We headed back from our border run to Costa Rica yesterday and decided to take in a tour at Jansen Coffee Farms in Volcan, Panama, just inside the western border of Panama....so, a long way from home. Jansen is one of the finer coffees and is one of only a few roasters in Panama. They also roast beans for several of the other growers. We've been to their beautiful farm before, sitting on the side of Volcan Baru (which is part of the reason the coffee from Panama is so wonderful), but never had taken any of their tours. Does that word Volcan sound familiar? Yes...its a volcano! Rich volcanic soil and those high altitudes make the coffee what it is. Delicious!
Here are some of the things we learned.
*All coffee originally comes from Africa. Yes, Africa. There are only 2 varieties - Robusto and Arabica (I always thought Arabica was from Arabia...shows what I knew). There are other varieties within these two, but they all fit into these two categories, and quite often, they are mixed.
* Robusto grows at lower elevations, is more disease resistant, grows plentifully and is thus cheaper to produce. This is the coffee that is used by huge coffee producers (Think Folgers, etc.) and added in to most coffees to keep the price down. It is machine processed. That doesn't mean it's a bad cup of coffee. However, FYI, unless your coffee says 100% Arabica, it probably has only a small portion of Arabica beans in it.
Smaller bean
Larger plant
Grows in lower elevations
Produces more per hectare
Has more caffeine (which makes it more bitter)
Has half the sugar (yes, sugar in the beans...who knew?)
*Arabica is only grown at higher elevations, in high humidity and rich soil and is not as disease resistant...so because of the humidity, it is necessary to plant the plant further apart, so as to resist disease and mold or fungus. Arabica beans take much more care and are more expensive because of it.
Larger Bean
Smaller plant
Grows best in high elevations with cooler temps and rich volcanic soil
Produces much less per hectare
Has less caffeine, thus a smoother, less acidic taste
Has more sugar, which adds to the flavor.
Regular Jansen Farm Coffees sell in London for $20.00 a cup. A pound of that here in Panama costs about $7.00
Geisha coffee is from the Arabica family, named so for a particular district in Ethiopia, not because of Geisha girls.... Geisha has won the Worlds Best Coffee title for the past 13 years straight. It may not be so much about how great it is, but more about how different it is. It certainly requires a refined sort of palate. It auctions for $300 a pound, but is sold for waaaaay less here in Panama. The taste varies dramatically depending on how it is dried and roasted. The beans that are washed and dried in the sun tasted much smoother to me, and I really liked it, but the most expensive, Geisha Natural is dried whole bean on shaded flats in the sun has a totally different taste. They call this processing "Honey" because the sugars are more concentrated in those coffee beans that are dried whole. It is also much more expensive. I didn't like it nearly as much, which is probably a good thing.
Geisha plants produce even fewer coffee beans per plant.
The beans grow in small clusters rather than filling an entire branch.
It produces larger coffee beans, which are more desirable.
It must be grown at the highest altitudes.
It is more disease resistant than regular Arabica, but puts out half the beans.
Geisha beans have more sugar content.
Geisha Coffee will sell for $40.00 a cup in NYC and $28.00 in LA. One lb in Panama costs about $12-$20 depending on where it is purchased.
*All of these beans are sorted 6 times at Jansen to remove any broken or inferior beans (which are ground and sold as Del Fino, and while it is seconds, it is still a very fine cup of coffee) and to sort by size.
The beans are sorted for size, because, the roasting is done according to the largest bean. If there are many sizes, the smaller ones get over done. When a buyer opens a bag of these quality beans, they'd better be all the same size.
*All of Jansen coffee (except Del Fino) is hand bagged, hand sealed, hand labeled.
*Where a crop of beans comes from (example: South side of a particular mountain) or which picking (1st picking all goes to seconds....for example, buyers will request a third picking), all has an effect on the flavor of the coffee.
*The Queen of England just got her annual order of Panamanian Coffee delivered. An executive from Hong Kong just flew his plane over to pick up one of the Jansen family so he could hand deliver some fresh roasted coffee to him in Hong Kong. We're famous!
*Jansen roasts small batches of coffee every day, to order. They only roast less than 100 pounds at a time. This guarantees better quality. Every single batch of beans actually have a different roasting "recipe" (time and temp, etc.) determined by the owner of Jansen Farms, who pre-roasts a small batch of each and every bag to bring out the best flavor, then gives that information to the Master Roaster.
*Coffee beans that are shiny are old an have had essential oils added to them to enhance the flavor that has been lost over time. HA! I always thought they must be a richer tasting, better quality coffee.
*Starbucks has approached the Jansens many times to buy their green coffee beans, but because they are a roaster, and that controls much of the flavor of the coffee, they have refused.
*Some of the manufacturers of KONA coffee from Hawaii, back when that was the rage, were caught coming to Panama, buying coffee beans and shipping them to Hawaii because they couldn't keep up with the demand.
*The saying amongst coffee growers and workers about instant coffee is this. "Nescafe no es cafe." (Nescafe is not coffee)
The tour through Jansen was a great time, even with the pouring rain. We took the tour that included their nursery, which is the largest in Panama....so got to see many exotic plants which they sell all over Panama. They have many different businesses within this business, including the nursery. They also repackage sugar and creamer into packets for restaurants. They now have a tour business as well, and even have a special house you can rent to stay at on the farm right by a lake. We probably never would have done the coffee tasting, but Emily included it just because it had been raining so hard. Our hour and a half tour ended up being a fascinating several hours, and we would highly recommend it to anyone who might be interested.
We ended up not getting back to El Valle and our beds until 2:00 a.m., but it was worth it. What a great day!
www.jansencoffeefarm.com
www.lagunasadventures.com (Family tour business at the Farm)
