Jelber Yague
Impressions: blood orange, chocolate, hazelnut, pumpkin
Roast degree: light medium (2.5/5)
Country: Colombia
Department: Huila
Municipality: Iquira
Vereda: Ibirco
Variety: Colombia, castillo
Process: washed
Farmer: Jelber Yague (and neighbouring farmers)
Farm: La Pradera
Coop: Bodega Manos al Grano Neiva
Partner importer: Azahar
Azahar is a coffee importer and exporter based in Colombia, and we have been wanting to work with them for a while. Everything aligned for us to receive this beautiful and important coffee.
Jelber Yague Pulido bought his three hectare farm La Pradera when he was just 17 years old. He lives on his farm with his wife and two children.
The farm, located at 1720masl boast amazing condition with its fertile soil and abundance of fresh water.
Jelber produced his own coffee, and also processed some from neighbouring farms to create a bigger lot.
This is Jelber's first time working with Azahar and we bought the full available lot.
The coffee is a classic washed, with 12hours of underwater fermentation to to remove the mucilage, followed by 8 days of drying.
This coffee is also part of a picker project, as well as following the guidelines from the Sustainable Coffee Buyer's guide. See our transparency report for more info.
This is the absolute perfect fall coffee: bright enough to not forget summer, but bold enough to prepare us for the cold North American months ahead.
This coffee is on the light side, but is still very versatile as both espresso and filter.
With our guide below, the espresso emphasize more the chocolaty tone of the coffee, and our filter recipes focus a bit more on the acidity of the coffee.
We got a lot of bright, blood orange notes while tasting this coffee.
We also didn't really want to put the tasting note pumpkin on there, and maybe we were biased while seeing all those pumpkin spice latte ads on tv, but we truly think we taste that in the finish of both the espresso and filter brews.
The coffee is also very comforting with milk chocolate and hazelnut impressions.
A no fuss, perfect daily driver.
|
Method |
Dose | Ratio | Time |
| Espresso | 16-20 g | 2.3:1 | 30-34 sec |
| Espresso with milk | 16-20 g | 2.1:1 | 32-36 sec |
| Americano | 16-20 g | 2.4:1 | 26-30 sec |
|
V60/Origami |
18-32 g | 17:1 | 3:30-4:00 min |
|
Chemex & Batch Brew |
40-60 g | 16:1 | 5:00-5:45 min |
|
French Press |
18-25 g | 15:1 |
4:30 min steep time |
Farmer: Jelber Yague Pulido
Importer: Azahar coffee
Price we paid Azahar for the coffee, in this case FOB price: 13.70CAD/kg
+0.83CAD/kg for the financing cost
+0.94CAD/kg for shipping
Farmgate price: Azahar paid Jelber 3,395,000COP per carga (125kg of parchment). The average in the region was 2,200,000COP, so Azahar paid roughly 40% above market price. (close to 20% - 600,000COP - of that price was money paid to pickers during harvest time. See below for details)
A buyer's guide?
Why did Azahar paid so much above market price for this coffee? This question can be answered with the hard work they put in the Sustainable Coffee Buyer's Guide.
Instead of following the C price (worldwide price) or a generic market or local price often dictated by the C Price, they went above and beyond and created a whole new way of paying farmers in a meaningful way.
They do the hard work on figuring out living condition and cost or production in each region where they work in Colombia (and Mexico).
There are 4 tiers in the guide:
- poverty wage: the price paid for a coffee that would leave farmers living in poverty in that region
- legal wage: farmers paid according to the minimum salary imposed by the government (often not respected in rural jobs)
- living wage: a wage that allows the farmers to live well with all his family while also paying farm workers a living wage
- prosperous wage: this is the same as the living income but with an extra 20% paid to the farmers family + another 20% paid for reinvestment in the farm
This coffee was paid according to the Prosperous category guidelines.
The Picker project
That is all amazing, but that is not all: this coffee was also part of another initiative led by Azahar called Manos al Grano, or The Picker's Project. We highly encourage you to visit those pages for the full details, but in a nutshell:
- most coffee pickers can't sustain their family with an average picker's salary
- they receive no job security or insurance
- farmers need to pay them early in the season, straining their cash flow
The Picker's project offers job stability, training, healthcare and insurance and a living wage. The pickers are also paid early via a financial institution, leaving farmers with a much better cash flow that often allows them to produce more and better coffee.