El Salvador: Finca Argentina, Yellow Pacamara, Natural

Fresh, sweet pear fills this elegant cup, but there a restrained funk from the natural process which adds a miso caramel edge to the finish and then a delicate bite of bitter orange on the aftertaste.

Roland last visited El Salvador in February as the harvest at Finca Argentina was just coming to an end. The farm is at a lower altitude than other producers we work with in El Salvador, so that shifts the harvests a little earlier than San Jose or Nejapa for example. He travelled with Mauricio to visit the Los Ausoles mill to cup the various fresh lots from the farm and everybody agreed that the Yellow Pacamara was tasting terrific this year. On the table at the time the samples included a Washed and a Natural, both of which cupped very well. You can buy Natural Yellow Pacamara coffee right here.

On The Farm

Near the town of Turin, in the Ahuachapán department of El Salvador, you’ll find Finca Argentina. It’s located in the Apaneca-Ilamtepec mountain range, surrounded by natural hot springs at an altitude of 1,300 metres above sea level. The farm’s 35 hectares are separated into 7 distinct areas or 'tablons'. Each of these individual plots have their own character, shaped by the landscape and the small peculiarities of microclimate that come with changes in altitude, aspect, soil, and even local volcanic activity. Over time, the team at Finca Argentina have put a lot of effort into exploring different varietals, discovering what grows best on each of the farm’s 7 tablons.

The Martinez Family

The farm was first acquired by the Martinez family in 1967. Dr Luis Guillermo Martinez bought the estate, and it quickly became his favourite and produced well. By the time his son, Mauricio, inherited in 2008, the cherry yields had dropped significantly, and he was unsure how best to proceed with his newly owned farm. It was here that his son (and our now good friend) Alejandro stepped in.

He had just relocated back to El Salvador after working as a city banker in New York and decided to lend a hand to his father’s business interests while looking for work. Ale’s interest was piqued when he saw that the farm had been classified for a Q auction in 2005, showing it had the potential for great coffee. He and his cousin based in London set about sending green coffee samples to roasters anywhere they could, seeking a specialty buyer. One of those landed with us in 2008 and we’ve been buying ever since.

Mauricio and Alejandro both now live in Canada, but Mauricio still owns and oversees the farm remotely. He relies on his farm manager and the on-site team to handle day-to-day operations and to keep him up to date, while visiting El Salvador regularly to check in. The Martinez family employ 50 people during the harvest and 30 the rest of the year. Mauricio's daughter Beatrix, who hadn't previously been involved in coffee, is also now stepping in to help with the family business. Processing of the coffee is carried out at the Los Ausoles dry mill, a cooperative facility in Ahuachapán. They have a very good relationship with Mauricio and have shown great consistency and reliability for us as buyers.

Highly Skilled Workers

Throughout the growing season at Finca Argentina, individual workers are given a lot of responsibility over pruning and managing trees. On many farms, pruning would be quite regimented (for example, every other tree gets a skeleton prune in this section), whereas Finca Argentina are leaving these decisions much more up to the knowledge of the staff, deciding on a plant-by-plant basis what kind of pruning is needed when they work through an area. It is easy to ruin coffee production on trees if you don’t make the right pruning choices, so this shows a lot of trust and is only possible when they retain and develop their workers’ skills long term.

El Salvador has been hit hard by the wider labour shortage impacting other Central American countries. Luckily Finca Argentina are currently managing well, but they are having to consider more ways to retain necessary numbers of staff during harvest season. The Martinez family employ 50 people during the harvest and 30 the rest of the year. They contribute labour and materials to improve infrastructure in their community’s towns, and grow 25 kg of corn annually for each person. They’re also implementing more ecological management: using compost and other organic products to minimise environmental impact, and intercropping beans to enrich the soil. Their work has improved the land’s biodiversity and cup quality, and the future for sustainable coffee from Finca Argentina is looking very bright.

What Is Yellow Pacamara?

The Yellow Pacamara coffee trees are mostly planted in the upper sections of the Finca Argentina, in the San Jorge tablon and upper parts of the adjacent tablons. The San Jorge tablon has been planted exclusively with Yellow Pacamara since 2018. The seeds for the Pacamara plants growing here were sourced from the Mierisch family in Nicaragua. You may well have previously enjoyed a Limoncillo Yellow Pacamara roasted by us. These plants are cousins! The varietal has been performing very well on the farm in El Salvador. The team at Finca Argentina love it for its productivity and hardiness, which fascinatingly are not qualities you would expect from this varietal when grown back in Nicaragua.

The varietal originated from a cross between Pacas and Maragogipe. Its initial selections were made by the Nicaraguan Institute of Agricultural Technology (INTA) in 1976 but were never completed following the Sandinista revolution. Further selections were later made by private producers in Central America, but the variety has never been stabilized, meaning that the plant's genetics are not stable from generation to generation. It is grown primarily in El Salvador, where it often dominates Cup of Excellence competitions for its high cup quality.

Check out our Varietal Guide for more information on Yellow Pacamara here: Coffee Varietal Guide: Pacamara

• Country: El Salvador
  
• Region: Apaneca-Ilamatepec
  
• Department: Ahuachapán
  
• Municipality: Ahuachapán
  
• Nearest Town: Turin
  
• Farm: Finca Argentina
  
• Producer: The Martinez Family
  
• Dry Mill: Los Ausoles
  
• Elevation: 1,300 m.a.s.l
  
• Variety: Yellow Pacamara
  
• Processing Method: Natural
  
• GPS: 13°56'29.4"N 89°47'04.1"W

Cupping Notes: Pear, Miso Caramel, Bitter Orange.

Cup of Excellence Cupping Scores

• Clean Cup: 7/8
  
• Sweetness: 6.5/8
  
• Acidity: 6/8
  
• Mouthfeel: 6/8
  
• Flavour: 6.5/8
  
• Aftertaste: 6/8
  
• Balance: 6.5/8
  
• Overall: 6.5/8
  
• Correction: +36
  
• Total: 87/100

If you'd like to find out more about how we score coffees, make sure to read our blog post “What Do Coffee Cupping Scores Actually Mean?” and if you'd like to try cupping yourself, we've got a guide to that too! What is Coffee Cupping.

Medium - Through the gap and let this develop a little, paying close attention to the heat and dropping well before second crack.