SWD Costa Rica SHB EP

Just on the outskirts of the town of San Ramon in Costa Rica’s West Valley lies Café de Altura San Ramon, a co-operative representing producers primarily in the West Valley, but also from other regions in Costa Rica. Formed in 2004 with closer to 500 members, Café de Altura was formed in order to better face the challenges of a changing industry, the co-operative has since grown and now represents closer to 3500 individual producers. Coffee from the West Valley is sold under the name “El Poeta” which is where this lot can be traced.

To prepare the beans for caffeine removal, they are cleaned and hydrated with pure, local water, the beans are then introduced to an internally developed Green Coffee Extract (GCE), and caffeine removal begins. Caffeine ventures out on its own, away from the coffee beans into the GCE until the ratio of soluble compounds in the GCE to the compounds in the coffee reach the point of equilibrium. Caffeine and GCE flow continuously through carbon filters until all the caffeine is trapped and separated from the GCE, which is refreshed so that it can be used again and again to remove more caffeine. The process is monitored for around 10 hours and caffeine levels checked as well as time, and gauge temperature controls, until the coffee is 99.9% caffeine free.