There are producers who grow coffee, and there are producers who understand it from the inside out. Leidy Yohana Bastidas is firmly in the second category. A coffee quality analyst by profession and a farmer by inheritance, Yohana brings a level of sensory precision to Finca Bella Rosa that you can taste in every cup.

This lot is one we've been looking forward to sharing since our Colombia trip in July. The coffee tastes like mandarin orange and white grape, with jasmine floating through the middle and honey rounding out the finish. It's delicate, sweet, and genuinely lovely. A Pink Bourbon that earns every bit of its reputation.

The Producer

Yohana inherited Finca Bella Rosa from her mother, Rosalba, and named the farm in her honour. Over the past three years she has planted 2,000 Pink Bourbon trees, steadily building the farm into a focused, intentional operation centred on one varietal done exceptionally well.

Alongside her work at the farm, Yohana works as a quality analyst at Sensory Cafe, an independent cupping lab in Pitalito, where she evaluates samples and runs sensory analysis for producers across the region. She has over eight years of experience in the coffee industry. That dual perspective, producer and analyst, gives her a rare ability to understand her own coffee the way few farmers can.

When we arrived in Pitalito, the first half of our trip was based at Sensory Cafe. We spent time there cupping coffees, learning from Yohana, and visiting farms together. Those drives out to the farms were a great opportunity for Kristin, our co-founder, to practice her Spanish, chatting with Yohana along the way. It's the kind of relationship that makes origin trips more than just sourcing work.

The Process

Finca Bella Rosa doesn't yet have its own processing infrastructure, so Yohana transports her harvested cherries by motorcycle to a nearby farm where the work continues. It's a logistical challenge that adds time and effort to every harvest, and it's handled with the same care she brings to everything else.

After learning about the infrastructure limitations Yohana was working around, we decided to fund some of the processing equipment she needed at the farm. It's an investment in her work and in the future of this coffee, and it reflects the kind of producer relationship we want to be building: one where we're genuinely participating in what makes these lots possible.

The Variety

At 1,650 metres in Vereda La Cristalina, the conditions at Finca Bella Rosa suit Pink Bourbon well. The altitude slows the cherry's development, concentrating sugars and building the kind of complexity that shows up in the cup as layers rather than a single note. The mandarin and white grape in this lot are bright without being sharp, and the jasmine and honey on the finish linger in exactly the right way.

This is a small lot. Yohana produces just seven 70kg bags for export each year. We feel fortunate to have some, and we're glad to be able to share it with you.