009 - Abelardo Medina

FREEZER SALE UPDATE (11/26):

From Christopher: There's a small but vocal minority of specialty coffee enthusiasts who love very light roasts—roasts that I, as a young roaster, would have dismissed as defective, under-developed and undrinkable. As time progressed, even if it's not my preference most days, I grew to love this style of roasting—what has come to be known as "ultralight" or "hyperlight" or "wheatgrass" roasting. They can be a little more finicky to brew, benefitting from faster-extracting burrs, precisely dialed water chemistry as well as many weeks (or months) of rest before brewing, and so they remain quite niche. While Aviary roasts light (so light that I've heard other notable roasters reacting to Aviary's coffees the way that I once dismissed ultralight roasts), only one official release this year (001) and one wildcard release (XX1) truly fit the definition of "ultralight."

One of the comments I often hear from fans of this style of coffee is, "while I loved this release, I wouldn't mind if you decided to roast a little lighter...." And so, I've decided that our final final release of 2024 should be in the same ultralight style as our first release.

This is our love letter to ultralight roasts: a bright, clean and laserlike presentation of this coffee and its original notes of passionfruit, nectarine, jasmine and lemon. We sorted 0.9% of this batch optically post-roast—a higher percentage owing to the lighter overall color and chaff presentation, but offset by the much-lower roast loss associated with coffee this light. Because of its very light roast level, we recommend resting it for at least 6 weeks prior to enjoying—it would likely benefit from 8 weeks (or more). 

Our final release of 2024 is a trust fall that came to us through our longtime export partners in Colombia at Osito—a washed Pink Bourbon that rivals the quality of coffees from the landrace's ancestral home, presenting in the cup with notes of passionfruit, nectarine, jasmine and lemon.

From Christopher: "'I know you like Pink Bourbons,' Didier Pajoy messaged me one day, after seeing me post about some of my work in Ethiopia. 'This year,' he said, 'there are coffees in La Plata equal to Ethiopians—from a producer whose name is Abelardo Medina.'"

"Before he worked for Osito Colombia as the purchasing and warehouse manager in La Plata, Huila, I knew Didier Pajoy as a coffee producer and technician who helped organize his neighbors in La Plata with another group of producers in La Argentina into an informal cooperative. As the biggest buyer of coffee from that original group and its successor, Grupo Mártir, I became familiar with the way Didier operates and valued him not only for his knowledge and skill as a coffee producer but also for his cupping spoon.

"Up to this point, the coffees I've purchased for Aviary have come through personal work or direct connection—I've typically visited the farm or mill or had many conversations with the grower or producer of the coffee throughout the harvest and post-harvest process. In this case, I didn't know Abelardo; but if nothing else, buying coffee is a game of chance and a game of trust. We work through trusted agents and build contracts and finance around trust anchors. The leads that come our way for new supply chains and new partners come from referrals through those networks of trust. And I trust Didier: so when he asks me to take notice, I take notice.

"I contracted the last available lot of Abelardo's coffee from an upcoming ocean shipment of coffee from Colombia through Osito. There was no pre-ship material available, and I wasn't able to sample before contracting. But because I can rely on the networks and systems Osito has built and because I've worked deeply with their team, I had confidence—confidence which was rewarded upon arrival with a dense, complex coffee with notes of passionfruit, nectarine, jasmine and lemon."

There is only 22kg available in this drop.