Las Etiopes Geisha, Peru | FILTER

Las Etíopes is a 7ha farm situated in the village of El Porvenir in Jaén, Cajamarca. The farm sits at an altitude of 1900m and reaches 2050m at its peak, of the 6ha only two hectares are currently planted with Ethiopian heirloom varieties, geisha, wush wush and sidra. Simon bought the farm in 2019 and the first trees were planted in early 2020. Of the Ethiopian varieties there are around 5 lines, some of which are compact types and others taller and somewhat similar to bourbon or geisha. The geisha grown at the farm is made up of two different lines, one which is a geisha type from Ethiopia and the other is seed from Panamá, most of the production is from the Panamanian line. 

Until 2025 almost all of the production from Las Etiopes was processed using conventional fermentation methods, dry ferment in tiled tanks, and this remains the primary processing method used at the farm, however in 2025 some of the production was processed in stainless steel tanks with added, natural, inoculants. In order to execute these new processing techniques a new processing lab was built to house the stainless steel tanks, food grade plastic bioreactor barrels and microscope and lab equipment in order to isolate and monitor yeast and bacteria growth prior to inoculation.

This lot was fermented with a natural mosto, made from fermenting a batch of geisha in sealed tanks with a solution made from simple syrup and hops, the purpose of adding hops is for it’s natural antimicrobial properties which allow for the proliferation of yeasts rather than bacteria. The pulped coffee is then left to ferment for a period of 5 to 7 days, with pH and brix readings taken regularly in order to monitor fermentation and yeast growth. Once the batch reaches a point where the yeast are sufficiently vigorous, the liquid is strained off and the coffee removed. This liquid is the mosto which can be used to inoculate production batches of coffee, and can be maintained somewhat like a sourdough starter with regular feedings of sugar syrup, keeping a close eye on the pH to ensure the acidity doesn’t drop too much. 

Freshly picked coffee is first rinsed and floated in fresh, cold spring water which serves to both remove lower quality beans and also to clean the cherry and reduce it’s microbial load. The rinsed cherries are depulped and placed in stainless steel tanks, where they are fermented for a period of 72 hours with the mosto under the natural pressure generated from fermentation.

Once the fermentation is complete the coffee is taken out of the tank and the liquid preserved for future batches, after being refreshed with more sugar syrup. The fermented coffee is washed once in spring water and moved over to the drying beds for slow drying. 

At Las Etiopes the coffee is dried in a covered drying tent where it dries slowly for a period of 15 to 20 days, depending on the weather conditions., until it reaches 11% moisture.