Nicaragua Jinotega El Diamante

El Diamante Estate has one of the highest altitudes in the Jinotega region, and they harvest their coffee two months later than most other Nicaraguan farms to take advantage of the cloud cover up on their mountain. The slower growth allows for the coffee to absorb more nutrients producing more complex flavors in the cup. It's one of the nicest Nicaraguan coffees we've had in recent memory!

We got a few bags from another roaster who had directly purchased an entire shipping container of coffee from the farm. He ended up not needing quite that much of it, so we happily grabbed a few bags from him. It's a washed process of Yellow Catuai and Caturra varietals. It's considered a "Direct Trade" coffee because he imports it directly and pays the farm directly, and it also has Organic certification.

Although Nicaragua is a somewhat "boring" coffee, this one is surprisingly flavorful. I prefer it as a light roast (roast it like a Costa Rica, and you'll be happy. For us, that means about 30 seconds past the end of the first cracks). It has a lot of sweetness, a caramel taste to it, an almond taste to it, is not harsh, is not acidic, and is not earthy. It fits the bill for "regular coffee" for the average person, but it's far sweeter and less bitter than most "regular coffee."  It's pretty easy to roast: too light of roasts don't tend to taste sour and too dark of roasts don't tend to taste burnt, so you have a lot of leeway on the roast. If you get it too light, you might taste vegetables, and that's how you know you didn't get it dark enough.  You can take it all the way up to the 2nd cracks if you want a darker roast flavor. 

Because it’s a high-altitude washed process coffee, it’s an excellent choice for French Roast, and you can take it a good 50 seconds into rolling second cracks. It's a little bit thin bodied when you do this. 

US Arrival: August 2019