Before 2010, coffee production had been sparse in Saraguro, a canton (county) of the Loja province in southern Ecuador. Despite favorable elevation and growing conditions for coffee, farmers here have traditionally grown corn and other subsistence crops. Years of low and volatile prices created the perception of coffee as a subpar investment. The recent success of a few high-end producers has led to many relatively new growers in the area, including Abel, who planted his farm in 2015. Abel hoped that careful attention to the best practices of cultivation and processing would help him harness the raw potential for coffee quality in his surroundings.
Abel succeeded. After his first full harvest in 2019, Abel placed first in the Best of Loja cupping competition. One of our coffee buyers served as a juror at the competition and purchased a small quantity of this phenomenal coffee at the subsequent auction. Counter Culture entered the 2020 buying season with hopes of buying Abel's entire harvest, and when that year’s crop yielded slightly more coffee than expected, we didn’t hesitate to increase our purchase volume. In 2021, we were pleasantly surprised when Abel made headlines by winning Ecuador’s first Cup of Excellence competition! In the years following his historic win, we’ve faced stiff competition to buy Abel’s coffee, but we are still kindly offered some of his best lots each season.
This year, Abel ran an experiment to better understand fermentation’s impact on his post-harvest processing. He fermented different harvests for 24, 48, and 72 hours before washing and drying. Our favorites were the 24-hour and 48-hour lots, which we ultimately blended together, balancing the bold fruit character of the 48-hour fermentation with the more nuanced floral notes of the 24-hour lot.
