NEWS & STORIES
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Our visit to Finca La Fany |
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Filed under On The Road
We have just returned from a fantastic trip through El Salvador and were lucky enough to spend some time with the Da Silva's who are the proud owners of Finca La Fany.
We have worked with Finca La Fany for many many years. The quality is always excellent, and it has always been a very reliable and consistent coffee. Typically the cup is exceptionally clean, and has a bright citrus acidity, cocoa tones, and balanced sweetness.
This year however the La Fany has been extra-exceptional. It has a lovely complexity, with a floral aroma, sparkling acidity and notes of sugarcane, cherry and honey. We have consistently scored this coffee around 89 - 90. It is just delish.
We explained this to the Da Silvas when we met them, and learnt that they have recently installed a wet mill at their farm. This is very unusual in El Salvador; typically most farms have their coffees wet processed by a third party. We learnt from Christian, our expert host from Mercanta, that in fact it has only been in the last 5 years that the larger mills have started to allow farmers to separate their coffee into individual lots which has led to a huge improvement in the quality of coffee more widely in El Salvador.
The new wet mill at La Fany means that Da Silva's are now able to separate their coffee by picking day, variety, and by different areas of the farm. It will also give them greater control of quality from harvest right through to export, as they will be directly controlling all stages of the process. For the 2010/11 harvest they did not have enough space to dry all of their coffee onsite, but for next years harvest they will have built enough space to dry all of their coffee. They plan to experiment with raised African beds as well as covered patio areas. They are also installing a cupping room on the property along with a small sample roaster. All very exciting developments indeed!
