This delicious coffee comes to us from the Cusco region in Peru on a farm called Pacaypata. The producer group, Valle Inca, are scattered around the small community of Calca, a market hub and one of last stops for travelers journeying into the Sacred Valley of the Incas. Señor Jose Prudencio, a producer himself, leads this collective by organizing coffee storage and transportation. He also operates a small cupping lab in Calca to monitor quality and promote their great work. After several years of operating as a loosely organized group, Prudencio formally organized the cooperative in 2020. That allowed the group to export coffee on their own and pursue organic and Fair Trade certification.

Prudencio truly cares about making a positive impact in his community in a more tangible way than pretty much anyone else we work with. He is committed to working further off the grid than anyone else, constantly extending the grid to bring more indigenous smallholders into the fold of better prices. This was reaffirmed on a recent field visit to Rio Mapacho, which is extremely remote and inaccessible. In the Lares Valley, the Yanatile Valley, a lot of these farmers are well past where the road ends. Prudencio has to hike in for hours to make these connections. Those producers’ coffees are now accessing a completely different market, paying at a far higher tier than previously because of this work. Like us, he doesn’t take shortcuts.

This washed coffee is grown at an incredible 1850 MASL. Varieties are Typica and Bourbon.

This is a balanced mild coffee that has some fruit flavors while remaining very pleasant. The nose is sweet and floral. The most notable flavors are honey and milk chocolate. As the coffee cools orange zest and golden raisin emerge.