Switching Decaf: from Mexico to Honduras

Over the past few weeks, many of us at Andytown have been a little sad that our Decaf Mexico Bella Vista was down to its last few bags. We made our first purchase of this coffee for decaf in 2019–and it was also our second year working with Mayan Harvest in Bella Vista and sourcing their community lot coffee. We always thought it would be really cool to offer a coffee in both its original, fully caffeinated form, and it was also a way for us to increase our purchases from Mayan Harvest and continue to build our partnership. We liked this coffee as decaf so much that we kept sourcing enough to keep it as our solo decaf offering for four years, making it our longest standing single origin offering without any breaks in between seasons.

A view of La Rinconada, one of the coffee producing communities of Bella Vista that we visited in early 2020.

So, if we liked it so much, why are we moving on? When we first started working with Rosalba Cifuentes, Founder of Mayan Harvest, the coffees she offered from her hometown were delicious, but there was room for improvement. Over the years, she and her team have been able to work with more farmers in the greater Bella Vista area while finding ways to ensure consistency and improve quality. This allowed Mayan Harvest to slowly command higher prices for their coffees, and it’s now to the point where it’s unsustainable for us to source it as decaf. We always knew that this day would come: with Rosalba’s determination to bring Bella Vista on the specialty coffee map, Mayan Harvest would grow, and we couldn’t be happier. And although we won’t have their coffee as decaf anymore, we’ll still have Mayan Harvest coffee in its fully caffeinated form later this year. 

For this bittersweet decaf departure, we needed a little comfort and searched for a coffee that felt like a hug. We decided to go straight to Swiss Water to see what decaffeinated green coffees they had available. The Swiss Water process gently removes caffeine using only water containing the soluble solids that naturally occur in green coffee—and never introduces chemical solvent residuals. The end result is a coffee that preserves unique origin flavors and characteristics and is 99.9% caffeine free.

A flow chart describing the Swiss Water Decaffeination Process

We tasted through a handful of Swiss Water samples and landed on a sweet and soothing coffee from Honduras. It’s produced by Molinos de Honduras, the oldest coffee exporter of the country. Working with over 7000 smallholder farmers, they mixed beans from various regions to create this laid back coffee with notes of pear, chocolate truffle, and sweet bread pastry. This reliable coffee will help you feel grounded when you need just the comforting taste of coffee to get you through the day. Don’t forget to pair it with dessert, or a warm blanket and a book at hand.