Peru Altiplano

Whole bean coffee

We roast to order on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays and ship the following day. Orders will be included in a roast if they’re received by 11:59pm Eastern Time the day before.

Origin: Peru

Region: Cusco

Province: Calca

Community: Alto Cedruyoc

Farm name: Pisonayniyoc

Producer: Huaman Veronica Vidal

Cooperative: Valle Inca

Altitude: 1850 meters

Process: Washed, dried on raised beds

Varieties: Bourbon

Tasting notes: Cherry, chocolate, custard

Peru is a favorite origin of ours and home to one of our oldest relationships. We’ve been buying coffee from the Valle Inca Cooperative in Calca since the 2017 harvest, and in 2019 we made the long journey over the Andes from Cusco to see the incredible work they do. We were floored by the dedication, enthusiasm, and hard work invested by everyone involved, with special gratitude to the founder and leader of the coop, Prudencio Vargas Saenz, who might work harder for his members than anyone works for anything. The positive impacts on the lives and livelihoods of the producers is real, and the quality of the coffee speaks for itself.

The COVID-19 pandemic hit the Valle Inca communities hard in terms of access to resources, as a result of tough restrictions on transportation. We worked with our sourcing partners, Red Fox Coffee Merchants, to pay an additional $.10 per pound on all of the coffee we bought from Peru in 2020 as a direct donation to Valle Inca for much needed staple foods and medical supplies, which the coop then distributed to the communities in need.

Peru Altiplano is one of our signature single origin offerings, a label that we bring back each season to showcase the Valle Inca coffees that we feel best represent the region’s “taste of place”. The Altiplano, or “high plain” in Spanish, is the Andean plateau, the roof of South America, and is a metaphor for the way we view the present and future of coffee in southern Peru.

This version of Altiplano was produced by Huaman Veronica Vidal at 1850 meters above sea level, using the Bourbon variety. In the cup we taste cherry, chocolate, and custard.

Transparency

This is our sixth year buying from Valle Inca. We visited the Red Fox Coffee Merchants office in Lima during the harvest to cup over a dozen samples, picking just a few. We bought 10 69kg bags of this lot for $5.25/lb EXW on a day when the Coffee Commodity price was $2.40/lb. We scored this coffee an 87.

Click here for more information on the coffee supply chain.