Guatemala Maragogype 928 Exotic

Farming Notes
Coming to us from José Padilla at Coffea Diversa Guatemala, this coffee is a special one!

We have been connected several times to coffees from José Padilla through our close connection to Cesar Gaitan at Café Rio Verde.

At Coffea Diversa, they are proud to grow hundreds of species of coffee. In fact, Maragogype 928 is an extremely exotic and rare coffee variety.

Originally hailing from Brazil, Maragogypes (often spelled “Maragogipes”) are a low-yielding and difficult to grow variety. Thanks to modern specialty coffee, we are now finding value in rarely grown varieties from the past. Now that there is an audience for high-dollar and unique coffees, Maragogype is ripe for the picking. . . literally.

Our Maragogype comes to us from the Jutiapa Region (and Volcan de Suchitan Subregion) of Guatemala. It undergoes what is called a “honey process.”

According to Trianon Coffee, a coffee roaster and educator in Austin, TX:

“Pulped natural or honey process is a method in which the fresh coffee cherries are de-pulped but allowed to dry without washing. Some of the fruit is still there, but not nearly as much as in the natural process. Most of the cherry is gone, but the remaining golden, sticky mucilage is reminiscent of honey, which is where the process gets its name.

One benefit to producers is that honey processing uses less water. Allowing the fruit to dry on the bean means that it can be physically removed during milling rather than being washed off as is typical of washed coffees.”