Costa Rica Black Honey | Black Honey Process from Sumava Lourdes, Cup of Excellence Champion Estate

How to Brew Black Honey Processed Coffee Beans? Flavor and Taste Profile of Costa Rica Sumava Estate Black Honey Coffee

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Costa Rica Sumava de Lourdes Black Honey

FrontStreet Coffee · Costa Rica Sumava Estate Caturra Black Honey Process

Region: West Valley

Estate: Finca Sumava de Lourdes

Variety: Caturra

Altitude: 1700 meters

Processing: Black honey process

Soil: Volcanic geology

Harvest: December to March of the following year

Flavor notes: Brown sugar, floral, citrus, pomelo, sweet spices, rich sweet texture

01 | Region Introduction

Coffee cultivation in Costa Rica began in 1779 with introduction from Cuba, with the first coffee exports occurring in 1820. Currently, there are approximately 32,000 coffee farmers, each with an average cultivation area of less than one hectare (10,000 square meters). Costa Rica has a population of 4.1 million (2006 data), with coffee cultivation covering 82,500 hectares, producing 1.7 million bags annually (60kg per bag), with domestic consumption reaching 380,000 bags. The average annual consumption per person is 5.5kg, higher than Japan (4kg) and significantly higher than Taiwan's average of just over 1kg.

Costa Rica was the first country in Central America to cultivate coffee, with a long history and a complete system from production to sales. Located in the Central American isthmus, the country features numerous volcanoes and enjoys natural advantages of abundant sunlight and fertile land. The climate is moderated by Pacific and Atlantic ocean currents and sea breezes, producing coffee with distinctive characteristics of local microclimate and terroir. In terms of both quality and quantity, Costa Rican coffee has consistently received worldwide recognition and is rated as one of the world's high-quality coffees. Many towering volcanoes reach 2,000 meters in altitude, allowing coffee cherries to grow slowly in the fertile volcanic ash soil and high-altitude cool environment, cultivating coffee beans with complete and rich flavors.

Coffee cultivation began in Costa Rica two hundred years ago, with the earliest growing sites located on the slopes of the Poas and Barva volcanoes, now known as the Central Valley region. After years of development, Costa Rica currently has eight main producing regions: Guanacaste, West Valley, Central Valley, Turrialba, Orosi, Tres Rios, Tarrazu, and Brunca.

According to ICO statistics, Costa Rica produces approximately 1.6 million bags of Arabica coffee annually. Although production volume is lower than Central American countries like Guatemala and Honduras, its quality and price are significantly higher than theirs.

Costa Rica has two seasons throughout the year. The dry season runs from December to April, which is also the coffee harvest time, while the rainy season spans from May to November. In recent years, many micro-mills have been established, requiring only 5% of the water consumption of traditional washed processing mills, and not requiring large water tanks or drying patios, making the required investment relatively small. The "honey processed coffee" with lower acidity, increased complexity, and rich sweet aroma has become a sought-after target in the coffee industry in recent years; among them, the outstanding performers have shined in major competitions, greatly enhancing the international reputation of various estates.

Sumava Estate

Costa Rica has seven coffee producing regions, among which Tarrazu, Central Valley, and West Valley are the three most famous and highest quality regions. Sumava Estate (Finca Sumava de Lourdes) is located in the West Valley region of Costa Rica, near the city of Naranjo, at an altitude of 1700 meters. The planted varieties include Villasarchi and Caturra covering 10 hectares, SL28 covering 2 hectares, Geisha covering 1 hectare, and other varieties. The estate owner is Francisco Men, with estate manager Jose Ordonez leading a full-time work team. In addition to cultivating diverse coffee varieties, the estate retains a large area of land as a forest conservation area, providing natural habitat for wildlife, making it a premium coffee estate in Costa Rica.

Costa Rica's Sumava Estate is a relatively young estate; Francisco Mena, originally engaged in the coffee trade business, acquired this land and preserved most of the original forest, developing only a small portion as a coffee cultivation area to maintain the estate's natural ecological balance.

The altitude of Sumava Estate ranges between 1670-1790 meters, in West Valley, another renowned region in Costa Rica. The high temperature variation combined with fertile soil creates ideal conditions for coffee cultivation.

