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Honey Monster Process

For those who are curious about the honeys: Francisco Mena explains Costa Rican Honey Process in this cleverly illustrated video by Tentacle Media.

I am incredibly proud of the videos we have done with our media partners Tentacle on coffee processing. We made them because we get so many people asking us what all the process mean – is natural best (because its natural after all – nothing added, right?)?  Are the ones that are not washed dirty? These are common emails (and questions I asked when I started to learn more about coffee) that we get all the time here at HB towers. The videos answered most of these questions.

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But we had a big hole in the offering. Washed, Pulped natural and natural leaves one of the most misunderstood processes unanswered.

Honeying is something we are seeing happen more and more in many countries. Something that really started out of necessity in the county I’m visiting right now in Costa Rica. A style that has been copied by these other countries as it can add different styles in the cup through this method of processing.

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The necessity in Costa Rica comes from the lack of water to fully wash the coffees, and an altitude (which Costa Rica has lots of) that means an inability with cool temperatures and unpredictable weather patterns up in the mountains, or the lack of desire to natural process because of the effects this can have on the final cup.

And so honeying was born. Born also because of the micro mill revolution that happened, small mills at home that economically used water, but mechanically scrubbing the bean to remove mucilage. Clever people on farms realised if you changed the settings on these new pulpers, you could control how much of the mucilage (or honey) gets left on the bean. The more that gets left on the bean, the more it tends to lead to a sweeter / different cup.

 

Anyway before I tell you all about this, my good friend Francisco Mena came to a cold winter land roastery in Stafford to tell us all about it (I’m actually with Francisco now in Costa Rica, its a lot warmer).

To launch this, we are also launching some coffees from El Potrero that show these different settings. We have a yellow, red, and black honey bourbon and a very very special golden honey Geisha from the same micro mill. We also have a natural bourbon and a pack with them all in at a special price, too. All great examples and all very rare and special lots for you to try!

So go watch “the expert” tell you all about it in the video (Francisco not me) before you buy the coffees here so you can taste what we are going on about. Very special coffees from some very special people in a very special country!

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