This coffee's appellation is a mouthful, isn't it? It is an unusual beast - a dry processed coffee from Mexico. This is something I haven't tried. By the way - I love Mexican coffees. The simple, straightforward tastes of something from Oaxaca or Chiapas are often the antidote to the crazy flavors I tend to favor from Ethiopia and elsewhere. In this case, however, the coffee is a bit crazy itself. Dry-processed coffees are processed sort of like making raisins - the whole coffee cherry is dried in the sun with the fruit and skin intact. After that, the outer layers are milled off the dry seeds. This processing can make for some interesting fruity flavors in coffee.
I decided to roast this coffee to Full City, or just a few snaps into second crack. Since it is a low-altitude coffee, I kept the temperatures moderate. The coffee was very uneven looking at the end, which isn't surprising. This morning I had a vacuum brew of it and was very pleased. Very often when these fruity coffees are roasted on the darker side, a lot of the fruit character is muted and replaced by roast notes. Not here. There was deep, rustic chocolate as a base (reminded me of....surprise... Mexican chocolate with almonds), and there was still a lot of nice tropical fruits lingering. Perhaps right on the edge of a ferment defect, but still pleasurable. This is a rich, complex, delicious coffee. Yum.
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Addendum 6/1/08
I tried this as espresso this morning. Awesome stuff. The fruit and chocolate really work well together, and there was just enough acidity to balance things out. Keep this one in mind for future espresso related endeavors.
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