Sergio Caro - Colombia, Shoebox | 125g

Tasting notes: Blue-raspberry, white tea, jasmine 

Producer info and cup notes: 

In 2025, at just 26 years old, Sergio Caro won the Tierra de Diversidad competition in Colombia with his very first harvest. He started his coffee career learning in the Urrao producers co-operative championed by Unblended's team alongside producers like Viktor Pineda and Daniel Hernandez, who's coffees we've recently featured as intensely floral and fruited examples of the Chiroso production happening there. Sergio's farm Los Pinos sits at a soaring 2,400masl, providing an extremely unique microclimate with some of the highest growing altitudes in all of Colombia. At just half a hectare with only 4 employees, Sergio's operation is very tight-knit, well controlled, and highly quality focused, producing just under 1,000kg for the lot that ended up winning the Tierra De Diversidad competition. Due to the high elevation, the fermentation times used here are quite long, with a total of 72 hours held in cherry underwater still somehow yielding quite a clean cup as the end result. For drying, Los Pinos utilizes raised and shaded beds for optimal stability and slow drying, taking 2-3 weeks to reach their final moisture content targets. In the cup, we find an explosive process-related mixed berry tone reminiscent of blue-raspberry candy with a white tealike texture that carries with it tons of delicate florals. This coffee is quite flexible under both of our QC brewing methods, the washed and natural recipes, with the washed recipe highlighting the incredible fruited character, and the natural recipe focusing deeply on the florality, which presents as jasmine and bergamot.