His work will be up through April.  For more info you can check out his website  https://gregorykramer.see.me

Story

Bolivia is a notoriously difficult place to source and export high-quality coffees. We have purchased from Cenaproc for the last six years, and each year we work together to slightly adjust the process to continually obtain their best coffees possible. This year, in particular, we are able to see the results of four intense years of fine-tuning and dedication to detail.

The biggest challenge is moving this coffee from farm to dry mill to ship in a timely fashion and at the right humidity level. Those who know and love Bolivian coffees from this region know of the challenges of trucking them from the mountains, down the affectionately named “Death Road of Corioco,” to the very dry region of El Alto before being packed on ships in Peru to finally voyage to us.

Farm History
Cenaproc was founded in 1992 and is one of the most well-recognized cooperatives in the region. Currently, the cooperative has about 171 members that come from three main areas close to their wet mill in Caranavi – Nueva Llusta, Nueva Cannan, and Libertador. They have gained a lot of national and international attention over the last few years. They have competed and won in the Bolivian Cup of Excellence since 2004. Their producers put a lot of time and attention into the care of their coffees. The average amount of land in production for each producer is between 2 and 5 hectares. Most producers apply liquid and solid forms of fertilizer that they create on site.

Place
Yungas, Bolivia
Nueva Llusta is located in the Yungas jungle in Bolivia’s eastern mountains. Most coffee farmers in Bolivia are small-scale with between one and eight hectares. Though this area has the perfect ingredients for quality coffee production, it has struggled for a while because of insufficient infrastructure. In the early 2000s, the government began focusing more on enhancing the necessary infrastructure for success of their coffee market.

Agrarian land reform began in 1953, but it was not until the ’60s and ’70s that land reform was a large part of Bolivia’s national agenda. Agrarian families were then given title to land and encouraged to move back to rural areas to cultivate citrus and coffee. Since Evo Morales has been in power in the early 2000s, he has continued to give land incentives to rural farmers, which has made coffee farming a more viable livelihood for individuals.

The producers in Nueva Llusta generally have a great amount of shade and often grow a variety of citrus and fruit trees in addition to their coffee production. They are also notoriously successful at processing the coffees on their own farms before taking the coffee to the dry mill.

People
Over the years, we have interacted most frequently with Pedro Patana, Cenaproc’s Director of Marketing and a coffee producer himself. In fact, Mr. Patana’s family figures prominently into this year’s selection of coffees from the region. He has worn many hats within the cooperative and continues to know its inner workings and help bring the finest of producers’ coffees together.

We also work closely with the dry mill that processes coffees from Cenaproc. Maria Nidia works for Vicopex, the dry mill in La Paz. Her attention to detail, patience, and persistence help insure that this coffee arrives to us at quality level and in a timely manner.

Production Notes
Variety: Typica and Caturra
Elevation: 1,500 – 1,800 meters
Harvest Time: May – October 2012
Process: Fermented for 18 hours and then washed
Drying: Dried on raised beds. The drying process is usually overseen by women.

Story

In 2010, after years of successful partnerships with quality-focused coffee producers in the Western Highlands, we found ourselves having to search high and low for a great coffee from Papua New Guinea. Reaching out to many of our exporting and importing partners resulted in the arrival of a sample from Baroida. Immediately upon tasting it, we knew that Baroida was a special coffee. Little did we know that the coffee we were tasting was the very first coffee the Colbran family had ever exported themselves. In 2010, after years of turning in their coffee to various exporters, that would either sell it or blend it into generic lots, the Colbrans decided to process and export their own coffee.

This year represents our third year of buying from and working with the Colbran family, and we have no hesitation in saying their coffee is the best in the all of the Pacific. Not only has there coffee been great for the last three years, but this year the Colbrans implemented myriad quality focused initiatives. They now employ a team of people to sort out any poorly picked cherry, they built a raised bed for drying experimentation, isolated varieties for the purpose of tasting, and did a few batches of post-fermentation soaking, all in an effort to make their coffee better. On the other hand, 2012 was a tough year amplified by a very low yielding crop for Baroida and the producers associated with the Tairora Project. Because of low yields Counter Culture is one of only a few roasters in the US with access to these great coffees, which makes us extremely grateful to the Colbran family for working with us, and makes us feel very proud to be representing their coffee.

Farm History
The coffee-growing region of Papua New Guinea’s Eastern Highlands is one of the most remote places on earth. The region’s legendary biodiversity, rich topsoil, elevation, and weather make it one of the most unusual microclimates in coffee. We’ve fallen in love with the coffees here, especially the coffee from Baroida. Since the 1960s, when the Colbrans bought their coffee estate, they have been producing magnificent coffee from their farm and neighboring farms. The Colbrans manage everything – from processing to milling – paying attention to every detail.

