Brugh Coffee Co. Nicaragua Yader & Karen Perfectionist Micro-Lot

August’s Barista Coffee Box features Brugh (like “brew,” conveninetly!) Coffee Co. from Christiansburg, VA. For this morning’s coffee, I selected their “Perfectionist” microlot from Nicaragua, so without further ado, let’s drink!

Brugh Coffee Company

Purchase this coffee directly for $15/12oz

Barista Coffee Box subscriptions

Brugh Coffee Co. Peru Amazonas review


MY COFFEE PUB 8/2017: BRUGH COFFEE CO. NICARAGUA YADER & KAREN PERFECTIONIST MICROLOT

Luke and Cassie Brugh founded Brugh Coffee Co. in 2016 with the theme of their business being the connections between people that coffee requires. They are a roaster only at this time, and you can buy Brugh’s coffee online as well as in markets all over the southwest Virginia area.

This morning’s coffee is a microlot from Nicaragua that Brugh is calling the Yader & Karen Perfectionist microlot. This microlot consists of Caturra and Catuai varieties from a farm near Jinotega, Nicaragua called El Cipres, owned by Yader and Karen. They live there with their two children, Jesus and Elvin. El Cipres sits at an altitude of 1400masl but has a unique microclimate that makes it quite chilly there. As a result, the coffee cherries at El Cipres mature much more slowly, with the harvest being about two months after that of the surrounding area! According to Brugh, this creates a denser, sweeter bean with more complex flavor notes. Yader and Karen are part of the excellent Gold Mountain Coffee Growers co-op that allows them to sell their coffee at a price that’s higher than Fair Trade prices, even. Brugh Coffee Co. gives us tasting notes of, “Red wine, peach tart, sweet tobacco” for this coffee.

I used my standard pourover setup for my 2oz sample packet from the Barista Coffee Box. 1:16 ratio of 28g of coffee to 450g of water, Handground grinder set to 3, Third Wave Water, and a notNeutral Gino dripper with Kalita 185 filter. This gave me a medium-bodied cup with lots of fruity brightness and sweetness. The first thing that hits me sipping this coffee is “red fruits” and I know that’s a worthless and generic descriptor, so I’ll suss it out, but once in a while a flavor has a close association with a color and this is that, for me! It just tastes “red.” LOL There may be a bit of grape notes in this cup. There is definitely some peach and apricot, especially, as there is some tartness associated with these fruit notes, too. The finish is slightly dry and has a little baked sweets character to it, so I can really appreciate Brugh’s “peach tart” descriptor for this coffee. The acidity in this cup has some citrus character… something along the lines of tangerine. It isn’t a harsh or aggressive acidity, although it is a main component of this coffee. It’s not lemon or lime but it’s not quite as mellow and sweet as what I would call orange acidity, either. This is a juicy cup, for sure, making me want to take lots of big sips of this coffee.

Overall, this is a really delicious coffee. It’s bright and sweet and nicely balanced, although the acidity is the star of the show in this cup for me. It has those peachy notes I love, although they’re quite subtle and I wouldn’t call this coffee a peach bomb by any stretch. This is a very drinkable coffee while still having a nice complexity to ponder, and that juicy mouthfeel will have you emptying cup after cup of this coffee, no doubt!