Why We Love This Coffee:

If you remember Sr. Noreña’s Gold Washed Anaerobic Pink Bourbon from 2021, then you’ll want to try this one as well. It’s hard to say that that, or any other coffee, was the best coffee we’ve ever tasted, but it is certainly the most memorable, and definitely one of our all-time favorites. After a few years of doing the Gold Washed process on the Gesha variety, rather than Pink Bourbon, we are back to Pink Bourbon this year and we are very happy about that!

Once again, this now famous Gold Washed process features 280 hours of fermentation, which gives it some truly unbelievable flavors—mango, a plethora of pink fruits (think cherry, raspberry, dragonfruit, cranberry, strawberry), rosé wine, and grape juice. Interestingly, this year’s version does NOT taste like a super hoppy IPA (as that first one did), but the intensity and ever-evolving nuances of flavor are absolutely there.

You’ll notice that the beans look quite dark. This color is absolutely normal for a coffee that is processed this heavily as it breaks down the cell structure significantly more than washed or natural processing does. If you’ve ever had light roast decaf coffee, you’ll have seen this before. Those beans also look like a dark roast. So for these kinds of coffees, the color is not a good indicator of roast level. Flavor-wise it does not taste dark at all - it is a normal light roast in terms of development and drop temperature, etc. 

Because of the more significant breakdown of the cell structure during the processing, you also don't need to rest it for very long at all (again, same as decaf), so we recommend getting started brewing right away!

Water Recommendation:

For those of you who want to get every last drop of excellence out of this coffee, our preferred brewing water is Rao/Perger water (90ppm GH, 42ppm KH). We also enjoyed brews with half-strength Third Wave Water (65ppm GH, 20ppm KH), Lance Hedrick’s Light & Bright water (60ppm GH, 25ppm KH), and filtered Philadelphia tap water.

Full-strength Third Wave Water is almost too intense and too sweet for us. Hard to believe, but we actually prefer water that tones down the profile a little bit.

Half-strength Third Wave Water gives a less intense, slightly more acid-driven cup profile. The fruit notes lean a little more towards citrus and a little away from the grape/strawberry deep sweet fruit realm.

Rao/Perger water to us is just the most balanced: sweeter than ½ strength TWW but not as overwhelming as full strength TWW, and there’s more complexity. The sweetness remains on the palate longest with this water.

Philadelphia water (Baxter water supply) filtered with a three-stage carbon system with a little softening (somewhat similar to what a Brita pitcher would do) still gives an excellent cup profile, very similar to Rao/Perger water, but the finish fades a bit quicker than it does with Rao/Perger water.

If this is all very confusing—check out our blog post on water for coffee!

From Our Importer:

“Coffee is a daily pursuit of an everyday product that requires a lot of attention. One of the newest coffees we feel very fortunate to offer is a shining example of this daily pursuit of excellence. At the same time, this coffee challenges any conventions that you, the coffee drinker, may have about what coffee can and should taste like.

Thanks to producer Edwin Noreña, we’re able to offer a selection that tastes unlike anything that we’ve ever offered. He combined the generational knowledge learned from his father and grandfather, a university degree in agronomy, and a Coffee Quality Institute Q-Grader Certification to tap into a new processing style that will be making waves for years to come.

Sr. Noreña’s daily pursuit of the best cup possible has brought this gem to our cupping table, subjected to a process he calls “Gold Washed”. Its name comes from the color on the parchment after being subjected to multiple stages of controlled fermentation. The intense fruits in the cup are the direct result of capturing some of the coffee cherry juice run-off from the first stage of low-oxygen fermentation, filtering it, and reintroducing it again after those same cherries are depulped. We were intrigued right away! Simply grinding this coffee filled up our whole lab with a fresh, effervescent scent we won’t soon forget. We couldn’t have been more excited to add water! ​​Sr. Noreña coffees are simply remarkable and we cannot wait to share more of them with you in the future.”