Name
“The name Baroida comes from an old traditional spirit that was believed to reside in a particular large rock that lies in the middle of the river that runs through the lands of the plantation. The reason it was believed a spirit, is that even the largest river floods could not move this one rock, even when all other stones and rocks were washed away.” – Colbran Coffeelands.

Place
Aiyura, Eastern Highlands, Papua New Guinea
Baroida sits just outside the town Kainantu in the Eastern Highlands of Papua New Guinea, and the villages associated with the Tairora project surround the estate. This part of the Eastern Highlands is mostly rolling grasslands, but it has remarkable climate and great conditions for growing coffee and, really, anything. The Tairora Tribe inhabited this area of Papua New Guinea 800 years ago and mostly cultivate sweet potatoes up until the 1950s and ’60s when coffee became popular.

The lowest altitude we saw around the plantation was just under 1,600 meters but can reach as high as 1,865 meters. Baroida itself was one of the first coffee farms in the area, and much of the coffee planted by small producers of the Tairora Project actually originally came from seeds from the Baroida Estate. Baroida today is only one of few estates in all of Papua New Guinea.

Kenya, and in particular the coffee from Kenya, strikes me as a Catch-22. On one hand, Kenya has the best average quality of any single country we taste samples from. On the other hand, it is the country where organic production is the least likely now and for the foreseeable future – because of plant disease, pest, and overall dependence of chemical fertilizers.

Papua New Guinea in general is a late-comer to the production of coffee, really only starting in the 1920s and not really taking off until the 1950s. Today, Papua New Guinea is most famous for how remote and culturally diverse it is. This remoteness kept outside visitors from venturing into the Papua New Guinea highlands until the early 1900s. This remoteness also led to the other very popular fact about Papua New Guinea which is that the hundreds of individual tribes in the country speak more 800 documented languages between all of them. It is often stated that certain tribes did not know of others tribes living as close as a few kilometers away due to the rugged terrain and remoteness of the highlands.

People
Baroida was founded by Ben Colbran and wife Norma in the early 1960s, after purchasing the land from an indigenous man named Taro. At that time, the surrounding land was mostly grassland, so, for the first two years, Ben primarily cultivated vegetables that he would sell in the coastal town of Lae. In 1965, Ben followed the the government’s encouragement to plant coffee, which thrived in this micro-climate. Ben owned Baroida until 1979, when he sold the land to a trust, but Ben’s son Nichol stayed to manage. Nichol managed the operation until 1991, we he left to work on other projects. In 1997, he bought the land back, but, in those 6 short years while Nichol was gone, the farm had been mismanaged and had fallen into disrepair. Fortunately, the Colbran family immediately started to turn things around, all the while helping to create positive livelihoods for a lot of the local producers around the farm. In 2005, Nichol’s son Chris moved back to the farm to work on many of the projects, in particular the cherry-purchasing Tairora project and the parchment-purchasing Lamari project. Chris’s wife Melody has also been an integral part of the Colbran farm, and, among many other contributions, she has helped build a local school for the community.

Nichol Colbran, son of Baroida’s founder Ben Colbran, was born in Invercargill, New Zealand, and came to Papua New Guinea when he was 6 years old and stayed ever since. Nichol has managed Baroida for over 30 years, and is constantly working on systems of improvement. Nichol’s son Chris was born in Goroka, Papua New Guinea, and grew up helping his father and grandfather on the farm. After a few years of moving around with his family, Chris returned to Baroida in 2005 to start the Tairora and Lamari Network, coffee projects dedicated to improving pricing and traceability in the local coffee trade.

Coffee veteran Stephen Romrundi, Baroida’s Extension and Sustainability Officer, hails from Mt. Hagen, and came to Baroida in 2007 to help with the Tairora Network. This past year, Stephen helped Counter Culture in separating varieties from the farm for tasting, and we are very excited about tasting this separation.

-Tim

Notes

Production Notes
Varieties: Typica, Bourbon, Arusha, MondoNovo
Elevation: 1,600 – 1,865 meters
Harvest Time: April 2012 – August 2012
Process: Washed
Fermentation: Coffee is pulped using disk pulpers and dry fermented for 36 hours. After fermentation the mucilage is removed though pumping the coffee through pipes.
Drying: Outdoor tarps and mechanical dryers. Coffee is dried on plastic tarps on the ground, and drying times vary greatly on climate and can range from a few days to over 30 days. he last few years drying has been a challenge as weather has been unpredictable and unseasonably rainy. This causes the Colbrans to use the mechanical drier more frequently, even though the tarps are preferred. This past harvest, more than 95% of the coffee for our lots though were dried solely using tarp drying.

Counter Culture has purchased coffee from the Cajamarca region of northern Peru since 2001, at which time the region had a reputation for producing large volumes of low-quality coffee. In 2006, we tasted coffee from the Cenfrocafe cooperative for the first time and we, along with all of our customers, were immediately hooked by its sweetness, hints of ripe clean fruit, and juicy acidity. We took a major step with Cenfrocafe in 2007 by focusing our attention on a small network of five communities and tasting coffee from each of the 75 families of these communities individually. In a chaotic meeting of all the members, we voted to name their coffee Valle del Santuario after the national park that abuts these communities’ farms.

