How to Enjoy Pour-Over Coffee from Colombia's Monte Verde Estate_ Guide to Brewing Light Roast Colombian Coffee

Colombia Tolima Las Mercedes Finca Monte Verde Wushwush Natural Custom Lot

Tasting Notes: bayberry and white floral, green grape, tangerine, pomegranate, dried cranberry, black tea finish

Region: Tolima

Producer: Gildardo Gutierrez Tejada

Farm: Monteverde

Variety: Wush Wush

Process: Natural

Elevation: 1850 meters

About Monteverde Farm

Monteverde Farm spans 15 hectares and grows Red Bourbon, Yellow Bourbon, Geisha, Wush Wush, and Mocha. The farm owner is Gildardo Gutierrez, whose family has farmed coffee here for 70 years. The farm is obsessive about detail: it picks only the most mature cherries and controls the entire fermentation process for up to 36 hours — the source of Monteverde's distinctive fruit character. Cherries dry on raised beds under plastic-roofed drying houses, with air circulating freely above and below the fruit, and the cool temperature is held throughout, stretching the natural process out to as long as 25 days.

Colombia harvests twice a year — the fly crop from April to June and the main crop from October to December. Beyond coffee, Monteverde grows avocados, citrus, and lemons for the local market.

Recently the owner's son, tracing the farm's history, put it this way: "I am a fourth-generation coffee farmer, and there are four professional coffee cuppers in our family. When we learned of the great success Hacienda La Esmeralda had growing Geisha in Panama, we spent 8 years working to cultivate excellent exotic varieties. We have planted many rare varieties on our farm, and through honey and natural processing we try to bring our customers the quality they dream of. Many years ago our farm was already certified organic; the certification has since lapsed, but we still practice clean, environmentally friendly agriculture."

Geographic Advantages

Monteverde sits in southern Tolima at 1800-2000 meters, a location that grants abundant sunshine and rainfall. Those high-altitude conditions let the farm grow special varieties — Geisha, Wush Wush, SL-28, and Bourbon Sidra — rather than the Caturra or Castillo that dominates most Colombian farms.

One more advantage makes these delicate varieties possible: water. Monteverde lies near the Rio Blanco (White River), an important Tolima waterway that flows steadily almost year-round regardless of season, supplying the farm abundantly. That stability in post-harvest processing is what lets the rich, delicate flavors of Geisha and Wush Wush fully emerge.

The Wush Wush Variety

The rare Wush Wush has won over countless coffee lovers with its unique aroma and delicate flavors. Many assume it is a grafted offshoot of Geisha, but it isn't. Like Geisha, Wush Wush originates in Ethiopia's Kaffa forest; the two were discovered separately in the Wush Wush region and the Geisha mountain region — hence their names — and both arrived in Colombia 30 years ago.

How to Brew Colombia Monteverde Wush Wush

FrontStreet Coffee Pour-Over Reference:

Weigh out 15g of Monteverde Wush Wush and grind medium — slightly coarser than table salt. We use grinder setting BG 5R (60% pass on the standard sieve). Water temperature is 89°C, brewed in a V60 dripper, at a coffee-to-water ratio of about 1:15.

Pour hot water from the gooseneck kettle in clockwise circles centered on the middle of the dripper, starting the timer as you begin. Within 15 seconds, bring the brew up to 30g and stop. At 1 minute, begin the second pour — the same clockwise circles from the center, keeping the stream off the area where grounds meet the filter paper to avoid channeling.

When you reach the outermost ring of grounds, leave that ring dry, then work circle by circle back toward the center. At 2 minutes 20 seconds the brew should reach 220g, completing the extraction.

Japanese-Style Ice Pour-Over Monteverde Wush Wush

FrontStreet Coffee Ice Pour-Over Reference:

Colombia Monteverde Wush Wush, light-medium roast, grinder setting BG 5M (67% pass on the standard sieve).

20g of coffee, 150g of ice, 150g of hot water. Water runs 1°C above the normal pour-over recommendation of 90°C. Normal grinding uses the Fuji 3.5 setting; for ice pour-over, go slightly finer at Fuji 3.0. The coffee-to-(water+ice) ratio is 1:15.

Bloom with 40g of water for 30 seconds.

Pour in stages: 60g first, then 40g. Use a fine but forceful stream to stir the bed thoroughly so the grounds roll — but take care not to raise the liquid level too high or splash the filter paper at the edges.

Total extraction should run about 2.5 minutes, similar to a normal extraction for 20g of coffee.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

If the Wush Wush has you curious about other rare Ethiopian heirlooms grown beyond Africa, Geisha is the natural companion — the variety that proved just how extraordinary these forest-derived cultivars can be. FrontStreet Coffee's Panama Boquete Geisha is the approachable way in: at a modest price it captures the classic Panamanian profile of orange-honey sweetness, an oolong-tea character, delicate fruit acidity, and clearly layered structure. For the full expression, the Esmeralda Red Label (Esmeralda Special) comes from single plots at 1600-1800 meters with batch cupping scores above 90, while the Green Label (Private Collection) blends plots for Esmeralda's signature high-altitude Geisha taste at a friendlier price.

Back on home soil, the Granla Estate Gesha near Yirgacheffe offers the Ethiopian side of the story: hand-picked ripe cherries dried on raised beds for 14-20 days, roasted medium-light to show bright citrus acidity, elegant ginger-flower aroma, and full ripe-fruit sweetness with Geisha's signature refined finish. Brew it like the recipe above — 15g in a small V60 at 1:16, water at 91°C, a coarse grind (78% pass on the #20 sieve), three pours to 225g over about 2:10-2:20.