I’m a simple man, and when Theodore’s Coffee Roasters sends me new coffee, I know I’m going to like it! Let’s dig into what I found to be a bit of a chameleon of a coffee, a specially processed Nicaraguan from my friends in Michigan! Slurp…
Purchase this coffee for $25 $20/12oz with free shipping on all USA orders!
THEODORE’S COFFEE ROASTERS NICARAGUA MI CIELO
Theodore’s Coffee Roasters, located in central Michigan, has turned into one of my favorite roasters. They’ve sent me A LOT of coffee to evaluate and share with you, dear readers, over the years, and I haven’t had a stinker in the bunch. This latest one I received from them is their Mi Cielo, a coffee from Tania Caballero’s farm in Nicaragua and I found it to be a very interesting cup, indeed. This coffee is a mix of Pacas and Catuai grown by Tania around 1400masl and it is processed in a special way, using carbonic maceration.
Before I geek out too hard on that, let’s meet the farmer. Tania comes from a long line of coffee farmers and has a degree in civil engineering, but at 39, this mother of 4 has devoted her life to her farm. She plants between 40-50 hectares and focuses on Pacas and Catuai, as well as experimenting with a variety of processing methods. Tania’s farm is located in a community called Los Simientos in part of Nicaragua that borders Honduras. All of Tania’s coffees are Rain Forest Alliance certified as well as UTC Certified and Bird Friendly Certified, so you can feel good about drinking them!
Now, let’s get geeky… carbonic maceration is a wine making technique that has made it into the world of coffee and it appears to have been originally promoted by the Australians. According to Theodore’s, Tania worked on her own carbonic maceration process in collaboration with some Australian coffee folks and Canberra’s Sasa Sestic won the 2015 World Barista Championship with a rare Sudanese coffee that was processed this way. Carbonic maceration in winemaking is associated most famously with the Beaujolais region of France and is used to produce light-bodied, brightly colored and fruity red wines designed for early consumption (as opposed to cellaring). [ref]https://vinepair.com/articles/carbonic-maceration-care/[/ref]
Carbonic maceration involves putting the coffee in a sealed container, pumping the air out using carbon dioxide, and monitoring the temperature as whole cherries start to ferment without the aid of oxygen or yeasts. The end result of CM is to get more fruit flavors like strawberry, raspberry, cherry and even some more estery notes like banana or bubblegum.[ref]https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321307503_Carbonic_Maceration_A_unique_way_of_coffee_processing[/ref]
I used my standard preparation for my cups of this coffee and even tried it out as espresso. As espresso, this coffee is really bright and fruit forward with lots of pineapple and tropical flavors, but I want to focus on my filter cups of Mi Cielo. I took a lot of notes on this coffee and prepped it multiple times, and I really found three quite different flavor profiles. I’m not sure if those flavor changes had to do with the coffee aging, or if it had to do with my slightly differing process. I used a Trinity Origin dripped with Kalita 155 filter for all three of these cups, and 22g of coffee ground in the same Knock Aergrind with the same settings each time. I used a 1:16 ratio for each cup, so that’s 352g of water and I used the same batch of Third Wave Water across the board. For cup #1, I used a Melodrip shower dripper thingamajig for the entire brew process. For cup #2, I poured stragight from the ketlle, and with #3, which I just had this morning (and liked the best of the three), I did an initial 44g bloom from the kettle, used the Melodrip through about 320g of coffee, then poured the last 32-35g of coffee carefully from the kettle.
Cup #1, using all Melodrip, had a bright, fresh, fruity aroma from the cup. It had light to maybe light-medium body. I got a little honey sweetness on the front end and a quick rush of apple notes. I was getting green apple malic acidity and plenty of red apple juice sweetness and flavors, too. I picked up on some strawberries and they were those really fresh, not-quite-ripe notes of strawberry, for me. This cup was really complex, the most complex of my three methods, and I got a lot of what I noted as “unusual acidity” in the second half of the sip. It was quite tropical, with that sort of intensity of pineapple, although the pineapple flavor wasn’t necessarily there. I was also picking up a note of lime, as there was quite a bit of bitterness along for the ride with this acidity and bitterness + acidity often equals “lime” to my brain. There was a dry finish to this cup and I noted that it was “wine-like” in its structure and complexity. This was a really interesting cup, but I did find the complexity to be a little challenging and it wasn’t super drinkable as a result.
Cup #2, which I made using Third Wave Water straight from the kettle (and, according to Melodrip, agitates the coffee more and results in more solids in the finished cup) was mellower with less structure. It was less pineapply and tropical, although those notes were still there. There was still a decent amount of that bitterness in the cup, too.
Cup #3 was my favorite, which was essentially a kettle-poured bloom and the last 30-40g of coffee also kettle-poured with everything else going through that nice, gentle Melodrip screen. Although, I will note that the Trinity Origin allows me to get my kettle spout really low, I pour gently from the kettle, anyway, and I use a flow control insert in my kettle, so it’s consistent and it doesn’t hammer out of the spout. Nonetheless, this morning’s cup made this way was the best of the three, for sure, and that could be PURELY on the age of the coffee and have nothing to do with the method, too, of course. I have no roasted-on date on my bag, but as of this morning, it’s around a month old. I know that’s heresy to some coffee people, but all I have to say in response is “give me a break.” And if it tastes good, it tastes good. So, this cup had a really nice, sweet, caramel and molasses aroma coming off it. I was also picking up some banana esters, very subtle, but there, in the aroma. This cup had toned down fruit, with a little bit of a tropical vibe, but not a ton. I got a lot of nice chocolate and caramel notes and as the cup cooled, there was banana in the second half of the sip and pink bubblegum in the aftertaste. If I agitate the coffee in my mouth some and puff air out my nose as I do it (retronasal tasting) I can get some nice ripe strawberry, too.
I really enjoyed exploring this coffee. Things have been a little slower at World Domination Headquarters with the amount of coffee I’ve been receiving (and actively trying to get) because newer job duties keep me from writing the crazy volume of reviews I kept up with for years, so it was nice to be able to spend more time with this coffee, try it different ways, and see it change and develop. If you can do the same, I’d recommend it. I enjoyed this coffee regardless of how I made it, but I did prefer the last best and I think the mix of subtle fruit and lots of sweetness resonated with me in the way I like my coffees from Central America. A great catch by Theodore’s with their always-solid roasting, and at $20 with free shipping this coffee is a no-brainer!