GUATEMALA - Bella Antigua

Roast: Medium  Tastes: Milk Chocolate, Caramel, Orange Location: Sacatepéquez department Variety: Bourbon, dwarf Bourbon, red caturra, yellow caturra, catimor hybrids Process: Fully washed Elevation: 1500-1650 masl Coffee Background:   The city of Antigua is in many ways a modern coffee Eden. It’s iconic, laid back, gorgeously ornate, and for a city of its size it is absolutely teeming with historic coffee infrastructure. It also was the center of Guatemala’s specialty universe for many years. Prior to other departments in Guatemala having their own name recognition, coffees from all over the country were regularly transited to Antigua mills and exported as “Antigua” coffee, simply because its reputation was so strong. (Some departments, like Quiché, continue to have strong cherry pipelines to Antigua and struggle for their own name recognition in the market.)   The Antigua valley itself is a gifted area for coffee: it’s accessible and flat, highly volcanic, and older farms remain plan