Recently, Qianjie got hold of a naturally processed Geisha coffee bean from Colombia's Cafe Granja La Esperanza. After brewing, it has aromas of blueberry and dark plum, and on the palate there are flavors of blackcurrant juice, orange and berries, with a full juicy body and a wine-like finish.

This Geisha coffee bean comes from Cafe Granja La Esperanza, a Colombian estate with a long history of cultivation and very high renown. Over the past decade or so, Cafe Granja La Esperanza has won more than 60 awards at major coffee competitions around the world. It is a regular at Colombia's green coffee competitions, and has even taken part in Panama's BOP competition and won awards there.

Cafe Granja La Esperanza does not refer to just one estate; the estate group owns a total of 5 coffee estates in Colombia: Potosi (Potosi), Cerro Azul, Las Margaritas, La Esperanza and Hawaii. Apart from Hawaii, which is located in the department of Cundinamarca, all the other estates are located in the department of Valle de Cauca.

Cafe Granja La Esperanza was founded by the couple Blanca Ligia Correa and Juan Antonio Herrera. Initially, the couple were assigned through labor distribution to work on a farm called Potosi, and during that work they developed a strong interest in the coffee industry, so the couple directly bought the Potosi estate.

At that time the Potosi estate mainly grew the Typica variety, but the estate owner Mr. Herrera hoped to cultivate more other coffee varieties, so in 1945 the couple bought a new plot of land near the Potosi estate and established La Esperanza, specifically introducing varieties such as Yellow Bourbon, Bourbon and Caturra for cultivation.

While running the estate, the couple had 14 children, growing the family. Among these children, Rigoberto and Luis developed a huge interest and talent for coffee growing and began taking over the family estate's operations.

In addition, in 2007 Rigoberto rented a coffee estate in the Boquete region of Panama to grow the Geisha variety, and in 2008 won the Best of Panama (BOP) championship, then in 2009 took second place again, a feat that also helped Hacienda La Esperanza gain a good deal of fame.

Later, Rigoberto also brought Geisha back to Colombia to grow at Hacienda La Esperanza, and as the operation grew, he went on to purchase three coffee estates, Cerro Azul, Las Margaritas and Hawaii (the Geisha that Qianjie sourced comes from Las Margaritas). The five estates have a total area of 150 hectares, and they are planted at different altitudes, all within the range of 1400-2000 m, each growing different coffee varieties.

At present, Hacienda La Esperanza is mainly concentrated in the Valle del Cauca department (the name comes mainly from the nearby well-known Cauca River), which was once Colombia's core coffee region, located in the central part of Colombia.

Thanks to the unique mountainous terrain and climate here, there are two dry seasons and two rainy seasons a year, so coffee cherries can be harvested in both seasons. In the past era when yield was prized, this drew considerable attention from the government, but with the rise of specialty coffee, Colombia's coffee core has shifted to the southern region.Even so, in the Valle del Cauca department there are still many well-known estates focused on coffee growing and processing research, such as Hacienda La Esperanza and Finca Inmortal, working hard to drive the development of the local coffee industry.