Nicaragua Agua Sarca

NICARAGUA AGUA SARCA – WASHED

DESCRIPTION

The Agua Sarca estate is run by the third generation of a traditional coffee-growing family, having evolved over time and refined its goals in order to produce coffee of the highest quality. The estate maintains its aim of preserving the environment, striking a balance between productivity, quality and ecology, and maintaining those varieties capable of providing the best yields of quality coffee.
This batch comes from Isacio Albir on his Agua Sarca estate, measuring 100 hectares, 80 of them planted with coffee. The remaining 20 hectares are a nature reserve of wild forest through which a river runs. Isacio tends to some 248,000 trees of varieties including Caturra, Catimor, Parainema, Catuai, Bourbon and Pacamara. The estate is to be found in the Dipilto area of Nueva Segovia. Isacio constantly experiments with new fermentation methods and estate management techniques. This batch is the perfect expression of the Maracaturra variety for which Nicaragua is famous. All Isacio’s coffees are processed at Cafetos de Segovia.
Cafetos de Segovia is a drying station located in Ocotal and surrounded by coffee plantations, allowing the producers to deliver the wet parchment coffee on the same day it is harvested and processed. Cafetos de Segovia is a labour of love for the Albir family, now in fact run by the third generation, the sisters Ana and Martha Albir, who inherited their passion for coffee from their father. In 2007, Ana and Martha decided to take over the running of the estate, to continue their father’s tradition. In 2015 they also invested in a thresher and began threshing operations at Cafetos de Segovia in 2016, providing threshing and export services not only for the family estate itself, but also for 11 nearby estates owned by family and friends.
The drying station serves their land and greenhouse, which they built in 2020 to grow experimental batches and more delicate varieties. A further 47 producers currently work with Cafetos de Segovia. During the peak of the harvest, the processing station receives as much as 300 quintals per day, and has drying capacity for 3,000 quintals at any given time (1 quintal = approximately 46 kg of green coffee beans). As many as 30 people work at the facility during the season.
Most of the coffee is delivered in wet parchment or cherry form. 80% of the batches are processed by means of the washing method. The beans are subsequently dried in a yard to begin with, in the shade for 5-6 days, and then in full sunshine. All the yards are covered with black netting, so the coffee is not placed directly on the ground. Shaded drying is needed because of the intensity of the sun at this lower altitude (below 900 m above sea level).
Cafetos de Segovia submits batches for the national Excellence Cup every year, and is always highly placed. Nicaragua is known for its substantial production of standard coffee, while micro-batches are much less common, despite the presence of good quality varieties. The low altitude throughout the country and the prevalence of coffee rust have made it more difficult for producers to achieve this elusive micro-batch status. The Albir sisters and their partners aim to produce specialty coffees, and are making additional efforts to separate batches by variety, along with a great many experimental processes, such as honey and natural processes, which are also unusual in the Nicaraguan coffee sector.

TECHNICAL DETAILS
Area: Dipilto, Nueva Segovia
Estate: Agua Sarca
Producer: Isacio Javier Albir
Altitude: 1,150-1,400 m above sea level
Variety: Arabica – Maracaturra
Process: Washed
Drying: Yards
Aroma: Cardamom and nutmeg spice, with hints of vanilla and sweet butter.
Flavour: Sweet, with hints of nutmeg and cocoa, clean on the palate. Sweet coffee with dazzling, citric acidity. Medium-high and enveloping body.

TASTING NOTES
Aroma… 8.00
Flavour… 7.75
Aftertaste… 8.00
Acidity… 8.00
Body… 8.25
Balance …8.00
Uniformity… 10
Sweetness… 10
Cleanliness… 10
Overall… 8.25
Total… 86.25