What Single-Origin Means for a Colombian Coffee
Single-origin means a coffee comes from one place instead of a blend of several. The place can be as broad as a country or as narrow as one farm, so the better question is how precisely the origin is named. All of our coffees come from Colombia, each from one region, Caldas or Nariño, and most can be placed more precisely, down to particular towns.
From a country down to a farm
On a bag, the term covers a wide range. "Colombia" on its own names a whole country, with growing regions that differ in altitude, rainfall and harvest season. A department such as Caldas or Nariño narrows that to one stretch of mountains. A municipality narrows it again, and a farm, or one lot from a farm, is as precise as coffee gets. The more precisely a coffee is placed, the more you know about where it grew.
Why the place shows in the cup
A coffee plant takes on the conditions it grows in: the altitude, the soil, the gap between warm days and cool nights, and how slowly the cherries ripen. A blend smooths those differences out on purpose, to hold one house taste from season to season. A coffee from one place keeps them, so what you taste belongs to one place.
Where each Kukuwu coffee comes from
- Nariño Sweet Symphony: a Caturra grown around Taminango and Buesaco, in Nariño, between 1,800 and 2,050 meters.
- Caldas Serenity Now: grown on the Santa Cruz de la Palma farm and by local growers in Chinchiná, in Caldas.
- Caldas Geisha Harmony: Geisha from two Caldas municipalities, Villamaría and Risaralda.
- Chinchiná Harmony Roast: the town of Chinchiná, in Caldas.
- Tropical Dulce Dream: Caldas. For this one, the department is as precise as we can name.
Two regions
Our Nariño coffee grows far to the southwest of Colombia, high in the Andes. Our Caldas coffees grow in the Coffee Axis, in the center of the country. The Nariño and Caldas pages describe each region and how its coffees taste.
What the origin does not tell you
The origin is only part of a coffee's story. It says nothing about how the coffee was processed: Tropical Dulce Dream is a natural coffee, dried in the whole cherry, while the other four are washed. It says nothing about the roast, which is light for the Geisha and balanced for everyday drinking in the Chinchiná Harmony Roast. And it is not a measure of quality on its own: that is what a cup score is for, and three of our coffees carry one on the Specialty Coffee Association scale. The questions and answers list them all.
To compare two places, brew the Chinchiná Harmony Roast and Nariño Sweet Symphony side by side, the same way, with one of the recipes in our brewing guide, and taste them one after the other.