Good morning and welcome to today’s review! I’m taking a look at Lord Windsor’s Xejuyu from Guatemala. A little hard to say, really easy to taste! Let’s dive in…
Purchase this coffee directly SOLD OUT
Other reviews in this series: Ethiopia Guji Qirtira Goyo
LORD WINDSOR GUATEMALA CHIMALTENANGO XEJUYU
I traveled to Long Beach, California in July for a work-related conference and picked up a couple 6oz bags of Lord Windsor’s coffee. The Ethiopia Guji I posted a week or two ago was sublime (and Lord Windsor is still roasting it, so don’t sleep on it!). It looks like I dragged my feet so long before posting this review that they’ve sold out of this morning’s review coffee, but I wanted to share my experience with it all the same so you know what Lord Windsor is all about! Regarding Lord Windsor Coffee, the shop was started in Long Beach in 2012 by Wade and Lindsay Windsor and that’s about the extent of what I’ve really been able to find out, although this article on their packaging (which I LOVE) from Sprudge offers a little more insight.
Lord Windsor is sparse in their information about coffee on their labeling and on their site, hoping this will spark conversation between customer and barista. This coffee’s bag has tasting notes of, “Cacao, bing cherry, creme brulee” and that’s it. This coffee appears to come from Xejuyu (shay-who-you) farm in Guatemala, who also offer some cool tourism opportunities. Xejuyu’s website says the word is Mayan for “at the base of the mountain.” Xejuyu grows coffee at 1700-1950masl and it appears that a lot of the coffee grown in the Chimaltenango department (like a state here in the USA, I suppose) is Bourbon and Caturra, although Typica grows there, too. Chimaltenango sits in the south-central part of Guatemala north of Antigua and west of Guatemala City. Because it’s elevation is high, most of the coffee in Chimaltenango qualifies for the SHB (strictly hard bean) grading, which is the highest Guatemala offers. I can only assume this coffee is a washed coffee and I’d be surprised if it were otherwise.
I’m using my standard brewing method of a 1:16 ratio of 22g of coffee to 352g of Third Wave Water in a Trinity Origin dripper with Kalita 155 filters. My grinder is a Knock Aergrind and I pulse pour through a Melodrip to minimize agitation of the coffee bed during brewing. This coffee took just a little over 3:00 to brew, including a 35 second bloom.
The aroma from this coffee is subtle but really nice. I’m getting sweet milk chocolate, maybe even like chocolate milk and caramelized sugars. I’m hoping this turns out to be a Guatemalan sugar bomb as I haven’t had one in a while. Taking a sip, this is a medium to medium-heavy bodied coffee and it is sweet and approachable right from the first sip. I’m getting more caramelized sugars in the base of this cup, anchoring the low end, along with cocoa notes that are just on the sweeter side of “semi-sweet” for me. In the high notes, I’m getting green apple acidity as well as a bit of lemon candy that adds a hint of tartness and structure to this coffee. As the cup cools it gets more green apple-y and leans a little bright in the balance, although is still very sweet, like apple juice. I’m not getting tons of complexity in this coffee, but it’s super inviting and easy to drink and I certainly appreciate that. Between this coffee and the Guji, the Guji is hands down the one I would suggest for you readers to get, which is good news since it’s still available on Lord Windsor’s site. There is nothing wrong with this Xejuyu in the least, but that Guji was just really special with all its florals. This Xejuyu is sweet, delicious, easy to drink, so I can hardly find fault with that!