Guatemala Antigua Bella Carmona
One Real 16oz. Pound
Bella Carmona is one of the most superb regional blends a roaster can find in Central America. Originally named after the Zelaya family's Hacienda Carmona, the blend now encompasses 18 historic Antigua Valley farms.
Luis Pedro and his team at the Bella Vista wet mill not only manage each of these farms personally; they also work like perfectionists at the cupping table to maintain the blend's quality, shipping what they believe is an accurate representation of the Antigua Valley's volcanic and bourbon-based terroir.
We buy a variety of Bella Carmona coffees each year, and they routinely astound us with how early they arrive and how crisp and sweet they taste.
The aroma is fresh bread and pastry, with highlights of cocoa and hazelnuts. In the cup, the body is Thick, rich, creamy, and sweet, but not too sweet. The finish is lingering and clean with more notes of deep, dark chocolate.
Guatemala coffee fans, scoop this one up fast because it will fly out of here. Start thinking about your late summer cold brew: this one is a perfect fit for the cold brew crowd!
Aroma: Fresh Bread, Pastry, Sweet Highlights of Hazelnut and Cocoa
Cup: Creamy, Thick, Slightly Sweet, Marshmallow Deep and Rich Hot Chocolate
Finish: Clean and Lingering, Dark Chocolate
One Pound
About this Coffee
GROWER: Luis Pedro Zelaya Zamora
REGION: Antigua Guatemala, Sacatepéquez, Guatemala
ALTITUDE: 1500 – 1650 meters
PROCESS: Fully washed and dried on patios and elevated tables inside solar dryers that provide protection from the rain
VARIETY: Typica
HARVEST: October - February
SOIL: Volcanic loam
The city of Antigua is, in many ways, a modern coffee Eden. It's iconic, laid-back, and gorgeously ornate, and it is teeming with historic coffee infrastructure for a city of its size. It also was the center of Guatemala's specialty universe for many years. Before other departments in Guatemala had their own name recognition, coffees from across the country were regularly shipped to Antigua mills and exported as "Antigua" coffee because of its strong reputation.
The Antigua Valley is a gifted coffee region: it's accessible and flat, highly volcanic, and older farms remain planted with mostly bourbon-based genetics under a precisely managed shade canopy. The valley's best coffees are decadent, with butterscotch- or marzipan-like sweetness and brightness ranging from piquant lemonade to dessert wine or tangy dried fruit.
Guatemala's best centralized wet mills and boutique exporters are in and around Antigua. There are hundreds of farms in the greater area, from the city's legacy estates to patchwork smallholder communities climbing most of the way up Volcán de Agua (which is not flat!), one of three looming stratovolcanoes that seem to be visible from every street corner in town and play a large part in Antigua's famous soil composition. This variety of producers creates coffees with endless combinations of microclimates, elevations, and varieties. There is a lot to work with here and a lot of talent.
Luis Pedro Zelaya has earned much attention around the cupping table and among learned coffee professionals. He has four generations of Guatemalan coffee culture pulsing through his veins and an Agribusiness degree from the renowned University of Zamorano. His stellar professional reputation for producing world-class coffees is drawn from his ability to implement precise farm management and post-harvest processing decisions.
The perennial arrival of the Bella Carmona lots personifies the combined execution of all the fundamentals. The process starts at Zelaya’s family farm, Hacienda Carmona, where plant nutrition, pruning, and pest management are superb, resulting in a selection of exquisite coffee cherries.
At Bella Vista, the location of the wet and dry mill, Luis Pedro and his team meticulously process fully traceable lots by harvest date, location, variety, and altitude. Coffee is depulped, fermented, and washed in a very traditional way perfected over the last 100 years. Then, the coffee is gradually dried in a controlled environment designed to protect cup quality. Raised drying beds and sensor-controlled airflow permit a more uniform drying process and an additional opportunity for hand-sorting parchment as it dries.
The same focus on sorting and quality control is maintained through to the final export stage. Bella Vista’s dry mill has also been specifically designed for sorting high-quality micro-lots. Bella Carmona is produced in the Antigua region, which has a protected designation of origin (PDO) established because of Antigua’s renowned coffee reputation.