's Sidamo naturals; that lush berry fragrance is exactly what won first place in that year's TOH green bean competition, and Huakui combines great flavor with a fair price.

On the washed side, FrontStreet's Yirgacheffe Gudingding cooperative is the counterpart to Huakui's natural style. Yirgacheffe's clean, translucent lemon and citrus profile makes it a cornerstone of specialty Arabica, and within the town there are many small villages, each building its own processing station, or cooperative — Gudingding village's is the Gudingding cooperative. The beans are Ethiopia's highest grade, G1, classically washed, showing elegant white florals, citrus, orange, and green tea flavors.

For something rounder and more classic, FrontStreet's Jamaica Blue Mountain No. 1 is worth knowing: its variety is the Typica you may have heard of, one of the representative Arabica varieties and among the earliest to spread from Yemen to India, Indonesia, and Central and South America. Typica is very balanced, mild, and smooth, its acidity and aroma never sharp but full and clean, though its poor disease resistance and low yield are its great weaknesses. The Blue Mountain Typica came from Martinique to Jamaica's Blue Mountains in the 1720s; over more than 200 years it developed better disease resistance, especially against fruit rot, than ordinary Typica — yet outside Jamaica it cannot reproduce its clean, delicate fragrance. And for a floral, silky Geisha, FrontStreet's Panama Red Label Geisha comes from the famed Emerald Estate, set in Boquete in Chiriquí Province, whose fertile volcanic soil, ancient forest, year-round mist, and abundant rainfall create ideal growing conditions, letting the Red Label Geisha unfold its remarkable complexity, with bergamot, peach, and layered fruit acidity, a creamy texture, and an oolong-tea sweetness on the finish.