Pitalito, Colombia

Speciality on a budget

We sought this coffee for its cup quality and price, to get as close as possible to our target minimum bar of 85/100 for all our coffee.  Although it still fell short by a point, this coffee at 84 points represents great value for money, is flexible across filter and espresso and has traceability, most importantly!

Smallholders and cooperatives

Pitalito is a community coffee from Pitalito town in the Laboyos Valley to the south of Huila, southwest Colombia.  Like much of the coffee that comes from Colombia, many of the coffee farmers will band together to produce and sell their lots of coffee, similar to what you might find in areas of Ethiopia.  The valley is surrounded by coffee trees with incredible fruit born from the volcanic soil.

The Huila region and Pitalito in particular have had successful entries in the Cup of Excellence competition in previous years, probably thanks to its decent elevation of 1600-1900 metres above sea level.

Growers from the region have maintained a tradition of planting mainly the Caturra varietal here, making up around 50% of this batch, alongside the more modern and robust Castillo cultivar at 30% and lastly the Colombia varietal at 18%.  The last 2% is made up of other indigenous varietals from the region.

The coffee is purchased from SKN Caribecafe (via IAC), a Colombian coffee distributor based in Bogota that operates on a direct trade basis with the farmers, and work with them on a quality basis to pay solid prices in return for a higher quality yield.  They also provide technical assistance to the farmers in order to help them achieve these goals.

Can you taste it?

The juiciness of this coffee is almost chewable, but it’s less fruit juice than it is gummy bears.  Berry and caramel are the key contributing notes with a little marmalade in the finish.  You’ll find medium acidity, medium body — an all-rounder.

Our recommendation

This is a perfect candidate for multi-use brewing and is at home equally on filter as it is on espresso.  For espresso orders, we’ll push the roast a tad to smooth out the acidity and increase body and sweetness.

Our picks for this either the french press/cafetiere or as the espresso base for your milk drinks.

Remember that the coffee is roasted to order as a fresh product — we recommend that you drink it within 2 weeks, 4 weeks at most from the roasting date, or the coffee will be far from its best!