This partnership has been our most successful small-scale farmer relationship to date – we’ve sourced incredible, organic coffee directly from small farmers, delivering premiums for quality, and have built rewarding personal relationships at the same time.

History
Cenfrocafe was founded in 1999 and has grown rapidly ever since, becoming a model for other smaller cooperatives in the surrounding area. Their approximately 2,200 members are part of more than 84 smaller local organizations. In 2007, they became Fair Trade certified, opening themselves up to even wider markets. A unique aspect of Cenfrocafe is their intentional hiring of youth and family members of producers to work within the cooperative.

Many of the farms in the mountains of the region have only been settled and planted for a generation, as opposed to the southern regions of Peru where the agricultural history dates back millennia. Cenfrocafe’s members hail from some 30-odd communities around Jaen and smaller towns like San Ignacio, Chirinos, and Tabaconas. In contrast, again, to the southern and central highlands of Peru, most of this region’s people are of mestizo descent and speak Spanish as their first and only language

Place
Jaen is a young and fast-growing city which bustles with commercial activity in coffee from the highlands and rice from the lowlands. The five communities that Valle del Santuario comes from include: Alto Ihuamaca, Bajo Ihuamaca, Las Mercedes, Francisco Bolognesi, and Alto Bolognesi.

People
It is not uncommon for the Coffee Department to use Cenfrocafe as an example of a model relationship and share strategies on how to find partners and create other successes similar to this one. We rely on honest, frequent communication with co-op management like Elmer Peña Silva and Teodomiro Melendres Ojeda, cupping support from Alexander Julca and Rony Perez, as well as on-the-ground support from agronomist Sergio Leodan Fuentes Ramirez. Over the years, we have identified over ten producers of micro-lot-quality coffee and we have no doubt that we will continue to find and celebrate coffees from individuals all over the co-op’s territory.

In addition to the recognition they have received from us, the co-op has dominated the past few years’ national coffee competitions, placing multiple coffees in the top 10.

Production Notes
Variety: Caturra, Bourbon, Pache
Elevation: 1,200 – 2,200 meters
Harvest Time: June – August 2012
Process: Washed on producers’ farms
Drying: On-farm drying in solar driers on patios or raised screens

Most inventive coffee pairing: Beaner Bar
Coffee and tamales? Why not! This Williamsburg café serves up creamy Counter Culture espresso drinks and single-origin pour-overs with deliciously authentic tamales for a lunch that can’t be beat.

Read the full article online, as seen in the March/April 2012 issue of Imbibe.

A few words from our Friend Armando from ” HIM in the kitchen.”
“Tell us about yourself Armando,and how did you came up with this amazing cookie?!”

My name is Armando. I am a Photographer and a Baker. I studied photography at Pratt Institute and after a few years of assisting I decided to take a break and enrolled in a Pastry and Baking course at the Institute of Culinary Education. I used to spend my summers in Portugal working at my aunt’s bakery, making breads and pastries, and that influenced me in taking the pastry program. Once I completed the course I worked at David Burke and Donatella, and Sullivan Street Bakery for some time.
But then I decided to get back into photography and combine the best of both worlds; Photography & Food. So now I mostly specialize in Food Photography, Still Life, & Interiors.
About 5 years ago, I started experimenting on a cookie recipe. I knew I wanted to incorporate Cardamom and Cayenne Pepper so I tried several recipes, altering the ratios, adding and subtracting ingredients here and there. It took me a full year of tweaking the recipe until I came up with what today I think is an exquisite cookie.
It is a Cardamom, Cayenne Pepper, & Chocolate Chip Cookie Topped With Sea Salt.
Its a very intricate cookie and you taste the flavors in stages. You initially taste the sweet and salty contradiction followed by the cardamom which opens the chocolate flavor and then finally but not least the lingering subtle cayenne heat in the back of your throat.’

For more information or if you want to help click HERE

A few words from Matt….

I’ve been painting all my life. Mostly realistic watercolor portraiture.
These paintings are a turn towards decorative art in a southwestern vibe.
All the small paintings are for sale for $60.
I’m also very available for commissioned painting (decorative art, portraits, pets, you name it)

Cheers!
Matt

(Small chihuahua, and larger painting are on loan are are not for sale)

Your support helps us to not only provide quality products for your dog while saving the environment but also spreads the word and encourages people to find new uses for old things – one of our favorite things to do.

Limbo Leashes are a product of the artists Sydney Day and Nick Shifrin (www.nickshifrin.com).

Limbo Leashes are currently being produced in Brooklyn, New York, USA.

Please feel free to contact us at LimboLeashes@gmail.com with any questions, comments, or interesting things you’d like to share with us!

These badass leashes and super cute earring are available through the month.
You pups and your gals will love them!