S&W Craft Roasting Guatemala Huehuetenango Finca El Injertal RFA

Coffee was first brought to Guatemala in the 1700’s by the Jesuits and Guatemalan coffee remains exciting and varied today. This coffee is from Finca El Injertal, which has been growing coffee since the 1930’s in the Huehuetenango region of Guatemala. It was roasted by S&W Craft Roasting in Coatesville, Indiana. This is a washed coffee of Caturra and Mundo Novo varietals grown in the range of 1185-1645 meters above sea level.

S&W call this a “smooth, full bodied, slightly sweet and lightly acidic coffee.” They also say that this Finca El Injertal is their mildest coffee and is best had as an immersion or autodrip brew. You can buy this coffee directly from S&W for $13.65/lb.

I had this coffee as a pourover as well as inverted AeroPress and I think I found a bit more character in the AeroPress. The beans are roasted a little darker than the Panama I reviewed from S&W recently, which makes sense if they are intending it for autodrip brewers which brew at a lower temp. The beans had small spots of oil peeking onto the surface. Darker roasts extract more easily, so there is less chance of underextraction in that case.

I found some brown sugar and something that reminded me of black pepper in the aroma. Both carried forward into the flavor. There is a bit of carbon and darkly caramelized sugar in the cup, especially as it cools, but it has a nice round mouthfeel and is not drying on the palate at all. The acidity is definitely low in this coffee, with very little in the way of fruitiness. In the AeroPress I found a little pepper, some nuttiness, and even a bit of coconut, which was more apparent in the Gino pourover.

Like S&W Craft Roasting say on their website, this is a mild, low acid cup and it’s not a real exciting coffee, but it is tasty and easy to drink with enough complexity to keep it from being boring. This coffee tastes like coffee! 🙂

  1. Nick
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    “This coffee tastes like coffee!”… Love it, this is the exact purpose of this coffee, to please the less adventurous folk!