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The first of two releases from the 2024 Mataquescuintla harvest continues a new relationship for us at 1000 Faces and marks just the second time that this coffee has ever been sold on the international market under the grower’s name - Wilson Zuleta.
We’ve been steadily increasing our purchasing from this area the past few years in continued solidarity with the Indigenous Xinka community, collectively known as Cafe Colis Resistencia. Wilson is a fourth generation coffee farmer and one of the youngest producers that we’ve ever purchased from at the age of 22. He took on the massive task of managing the family’s farm, Campo Nuevo, after his brother, Denis, made the decision to migrate to the United States in 2022. This is an extremely common occurrence throughout coffee growing communities in Central America, unfortunately, as profit margins are slim to none for many smallholders in the coffee sector.
Our importing partners, Semilla Coffee, share: Wilson is the fourth generation of coffee growers in his family, and he’s been very animated about the opportunity provided to him now to try to “push his family forward and grow his farm” via selling his coffee internationally. As he shared, his goals from this new stage in his life are to “improve the quality of life for my family, to grow our drying area to be better able to process more coffee, and to continue to achieve better prices for our coffee to guarantee that our efforts are compensated.”
Like all other producers that Semilla works with in this region, Wilson Zuleta is a part of a family of land defenders and an active member of the peaceful resistance against the Escobal silver mine. For more in depth information surrounding the Xinka resistance, the formation of Cafe Colis Resistencia, and more recent updates of their activity, we encourage you to check out this article published by the LA Times, Luis Solano’s analysis, and the full packet of information provided by our friends at Semilla.
This selection from Wilson Zuleta exemplifies all you could want in a classically comforting Guatemalan coffee! It offers a full body, heavy sweetness, and familiar dominant flavors of milk chocolate, brown sugar, and nut butter. Wilson’s coffee in particular showcases a juicy acidity this season that reminds us of all the red and orange fruits. We’re tasting: dried cherries, orange marmalade, apple butter, almond butter, hazelnut, vanilla, cream soda, baking spices, tootsie roll, nutter butter, milk chocolate.
Relationship
Semilla Coffee shares: The name Cafe Colis Resistencia builds off the storied history of resistance amongst the Xinca peoples, which traces its lineage back to the era of contact by Spanish conquistadors.” Generations of Xinca peoples, who initially banded together in resistance against colonization, have now formed a common collective in the face of a mining operation that’s destroying their lands. In short, the Escobal mine was established despite hundreds of complaints between 2011 and 2013, citing a lack of good faith and severely inadequate environmental impact assessments. Notable effects of the operations have been collapsing houses due to subterranean mining, freshwater springs completely drying up, and fish populations dying off in nearby lakes. The culmination of years of protests led to establishing a blockade in front of the mine’s entrance in 2017, and the government finally recognizing the rights of the Xinca peoples, ruling in their favor, and shutting down the mine. Though the mine is still closed today, Cafe Colis Resistencia remains active in their resistance. They’ve established encampments in the towns of Casillas and Mataquescuintla, keeping watch 24 hours a day and stopping all trucks entering the area that may be carrying mining material.
Despite the many challenges facing Cafe Colis Resistencia, they’re a collection of extremely passionate and dedicated people who are growing absolutely delicious coffee. Semilla’s work with them has always been to primarily assist in the development of an international market in North America, and to do so despite the fact that their coffee quality may not quite be as high as it could be. Semilla has made big efforts to assist in the transition into specialty coffee over the last few years. They share, “Our goal with this is not only quality - it stems from our belief that part of the cycle of oppression in coffee comes from a lack of access to information that keeps small producers dependent on local buyers and other gatekeepers in the industry who can dictate price and set limits on a producer’s possibilities. As we see this group taking steps every year towards being able to independently process, market, and sell their own coffee, it allows us to feel confident that their success is not dependent only on a single buyer group who wishes to support them and puts them in a better place to advocate for themselves, both locally and internationally.
This is a project built on collaboration, trust, and risk-sharing. Through our support, which we plan to continue growing in the future, we hope to position ourselves as a stable buyer and a platform upon which to center the stories of this coffee producing group. Many thanks to the folks at Bows Coffee and Semilla Coffee, who established the initial connection to Cafe Colis Resistencia and have been organizing all of the logistics for export/import since 2018.
Processing
Many of the producers within the larger Cafe Colis Resistencia collective rely on a local wet mill named La Concepcion. Though this service has helped tremendously in the first few years of exporting internationally, issues continue to emerge. Prices are rising each season, and the output is generally quite inconsistent.
Wilson’s coffee is processed, using a communal depulper, and dried at his home on raised beds. Ripe cherries are first sorted and floated to remove defects. They’re then stored in sealed plastic bags under shade for 48 hours to begin the fermentation process in cherry. The cherries are then depulped and the wet parchment is put out to dry raised beds for 15 - 17 days.
Brewing
Wilson Zuleta is a straightforward coffee that benefits from relatively tighter grind sizes. Aim for a brew ratio around the 1:16 - 1:17 (coffee:water) range to accentuate the big body and heavy sweetness this coffee has to offer. The ideal brew should have a creamy milk chocolate sweetness with a balanced fruited acidity like cherry pie.
If your coffee tastes overly nutty, slightly sour, and the mouthfeel is thin or watery - like boiled peanuts - try grinding finer.
If your coffee tastes more like bittersweet chocolate (versus the ideal sweeter, milk chocolate flavors) and the mouthfeel is cloying and gritty - like cocoa powder - try grinding coarser.
