Glossary.

Where a lot grows, and when it was picked.

Cosecha

Harvest, and the harvest year a lot belongs to. A Colombian cosecha is named for the year it was picked.

Harvest dates vary by department and by the mitaca, so the cosecha on a lot record is the year of the main picking. A lot landing in New Zealand early in the year after its cosecha is normal; green coffee rests for weeks at origin before it ships.

Harvest calendar →

Department

Colombia's thirty-two regions. Huila, Cauca and Antioquia are departments. A lot record names the department first, then the municipality, then the vereda.

Origins →

Mitaca

The second, smaller harvest of the year. Most Colombian departments pick a main crop and a mitaca, so one hillside can offer fresh coffee twice.

Harvest calendar →

Municipality

The town and the land around it, one tier below the department. Gigante and Pitalito are municipalities of Huila.

Vereda

The smallest rural division in Colombia, a cluster of farms below the municipality. It is the nearest a lot record can come to naming a hillside.

What happens between the cherry and the green.

Anaerobic

Fermented in a sealed, valved tank where the microbes' own carbon dioxide pushes the oxygen out. The word names the tank, not the drying: an anaerobic natural then dries in the fruit, an anaerobic washed is rinsed.

The anaerobic natural process →

Depulping

Squeezing the skin and most of the fruit off fresh cherry, usually within hours of picking. The first step of a washed or honey process.

Drying beds

Where parchment or whole cherry dries: a concrete patio, a raised mesh bed or a covered parabolic dryer. Colombian lots usually dry under cover over one to three weeks.

Green coffee

Coffee after hulling and before roasting: the dried seed, pale green, bought by the kilo.

Honey

Depulped, then dried with the mucilage still on the parchment. Named for the sticky layer, not for a flavour.

The honey process →

Hulling

Milling the dried parchment, or the dried fruit of a natural, off the bean. What is left is green coffee, which is what the house ships.

Mucilage

The sweet, slippery layer between the fruit skin and the parchment. Washing takes it off, a honey keeps it, a natural dries the whole fruit around it.

Natural

Dried in the whole cherry, never depulped, and hulled at the end. The slowest of the four to dry, and the one with the most that can go wrong on the bed.

The natural process →

Packing

How a lot is sealed for the voyage: a hermetic liner or vacuum pack inside the box, which keeps air and moisture off the green coffee.

Parchment

The papery husk around each green bean. Coffee is dried and stored in parchment, and hulled out of it shortly before export.

The mill

Two mills handle a lot. The wet mill on the farm depulps, ferments and dries. The dry mill near the port hulls, sorts and grades for export.

Washed

Depulped within hours of picking, held in a tank until the mucilage loosens, washed clean and dried. The method Colombia built its name on.

The washed process →

How a lot is graded, and by whom.

Cup of Excellence

Colombia's national green coffee competition and auction, held since 2005. Lots are cupped blind by national and international juries, and the scores are public.

Cup score

A score out of 100 on the SCA cupping form. Specialty begins at 80. On a lot record the score always names who cupped it: the exporter, the house or a Q grader.

Scores from different tables do not line up exactly. An exporter cups to sell, the house cups to buy, and a Q grader cups to a protocol. The lot record keeps the source beside the number so it can be read for what it is.

Cupping

Tasting coffee to a set protocol: ground, steeped, the crust broken and the cup slurped from a spoon, so lots can be scored on the same table.

Exporter

The company at origin that mills, grades and ships a lot. Its offer sheet is where a score usually starts, which is why a lot record reads Exporter's cupping until the house or a Q grader cups it.

Q grade

A score and report from a licensed Q grader cupping to the SCA protocol. The house shows a Q grade only when a lot has one, and links the grader's own report.

Q grader

A cupper licensed by the Coffee Quality Institute after calibration exams. A Q grader's score is the independent grading the trade recognises.

SCA

The Specialty Coffee Association, whose cupping form and 100 point scale the trade scores on.

Screen size

Bean size, sieved through holes measured in sixty-fourths of an inch. Screen 17 passes a 17/64 inch hole. Colombian supremo is screen 17 and up; excelso is 15 and up.

Size says nothing about the cup. A lot that spreads from screen 15 to 18 roasts less evenly than one sorted to a single screen, which is why the roaster rows on each variety page note the spread where it has been measured.

Supremo

Colombia's export grades by size. Supremo is screen 17 and above, excelso 15 and above. A size, never a cup score.

The words a roaster uses once the green is in the drum.

Density

How much bean there is per litre, a stand-in for how slowly it grew. High-grown lots run dense, about 700 g/L and up, and take heat harder early in the roast.

Development

The time from first crack to the drop, and what happens in it. Longer development builds body and softens acidity; shorter keeps the clarity.

First crack

The audible pop as steam and gas break out of the bean at about 196 degrees. The first marker a roaster drops on or develops from.

Maillard

The browning reactions between sugars and amino acids once the bean passes about 150 degrees. The stretch of the roast between yellowing and first crack.

Sample roast

A light, standard roast of 100 to 200 g so a lot can be cupped on its own merits. The 200 g sample the house sends is for this.

Get prices →

The names, lines and institutions behind the house's own record.

By commission

Bought to order against a deposit, not held in New Zealand. The rare lots work this way, so they carry no box count.

Rare lots →

Cenicafé

The federation's research centre at Chinchiná, Caldas, since 1938. It bred Colombia, Castillo and Tabi, and publishes the trials the house cites.

Landrace

A variety shaped by farmers and place rather than by a breeding programme. Most of the Ethiopian lines grown in Colombia, Gesha, Chiroso and Pink Bourbon among them, are landraces.

Varieties →

Leaf rust

Hemileia vastatrix, la roya: the fungus that strips arabica of its leaves. Colombia's breeding programme exists to resist it, which is why Castillo and Tabi carry Timor Hybrid lines.

Lot record

The house's own account of a lot: ground, grower, process, harvest, score and who scored it. A record kept by the house, not an independent grading.

The record renders only the rows the house can fill. A row is left out rather than marked to be confirmed, so a lot record with no grower line means the house does not yet know, not that it is hiding one.

Lots →

Lot sheet

The sheet the house emails on request: the lot record with its price per kilo, minimum and arrival. Prices live there, not on the site.

Get prices →

Selection

The house's three shelves: established lines, sought-after selections and rare lots. A selection says how a lot is bought and held, not how it cups.

Varieties →

The federation

The Federación Nacional de Cafeteros, the growers' body since 1927. It sets the export grades, runs Cenicafé and publishes the harvest calendars.

Timor Hybrid

A spontaneous cross of arabica and robusta found on Timor in the 1920s. The source of leaf rust resistance in Castillo, Tabi and most modern bred varieties.

Castillo →

World Coffee Research

The research institute whose variety catalogue is the trade's reference for lineage, bean size and resistance. The house cites it where it has an entry, and says so where it does not.