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Beans: Mentiritas Blancas, Pacamara, Natural, Chiriqui, Panama.
Shop: Mentiritas Blancas, Panama City, Panama.
Mentiritas Blancas – Ka’Kau: Background Information.
It has been several years since I first visited Mentiritas Blancas in Panama City. It was due to a friend of mine in Panama who pointed out that this was the place to be, and he didn’t lie.
Mentiritas Blancas is a coffeeshop that caters to everybody: passers by, regular customers and tourists. Not only do they serve great coffee, they also have great tea and food.
The Ka’Kau consists out of the Pacamara bean that has undergone a Natural proces. The beans were dried slowly for 38 days straight on the farm of Hector Aguilar: Finca Aguilar Peralta.
The beginnings date back to 1983 when Héctor Aguilar Barroso began to cultivate, on his own, varieties such as caturra, typica and catimor. In the mid-1990s, coffee cultivation decreased and other crops such as blackberries, beans, chayote and others were introduced. After more than a decade later, coffee cultivation resumed fully in 2007 with the Catuai variety, and in 2016 with the Geisha and Pacamara varieties.
The beans were grown at an altitude between 1300 and 1500 meters above sea level with an average temperature of 21 degrees celsius, going as high as 29 and as low as 14 degrees. The Highlands in Chiriqui make for an excellent coffee growing climate.
Opening the package.
The package of Mentiritas Blancas is a beige carton bag with a ziplock and degassing valve. The package has a label attached to the front where upon you will find information about the coffee and a little art. In this case, the package shows red coffee cherries and white coffee blossom. The information states the name, varietal, process, growing altitude, origin, producers name, tasting notes, a recipe for brewing and the roasting date.
All the information you need is on the label and it makes for easy pickings when you don’t yet know what to buy.
When opening the package you will see evenly roasted beans that have no defects inside them. This is always a great start since defects will ruin your brew over and over. If you open the package, a creamy chocolate aroma comes up with a hint of raw cocoa. The beans are crispy, a little salty (which usually indicates juiciness) and have a soft chocolate flavour to it.
Mentiritas Blancas – Ka’Kau: The tasting.
I have brewed this coffee on the V60, Aeropress and Clever Dripper. Without a doubt, the Aeropress has the best brew of them all. I used a cold bloom recipe and it made for a deep creamy Nutella aroma after the brewing was done.
When I was done grinding the coffee, the aroma that came off was floral, peppery and lots of cocoa/chocolate. While brewing, the coffee gave off a floral note turned that into a citric aroma with sugared tea, vanilla and soft berries. Letting the coffee cool down, notes of butterscotch, caramel cream and Nutella popped up. This made for a super sweet and pleasant aroma palette.
When I took the first sip of coffee, the aroma of warm Nutella was accompanied with flavour notes of salmiak and cocoa. The bright malic acidity complemented these flavour notes very well, even when the coffee cooled down. Slurping the coffee into your mouth made the Nutella aroma appear even more, so I suggest doing that for sure.
After letting the coffee cool down, the notes of this coffee changed quite a bit. Notes of green grapes, green apple, lemon and grapefruit all emerged in the medium-warm range, yet the chocolate and caramel notes never disappeared. I especially liked the grapefruit note in the coffee; it gave a bit of rawness to the cocoa flavour in the coffee.
As the coffee cooled down even more, these notes balanced out great and the mouthfeel got even better. The juiciness of the coffee, and the flavour notes, made the coffee feel creamy and think.
After swallowing the fruity notes disappeared and the chocolate/caramel and cocoa flavours remained for quite a long time.
The verdict.
Giancarlo of Mentiritas Blancas roasted the Ka’Kau coffee very well. Fruity notes of green grape, grapefruit, green apple and lemon are all very obvious. The fundamental flavours of chocolate and cocoa open up the way for subtle flavour notes such as butterscotch, caramel and vanilla. All this makes for a super sweet and rich cup of coffee that is drinkable all day long. Great job Giancarlo! I cant wait to start reviewing your Geisha coffee that is waiting in my cupboard.