Estate owner Francisco Mena introduced high-quality varieties that ranked in the top 13 of the Cup of Excellence, including the Bourbon mutation variety, Villa Sarchi. This is a rare variety cultivated through hybridization of Red Bourbon trees. It exhibits strong wind resistance, prefers high-altitude environments, and possesses excellent acidity with various fruity aromas. It has high sweetness, bright and delicate citrus acidity with deeper raisin and nutty notes, showing considerable complexity and excellent balance.

Most of the estate is left as forest to maintain the natural environment. Significant effort has been invested in estate management, avoiding traditional burning methods for fallen trees, rotten wood, and weeds. Instead, wood is shredded into fragments and mixed with organic fertilizers for use as farm fertilizer. From the El Chayote reserve in West Valley, in the fertile volcanic soils of Pos, facing Pacific convection and moisture combined with significant day-night temperature differences and excellent microclimate, this small 1-kilometer radius area has produced four champion estates! Truly a testament to outstanding terroir and people!

02 | Processing Method

Honey Processing

The honey processing method, known as Honey Process or Miel Process, produces what's called Honey Coffee. Coffee estates in Costa Rica, Panama, Guatemala, and other regions have adopted this processing method. The so-called honey processing refers to the process of producing green beans by sun-drying with the mucilage intact.

Estate owner Mena employs a unique sweet juice honey processing method, which he calls: sweet sugar process! The juice extracted during coffee cherry processing is used to soak the parchment beans during processing. Because the cherry juice contains high sweetness and unique enzymes, the processed parchment beans contain richer flavors and more complex positive characteristics!

The typical harvest season is from January to April each year. Due to the estate's temperature of only 10-20°C, there are often still ripe coffee cherries waiting to be harvested in April! Simply put: processing methods that retain more mucilage result in coffee with richer final flavors and higher sweetness. Here's a comparison of several honey processing flavor profiles:

The mucilage portion is the part with the highest sugar content in coffee cherries and is an important component of coffee processing fermentation. It can be said that this part determines 80% of the nutritional supply during processing. Yellow honey retains 60% of the mucilage, red honey retains 75% of the mucilage, and black honey retains almost all the mucilage.

03 | Green Bean Analysis

Caturra, varietal Caturra, Coffea arabica var. caturra.

First discovered in São Paulo state, Brazil in 1937, it's a natural mutation of Bourbon. Currently widely cultivated in Brazil, Colombia, and other Central and South American regions.

04 | Roasting Analysis

Yangjia 800N roaster, 550g green beans input, specific operation:

Heat the roaster to 200°C and load the beans, with damper setting at 3. After 1 minute of steaming, adjust heat to 160°C, keeping the damper unchanged. When the temperature reaches 160°C, reduce heat to 135°C. At 5'40", the temperature is 154.9°C, the bean surface turns yellow, grassy smell completely disappears, dehydration is complete, damper remains unchanged;

At the 9th minute, ugly wrinkles and black spots appear on the bean surface, the toast aroma clearly transitions to coffee aroma, which can be defined as the prelude to first crack. At this point, listen carefully for the sound of first crack. At 9'21", first crack begins, reduce heat to 80°C, fully open the damper to 5 (adjust heat very carefully, not so low that there's no cracking sound). At 193.4°C, discharge the beans.

Cupping Notes

Flavor: Preserved plum, honey, brown sugar, orange blossom, white chocolate

Mouthfeel: Excellent sweetness, gentle fruit acidity, round and full-bodied, persistent aftertaste

03 | Brewing Analysis

Pour Over Reference

Using Key's dripper, 16g of coffee grounds to 32g of water, 30-second bloom. Extract with water temperature of 89-90°C, ratio of 1:15, medium-fine grind (Fuji grinder setting 3.5). For the second pour, add water to 110ml and pause. Wait for the water level to drop before slowly pouring again, maintaining even speed, keeping water level not too high. Add water again until reaching 233ml, then stop. Extraction time: 2:15 seconds. This yields rich natural sweetness. Everyone can make fine adjustments according to their own taste preferences.

FrontStreet Coffee · Costa Rica Black Honey Process Catuai Tarrazu Region Sumava Estate Specialty Single Origin Coffee Beans

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