A New year means new beginnings. For City Girl Coffee, it also means new crops! Just before the end of 2020, we started in on a new batch of beans for our Blondie Brazil light roast from the Nova Esperança farm. If you, like us, enjoy learning about where your food comes from then we know you’ll love this month’s blog installment!
Arabela Pereira Lima, owner of Nova Esperança Farm
Meet The Grower
The current batch of City Girl Blondie Brazil is grown by Arabela Pereira Lima who owns Nova Esperança farm, which translates to “New Hope.” The farm is located in the city Monte Santo de Minas, which is in the Mogiana region of Brazil.
“It all started during my childhood," says Arabela, "I used to accompany my mother, Leda, to the farm and later she encouraged me to attend the college of agronomy. From then until now the interest has become a passion and I can’t imagine myself working with in any other career. The desire to stay in the profession comes from knowing that I never know everything, there is always a new knowledge to be tested, it is always dynamic. Also, the satisfaction of being able to please several people with my work, that’s something priceless to me.”
Harvest and Production
Nova Esperança harvests coffee between July and August. During this harvest time, coffee cherries are plucked from the trees and prepared for processing. Different farms use different processing methods, but at Lima’s farm, coffee is processed by laying the beans out onto cemented patios to dry in the sun. Beans are raked regularly to prevent spoilage as they dry. Once void of moisture, the dry cherries are milled to separate the outer cherry from the coffee beans inside. This results in the green coffee bean that travels all the way to Duluth, MN where City Girl roasts.
Tasting Notes
Roasted lighter to highlight the bean’s character, our Blondie Brazil is the lightest roast available from City Girl Coffee. Sipping this coffee, you’ll pick up on delicate, sweet, floral notes as a result of the coffee cherry drying on the beans. You may notice hints of hibiscus and honeysuckle both in scent and taste, as well as some notes specific to the Nova Esperança batch: chocolate, praline, raisin, caramel, apple.
Want to give it a try? Order our City Girl Blondie Brazil now!