Caturra / Black Honey – Love it or hate it. Amazing intensity, lots of winey and fruity sweetness and many flavor layers. For heavy naturals afficionados!
Out of stock
€20.60
Regardless of the region, our honey and natural Costa Ricans tend to roast pretty similarly. We recommend a fairly subtle approach from the beginning and building up the energy progressively through the roast in order to achieve demanded roast time. These coffees usually take the heat very efficiently, so watch out close to the first crack and don’t let your RoR to sky rocket if you want to be in full control.
Please note this is a general, not a specific tip. Each coffee tends to behave a bit (or a lot!) differently and should be approached individually. We highly recommend working with a colorimeter machine. Your local data, depending on your grinder, grind size and the way you prepare coffee surface for measurements, will be the most precise tool for your QC routine aside from cupping.
LOCATION: Carrizal, Alajuela, Central Valley
ALTITUDE (MASL): 1500 m.a.s.l
VARIETIES: caturra, typica, SL28
PROCCESING METHOD: red honey & black honey
Rodolfo is a third generation coffee producer, now super proud of his daughter, Ariela, who’s involved as fourth generation! We started buying from Carrizal in 2024, captivated by two wonderful caturra lots of black (more mucilage covering parchment during fermentation and drying process) and red (less mucilage) honeys.
Finca Carrizal was established in 1890 and is located between two majestic volcanoes – Poas and Barva. The area is beautiful with natural borders of the finca shaped by two crystal rivers, also 15% of the farm is covered with a natural forest. Rodolfo and Ariela place emphasis on environmental consciousness, striving to minimize their ecological footprint, from farming to harvesting.
88 Graines idea is grounded on establishing a collaborative coffee sourcing model between coffee producers and roasters.
Realization: 
_sluive –
2023 crop:
Pinot Noir hits the spot, wouldn’t roast it too light, just past first crack+~1min to 204C works great. Acidity reminds me of a longer processed Anaerobic Natural. Some spices are in there, smells like speculoos with red currant.
Bean quality is great, sorting as well. I’d say it’s a G1, based on defects etc. (+: My backtch of 300g had no Quakers at all). Beans are very uniform, smell of the greens is overwhelming (as to be expected from that processing). Roasting tends to be easy, elongated soak and dry times help to develop flavour. Favorite Roast was at -11,3w%, 18min (soak 0+3min, dry +4min, 175C@ 12min, FC at 197C (bean temps)): Light roast, best flavour after 3 weeks of resting.
Conclusion:
Easy to roast, good flavour for a black honey from Cista Rica at that elevation, but would prefer a red honey instead. The Pinot noir Flavour can be overwhelming at times. (Maybe Awesome for espresso blends??)