This coffee is an expression of the development of Nordic Approach and our taste in coffee, as well as a testament to producers developments in processing. Wildly fruity, funky coffees never used to be our thing, they also have never been produced to the level that they are now. With better understanding and knowledge of fermentation, and with ways of controlling this we have come to love the funk! This is how we started to discuss processing coffees with producers and different ways we could achieve more fruit and still great coffee. We came up with the name Bombe de fruta because it literally means fruit bomb.

Bomba de Fruta is a concept we created to encompass natural coffees from Colombia. While we have been buying some natural coffees from an individual producer in Antioquia, Colombia, for some years, it is not common to find coffees being produced as naturals in Colombia.

We thought it would be interesting to present coffees processed this way from other regions of the country. We have grown more and more fond of fruit expressive coffees over the years.

Producing natural coffees comes at great risk to producers as they cannot sell this coffee on the local market. The National Federation of Coffee Growers (FNC) will buy any coffee in Colombia that is washed and meets their quality standards, so the producers need to make sure they also produce some pulped, washed coffees to ensure their income.

Coffee concept

Bomba de Fruta refers to lots we

Production

Picking:

Coffees are picked in 3-4 passes. Meaning the producers/workers pick the ripe cherries in one block. Then they might wait a few weeks until it’s again a decent amount of ripe cherries to pick in that same place. Generally, the first and last pass is of lower quality, and the second and third will be considered as the best, with more ripe cherries and uniform quality. When we can, we try to buy parchment harvested in these two passes.

Fermentation:

The fermentation process is happening inside the closed environment of the coffee cherry, with sugars from the fruit transferring onto the bean. In Narino producers are first fermenting the cherry in bags for four days before continuing the drying on the parabolic dryers or mechanically. A higher temperature will speed up the fermentation process, and a lower temperature will slow it down.

Washing and grading:

No washing is required when coffees are processed Naturally!

Drying:

For the smallholders in Narino, the coffees are commonly sun-dried in parabolic dryers that work almost like a greenhouse. The better producers have well-ventilated facilities. There are many different variations and constructions, but generally, they are all systems that can protect the coffee from rain. Drying the whole cherry rather than parchment takes much longer. Drying in Narino is a big challenge due to rain and high humidity. During drying the producer’s hand sort the parchment coffee for impurities and defects. By receiving premium payments, the producers can improve their facilities, by building new or reconstructing the dryers to increase ventilation and potentially add shade nets to slower drying, and hence improve the quality and longevity of the coffee.