Things are finally getting a little more back to normal with my travel and work schedule, so without further ado, let’s talk about some coffee! This morning, I have a nice Colombian lot from Manzanita Roasting Co.!
Purchase this coffee directly for $17/12oz.
Other reviews in this series: Spring Blend | Burundi Red Honey
MANZANITA ROASTING CO. COLOMBIA NELY MONCAYO
It feels like forever since I posted my last review, although it hasn’t been that long. My work travel schedule has been nuts over the last two months and it’s nice to get back into things and be able to post some older reviews. I wrote this one quite a while ago, but I’m happy to say that this coffee is still available from Manzanita Roasting Co., so don’t miss out on it! Manzanita Roasting Co. is based in San Diego county in California. Weston Nawrocki is a classically trained chef and sommelier and his wife, Samantha, has the wine business in her blood, with her family operating Bernardo Winery for over 125 years. The couple met over their mutual loves of food and wine, which evolved to include coffee, too, and a handful of years ago they established Manzanita Roasting Co. to share this passion with others.
A while ago, Manzanita sent me their Spring Blend, which is not available any longer, but this was a blend of this morning’s coffee, Nely Moncayo, and a red honey coffee from Burundi. Links to the Spring Blend and the Burundi are above. It’s cool for me to be able to drink both the blend and the components of the blend individually! This morning’s coffee was grown by Nely Moncayo at Finca La Piedra in the Nariño department of Colombia. This is a 100% Caturra lot and La Piedra sits at 1900masl. This is a washed coffee that Manzanita says has flavors of, “dark fruits & creamy.”
I’m using my standard pourover method of a 1:16 ratio of 22g of coffee to 352g of Third Wave Water in a Trinity Origin dripper with Kalita 155 filter. I’m grinding with a Knock Aergrind and I use a Melodrip to control my pulse pouring and keep the coffee bed undisturbed during brewing. This coffee got a bloom of 30 seconds and took a total of 3:00 to brew, including the bloom.
Taking a sip, this is a sweet and vibrant coffee like I’ve come to expect and enjoy from Colombia. This is a medium-heavy bodied coffee with a dairy creaminess to it. There’s a light caramel sweetness to the cup with some hints of molasses in it, for me, too. Over that, I am getting a lot of red plum notes that are sweet and bright and have a hint of tartness I associate with fresh plums. I’m getting a little bit of a floral note in some sips. Toward the second half of the sip I’m getting some faint raspberry notes that carry into the finish, but that plum is really the star of the show in this coffee, for me. Alongside all this fruitiness I’m getting some small hints of cocoa, but I wouldn’t call this a chocolatey coffee by any stretch. This is a “juicy” coffee, for me, in that it hits my cheeks and sides of my tongue and seems to be encouraging a lot of salivation, which makes me want to take more and bigger sips. This coffee finishes sweet and has a lingering aftertaste of plums, a bit of raspberry, and a nice sweetness that coats my palate. I loved Manzanita’s Spring Blend, and seeing how it’s a blend of two awesome coffees in their own right, it’s no wonder!