Theodore’s Coffee Roasters El Injerto

Good morning and welcome to today’s review of a coffee from world-famous El Injerto in Guatemala, roasted by my good friends at Theodore’s Coffee Roasters. I’ve been excited to check this one out, so let’s get right into it!

Theodore’s Coffee Roasters website

Purchase this coffee directly for $20/12oz

Other reviews in this series: Emperador (geisha)

El Injerto website

El Injerto Instagram

THEODORE’S COFFEE ROASTERS EL INJERTO

El Injerto is one of the small fraction of coffee farms on the planet known in the specialty industry by name, and for good reason. The farm was started in 1874 by Jesus Aguierre Panama and coffee was planted on El Injerto’s land in 1900. The 3rd and 4th generations of the Aguierre family continue to run El Injerto, which is located in the famed Huehuetenango department of Guatemala. Coffees grow anywhere from 1500masl to 1920masl on their properties, with the entire farm under shade. The Aguierre family takes every aspect of growing, picking and processing extremely seriously, and they are good stewards of the land they rely on. They’ve won first place in the Cup of Excellence 9 times, as well as a host of other awards, and El Injerto is Rainforest Alliance certified and certified carbon neutral. El Injerto has worked hard for their fame and you can always find that passed on in the cup. I can hardly think of a better roaster for this coffee than Theodore’s Coffee Roasters, owned by Darwin Pavon. Darwin started Theodore’s (named after his grandfather) in 2013 and the company recently moved from central Michigan to the west coast of the state in Zeeland. Darwin is an agronomist who has been working with coffee farmers all over Latin America for many years. Born in Honduras, himself, Darwin’s perspective on coffee and his job offer him unique opportunities to find some of the best coffees in Central and South America. Theodore’s roasting is always on point, with sweetness and balance being a feature of every coffee I’ve reviewed from them (and I’ve reviewed a lot). Theodore’s Coffee Roasters are one of my “go to” brands when someone asks where they should buy coffee from, and I’ve never had a bad cup from them.

I’ll give more details about this coffee at the end of the review once I’ve typed out my notes. I don’t want to bias my palate, which is very easy to do, by accidentally seeing Theodore’s tasting notes, and I’ve taken a lot of steps to keep those hidden so far! For this cup I’m using my usual pourover setup of a 1:16.5 ratio of 22g of coffee to 363g of Third Wave Water in a Trinity Origin dripper. I have mine set up like a standard flat-bottom 3-hole brewer, such as the Kalita Wave, and this dripper uses Kalita’s 155 size filters. My grinder is an Orphan Espresso Lido 3 and I pulse pour my water through a Melodrip to minimize agitation in the coffee bed. This coffee got a 35 second bloom and a total brew time, bloom included, of 3:15.

The aroma from this cup is nice, with “warm” notes of lightly caramelized sugar and a hint of molasses dominating. This is an inviting aroma that draws me in to start sipping. Taking a sip, some of that same light caramel note is there on the front end, coating my tongue and giving me the sense of medium-heavy body. This sweetness is followed up quickly by a wave of citrus, mainly leaning toward tangerine and mandarin notes for me. This citrus gives some nice, soft acidity and brightness to the cup, which is perfectly balanced to me. In the mid sip I get a little bit of the peel and pith, so there is a bit of bitterness coming along with the orange notes and I really like that. Coffee is an inherently bitter beverage to begin with, so understand this is in the context of what coffee should be. Some bitterness in the cup is totally acceptable, really a good thing, so long as it is balanced with the sweetness and acidity of the cup, too, which is the case here. Beneath this citrus fruitiness I’m getting a hint of apple, too. It’s almost more of a “feeling” than a flavor note in this cup, but there is a crisp, refreshing aspect to this coffee that I associate with malic acid and apples  that I am getting from this coffee. This coffee finishes sweet but does leave my tongue feeling dry between sips. The aftertaste has some sugary sweetness in it, notes of orange candy and a hint of black pepper for me. As the cup is approaching room temperature I’m getting distinct hints of banana in the sip, which I didn’t expect at all and is a welcome addition to this flavor profile! This is a really, REALLY nice cup of coffee, super easy to drink and exceptionally well-balanced but with enough complexity to make us geeks happy, too. An easy buy!

More About the Coffee 
This selection from El Injerto is a washed coffee of Catimor and IHCAFE varietals. Theodore’s gives us tasting notes of “Sweet and tropical notes, caramel covered apples, lime, pinkl lemonade acidity with long finish.” So, not too far off, really. I was going to mention a hint of lime and that pith/peel note I mentioned was more grapefruity, but I decided that would be too fussy, so I rolled with what I had above. Dangit! LOL Not that this is a contest or anything, but I always like when my tasting notes are close to the roaster’s! This is an excellent cup and if you’re a fan of Guatemalan coffee, this one is a real banger!