El Carmen Sugarcane Decaf

Want to recreate the Caravan experience at home? Check out our recipe book, Caravan: Dining All Day.

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El Carmen Sugarcane Decaf

  • Region

    Pitalito, Huila

  • Varietal

    Caturra, Castillo

  • Farm/ Producer

    Various Smallholders

  • Elevation

    1600-1800 masl

  • Process

    Sugarcane Decaf

 

Beginning life as a washed process lot of Caturra & Castillo varietals, grown by over 300 smallholder farmers in the Huila region of Colombia, this coffee is a superlative example of our mission to redefine the standards of decaf. Caravan and the El Carmen cooperative are disrupting the traditional ideas that decaf drinkers do not deserve better, overturning the tyranny of lower-grade, past crop and dark roasted coffees without pleasant taste qualities.

Often described as the ‘natural process’ decaf, sugarcane decaf uses ethyl-acetate as a selective solvent to remove caffeine from the green coffee. Ethyl-acetate is naturally occurring organic compound produced by the fermentation of fruits, most often found in ripe bananas.

 

  Caravan Coffee Roasters are proud members of 1% for the Planet. For more information please visit https://www.onepercentfortheplanet.org


BREWING GUIDE

 

By using the ethyl-acetate produced by the sugarcane industry, the decaffeination process is conducted locally and in-country. This ensures money is kept in the local economy, and reduces the carbon footprint of the coffee as no further shipping is required to get it to a decaffeination plant in Europe. Combined with the pricing structure set up by our friends at Raw Material which consistently pays fair prices well above the commodity coffee price, this decaf is delicious, sustainable and equitable – a perfect all-day drinker.

We profile our decaf roasts to be consistent and easily extractable – our gold-standard recipe is 18g in, 36g out, and shots around 25-30s. For filter, try a ratio of 65g/litre.