RUBÉN LÁZARO

Tasting Notes: Apple Pastry, Baking Spices, Creamy

Process:  Washed

Overview

Jorge Rubén Lázaro Ramírez (commonly known as Rubén Lázaro) farms multiple parcels at approximately 1900 MASL, situated in Canoguitas, Huehuetenango.  He manages five of his own parcels totaling 35 cuerdas, but also helps farm his brother’s and mother’s plots for a combined total of about 75 cuerdas.  A “cuerda” is a traditional unit of land measurement in Latin America and is about 97% the size of a US acre.  Rubén’s farms are planted primarily with arabigo, caturra, bourbon, and a small amount of catimor.  His farms are shaded by chalúm and grevillea trees.  He utilizes spent coffee cherry pulp to help in his fertilization process and does this twice yearly.  

Decades of Dedication

Rubén is 47 years old and has been working in coffee since the age of 12.  In the early days, he worked alongside his father as a simple laborer on coffee farms along Guatemala's southern coast in areas like Mazatenango, Realhuleu, and Escuintla.  In those early days, he would also travel repeatedly to Mexico to find other agricultural work.  After years of hard labor, he finally saved up enough money to purchase his own parcel in 2002.  This land had no coffee growing on it, so he started from scratch, planting Caturra and Bourbon varieties since he was most familiar with these, having worked with them in the past.  Rubén has spent the last four years as part of a dedicated group of producers in his area that are solely focused on producing the best specialty coffee possible.  In times past, he sold mostly conventional coffee, but has happily focused more on specialty production due to the higher prices for his hard work.

This Particular Lot

For this lot, Rubén combines coffee cherries all harvested the same day from his different parcels consisting of Bourbon and Caturra.  Cherries are picked from the early morning until about 3 pm and then de-pulped the same day.  After de-pulping, the coffee is fermented in a concrete tank anywhere from 12-24 hours depending on ambient conditions and then washed in a separate concrete tank. Agitation of the coffee to wash it clean and remove the mucilage is done with a long rake/stick–the old-school way.  Rubén changes the water several times throughout the process until the coffee is clean, removing floaters each time.  The coffee is then laid out on clean nylon to dry on the front patio of Rubén’s home and stored at home until it's ready to be sold.

Quality Over Quantity

Rubén prides himself on careful harvesting and constant farm maintenance.  He believes these are crucial to maintaining quality.  Careful picking is important so that ripe and unripe cherries are not harvested together, which would obviously decrease cup quality.  Good farm maintenance is also key to producing quality coffee, claims Rubén, especially the timely application of a good quality, natural fertilizer.

This coffee was purchased directly, in parchment, from the producer by our good friends at Shared Source Green Coffee Agency.  They then fulfilled the dry milling and export for this coffee themselves.