Honduras Capucas Decaf

A Swiss Water Decaffeinated coffee from Western Honduras grown as Fairtrade, Organic, Rainforest Alliance Certified and Strictly High Grown (SHG).

Roast: Full City (4/7) (Medium)

Tasting Notes: Milk Chocolate and Apricot

Altitude: 1450-1600 MASL

Variety: Primarily Caturra

Story:

Central American coffee is well known for its high quality arabicas and Honduran coffee is no exception. Situated between Guatemala, El Salvador and Nicaragua, it is in a hotspot of excellent coffee producers. With similar growing conditions to that of its better-known counterparts Honduran coffee is typically a combination of darker and more caramel notes with tropical fruit and berry overtones. A few decades ago, the government introduced incentives for small farms to begin operations, there are now over 100,000 families involved in the production of coffee with 70% of them farming on less than 2 hectares each.[52]

Cooperativa Cafetalera Capucas Limitada (Cocafcal) or Capucas as they are better known, is situated on and around the Celaque mountain, which is the highest peak in Honduras. Celaque means 'box of water' in the local Lenca language, and the mountain is the source for many rivers and streams. Capucas was founded in 1999 by Jose Omar Rodriguez, the great-grandson-in-law of the original Capucas farm owner, and takes its name from the local town of Las Capucas.[51][53]

In 2004 Omar was chosen to become the general manager, a role he continues today. The coffee is harvested at its optimum ripeness and handed in at the cooperative. It is then washed, dried in the solar dryer and stored in parchment before being trucked to the port of Puerto Cortés. Capucas were the first in the country to build a facility to dry microlots in a large scale with solar dryers.[53]

The cooperative has many initiatives to improve the lives of workers and the local community, including continuing to pay for a GP to treat workers for free in their health centre, which is in the centre of Las Capucas. In 2016 Capucas partnered with the National Autonomous University of Honduras (UNAH) to provide a university education for their workers. Their virtual classroom was opened in the community of Capucas in a rural part of San Pedro Copan, UNAH provide the technical support, teachers and subject matter for the students. They also have a football academy, which is free to join and a virtual library for members, children and partners of Capucas Cooperative.[53]

This coffee has been decaffeinated by Swiss Water. Whilst some decaffeination processes use solvents such as methylene chloride and ethyl acetate, Swiss Water use a completely chemical-free process. The beans are continually circulated in their signature Green Coffee Extract (GCE) which only consists of fresh water and all the soluble solids already within coffee. This allows all coffee certifications to remain intact (including Organic), something the chemical solvent process cannot make. The GCE is constantly refreshed and reused, minimising the environmental impact of the process.[28] If you would like to learn more about their process you can do so here.