Palm Tree & Toucan EstateCoffee Bean Intro:
Colombia LA PALMA&EL TUCAN
Colombia · Palm Tree & Toucan Estate
Country: Colombia
Region: Huila
Estate: Palm Tree & Toucan Estate
Processing Method: Lactic Natural
Elevation: 1650 m
Variety: Catuai
Palm Tree & Toucan Estate LA PALMA&EL TUCAN
Established in 2011, Palm Tree & Toucan Estate was co-founded by a mad scientist, a passionate founder, a dedicated farmer, and a gifted artist.
One of the estate’s founders Felipe has been in the specialty coffee industry for over a decade, previously running green bean trading in the United States. 2010 Around
, he decided to return to Colombia to join the specialty coffee revolution in his homeland. Sebastian The estate manager, Sebastián ( 2018), as the champion of the
Colombia Coffee Brewing Championship, is passionate about promoting Colombian coffee worldwide. (Ecotopo) Unlike traditional coffee producers, they did not inherit any coffee farms from their predecessors but instead sought out what they believed to be the ideal coffee-growing environment from scratch
: optimal elevation, perfect weather, balanced sunlight and natural shade, reliable water sources, suitable temperatures, and a community of dedicated coffee growers in the region. 2011 In their first year, they visited over a hundred farms, but it wasn’t until 11, in 18, that they found a satisfactory location. They purchased a 1600-2200-hectare plot of land located in the Eastern Andes at an elevation of Cundinamarca m in the Apulo River region. The area features a nearly pristine forest on a mountain, divided by the beautiful Apluo River (
). Monsoons from the Pacific and warm, humid air currents from the Amazon converge here, creating a complex and variable microclimate that enriches the coffee with distinct terroir characteristics. The high elevation also contributes to the coffee’s unique profile. LPET The farm is equipped with advanced
processing facilities, where they process coffee cherries purchased from neighboring farms and other crop series. Neighbors & Crops In addition to actively assisting surrounding smallholder farmers in improving their cultivation and processing standards ( Estate & Varietals project), the estate owner has dedicated the past five years to cultivating unique terroir expressions within the free estate, investing significant resources and time into cultivation and processing. Furthermore, they have developed various product lines to cater to different flavor preferences, including the estate’s flagship offering: the proprietary variety (
2019) project. WBC The
champion’s winning beans came from this estate.
Processing Method Lactic Fermentation Lactic Fermentation ( “), as the estate’s signature processing method, involves achieving a higher concentration of lactic acid bacteria through anaerobic fermentation during the coffee processing stage. The most desirable flavors in coffee— ”、“ body, ”、“ high sweetness, ”、“ caramel, ” wine-like acidity, and “ silky mouthfeel— ” all depend on the lactic acid concentration during fermentation. Palm Tree & Toucan Estate uses the carbohydrates in mucilage to ferment, leveraging the lactic acid produced by this type of bacteria to achieve more complex cupping profiles.
Before depulping, the cherries are placed in a sealed tank. Sugar content, temperature, and pH levels are recorded. Ripe cherries, with their high sugar content, provide ample nourishment for naturally occurring yeast and bacteria in the air and on the coffee cherries, initiating fermentation. One byproduct of this fermentation is carbon dioxide. When the tank is sealed, it gradually fills with CO₂, displacing oxygen. Under these anaerobic conditions (i.e., without oxygen), surviving bacteria produce lactic acid, hence the name. After lactic fermentation, LPET the cherries are left to ferment in the container for approximately 70 hours before being depulped.
To determine whether cherries have undergone lactic fermentation, the simplest method is to observe the beans after depulping. If everything goes smoothly, the fermentation process also produces a small amount of alcohol, which transfers some color from the pulp to the beans. The dried green coffee beans still require manual sorting before export. In the final selection process, the ratio of coffee green beans to coffee cherries is approximately about 1:85，, meaning LPET an average of 85 kg of coffee cherries is needed to produce 10 kg of green beans.
