This Sidra lot comes from Consuelo Rubio and her daughters, Blanca Flor and Roxana, whose farm, Finca San Francisco, sits on the slopes of the Andes Mountains (at approximately 1800 M.A.S.L), near the village of El Lirio in northern Pern. The family applies meticulous care and a scientific approach to cultivating and processing their coffees, which we had the opportunity to witness up-close when we first spent time on their farm in 2022. The resulting profile of this Sidra is rich and complex – we taste shortbread and toffee, with hints of baking spice, complemented by juicy mandarin notes.
The Rubio family has been farming coffee on the same land for generations. Blanca and Roxana’s grandfather originally managed the coffee fields for the owner of a large estate in the region. In 1969, the Peruvian government initiated agrarian reforms, which split up the vast estates (held by a group of elite and powerful landowners at the time) and redistributed the land to the rural workers. Following these reforms, the Rubio family had the opportunity to purchase a small parcel of the land which they had previously managed. In the 1990s, Consuelo and her husband began planting coffee trees on the farm, with an initial focus on cultivating Typica, Caturra and Timor.
The family’s production of Sidra as their flagship varietal resulted from a series of lucky events. In the early 2000s, a friend gifted the family five Sidra plants that he had collected from a trip to Ecuador. The Rubio family forgot about the gift, only rediscovering the plants years later while Consuleo’s late husband was on a walk through the farm. Unlike the family’s other varietals – which had been affected by a leaf rust outbreak that year (a disease affecting coffee plants) – the small cluster of Sidra plants was in beautiful condition. Mystified, he sowed the seeds and the coffee’s unique profile blew him away. It was only after further research that the family connected the dots and recalled their friend’s gift from Ecuador!
We were introduced to the Rubio family in 2022 and spent some time on their impeccable estate – as you can see from our drone footage, the meticulous care they have taken in cultivating their plants is a sight to behold! This is the second harvest that we have purchased from Consuelo Rubio and are excited about continuing to work together as they remain at the forefront of progressive coffee production in Peru.
The Rubio family takes a scientific, precise approach to processing – they measure and record the changes in the coffee cherries at every stage of the process to ensure a consistent cup profile. This Sidra underwent an anaerobic washed process. Between August and October 2023, the cherries were selectively harvested when they reached an average Brix (i.e. natural sugar level) of 18%. They were then de-pulped and fermented in a restricted oxygen environment (sealed, airtight GrainPro bags) for 40 hours (until the pH level of the beans reached 4.0). The coffee was then slow dried in elevated mesh trays in the shade for 40 days.
This is our second year working with the Rubio family, and the second harvest of Sidra that we have exported from them. It was harvested between July and October 2023 and landed in the UK in December 2023.
We agreed the price of the parchment coffee (that is, the unhulled coffee beans still covered by a natural protective "parchment" layer) with Consuelo’s daughter, Blanca, during the harvest. We paid Blanca directly for the coffee, and we worked with Collective Bean to process it (including removing the parchment layer and packing it into 46kg bags) and export it to the UK.
For further details on the prices below visit our Transparency Page.
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