Kona Coffee FAQs-Roasting, Sourcing, and Shipping
Find answers to common questions about our 100% Kona coffees, roasting schedule, shipping times, and sourcing practices.
Colombia Finca El Paraíso -Geisha Sake
Item is in stockHurry! Low inventoryItem is out of stock
Item is unavailable
Tasting Notes
Complex aromas of Muscat grapes, Bergamot, Pear, Sake. An immensely floral cup. Soaring acidity and a juicy sweetness. An extremely lush and lingering mouthfeel. One of the most stunning coffees we have come across in the past year.
"Exuberantly aromatic, rich, very complex. Bergamot, Concord grape, ginger blossom, pistachio, lychee in aroma and cup. Juicy-bright, exceptionally high-toned acidity; lush, silky mouthfeel. Rich, pungent, crisply sweet finish."
"A decadent, expressive, voluptuous double-anaerobic Colombia Geisha with a wide range of aromas and flavors, from spice-toned bergamot to super-sweet lychee."
Background Info
El Paraíso is a farm at 1900m In Cauca, Colombia operated by Diego Bermudez. They grow several varieties on the farm -Bourbon, Castillo, Laurina, and Geisha. Diego also operates the INDESTEC mill processing coffees from neighbor farms as well as their own. Operating a mill that looks more like a laboratory than a coffee mill. Their fermentation methods are quite novel and employ inoculation from a collection of micro-organisms they have isolated from coffee and selected according to their sensory profiles in fermentation. These innovative methods have garnered their coffees many awards.
In 2018 El Paraiso's Bourbon washed entry to Cup of Excellence placed 10th. He has been producing some very interesting coffees of unique flavor profiles for the past few years with names like "Red Plum" and "Lychee" and a Geisha profile he named after his daughter "Letty" Last year we featured his Geisha Letty and Coffee Review scored it 97, Their highest score of the year!
This Year he has a new coffee: Geisha Sake
Compared to many of his coffees this one feels fairly understated. In any other context it is still an explosively aromatic cup. Compared to the Letty, Geisha Sake is more elegant, more balanced, more complex. The flavors of the variety show through more.
Geisha Sake starts with cherries that are harvested over-ripe. The idea being that this longer contact time of the fruit and the seeds allows more of the fruits flavors into the beans.
After sanitizing the cherries with ozone, the cherries then undergo two stages of fermentation. First the whole cherries are submerged under water for 48 hours. After that the coffee is pulped and fermented with a strain of Lactobacillus for 24 hours. After fermentation the beans are given a 'Thermal Shock' using Hot and Cold rinses to help the seeds absorb the fermentation metabolites and halt any further fermentation. Afterwards the parchment coffee is rapidly dried with an in-house designed Eco-Enigma dehumidifying dryer to avoid over oxidation of the coffee or continued fermentation
Internally they gave this batch the code J-77. A visit from a client who cupped the coffee and said the flavors reminded him of Sake. And so the name Geisha Sake was born.
What Is 100% Kona Coffee?
100% Kona coffee refers to coffee grown exclusively in the Kona district of Hawai‘i Island — a small, volcanic region
along the western slopes of Hualālai and Mauna Loa. The combination of mineral-rich soil, afternoon cloud cover, and gentle trade winds produces one of the world’s most distinctive coffee terroirs.
To be labeled “100% Kona Coffee,” every bean must be grown within the Kona district and meet strict Hawai‘i grading quality standards. Kona coffee can be made from different arabica varieties, but Kona Typica — a heirloom lineage — remains the region’s most common and traditional cultivar.
If you’d like to explore more Kona coffees, you can browse the full collection here: Browse the Kona Coffee Collection .
About Kona Coffee
-
Kona coffee grows on the volcanic slopes of Hawai‘i Island, where mineral-rich soil, afternoon cloud cover, and slow cherry maturation create a naturally sweet and balanced cup. Our Kona Classic Medium is sourced from high-elevation farms and hand-harvested for clarity, smoothness, and elegant sweetness.
-
Yes — this roast is Authentic Kona coffee made exclusively from North Kona district-grown coffees, never blended. Our Kona coffees comes from small farms at the highest altitudes in the region.
-
Medium roasts highlight Kona’s signature profile: gentle sweetness, soft citrus, toasted almond, and milk chocolate. The result is a balanced, approachable cup ideal for everyday brewing.
-
This coffee shines in pour-over, drip, and French press. Use filtered water just off the boil and a medium grind for maximum clarity and sweetness. If you are looking for a Hawaiian coffee for espresso use we recommend our Hawai‘i Island Blend
-
Kona is the highest labor cost coffee region in the world. Wages for farm workers here are 15-20x higher than almost all other coffee producing countries. Limited and expensive land, hand-picking, and high production costs create a naturally small supply each year — especially from high-elevation farms like those we partner with.
Company & Facility
-
We roast and fulfill all of our coffee orders in Hilo, Hawai'i.
-
We roast in small batches using a Diedrich IR12 roasting machine.
Satisfaction Guaranteed
-
We source an array of the top specialty coffees worldwide that appeal to an array of different palates.
If at any point you have difficulty brewing, or just appreciating one of our roasted coffees, no problem. Shoot us an email within 5 days of receiving your coffee and we'll help you find the correct brew settings for your coffee, or give you a credit (minus actual shipping costs) on your next purchase. Yep, we're a Satisfaction Guarantee coffee company!
Please note, our Satisfaction Guarantee only applies to U.S. orders of roasted coffees, and you must contact us within 5 days of receiving the coffees. Credits do not include actual shipping fees, which may be different from posted shipping fees.
-
We roast and ship on Monday/Wednesday/Friday.
Coffees
-
Our commitment to you is to serve exceptional, fresh-roasted coffees. And part of being exceptional means roasting before the flavors inherent in the green bean begin to fade, which happens over time.
Like apples and pumpkins, coffee is a seasonal agricultural product and each country has a different harvesting cycle in which coffees are at their peak. If we were to insist on serving a single origin all year long, the flavors in that coffee would be noticeably better one half of the year over the other. So the reason you no longer see that coffee you loved is because the optimal season has passed. For more on seasonality in coffees, see this blog post here.
-
Hopefully so. If it was a popular product or we receive customer requests, we will make every attempt to bring it back. However, please note that coffees from a certain producer may not taste the same year after year.
If you loved a coffee and no longer see it listed, shoot us an email and ask us what is similar. We’d be happy to provide a personal recommendation.
-
We aim for balance and completeness along with differentiation and distinction. You shouldn't need to be a professional coffee taster to tell the coffees a part, so, when we’re selecting coffees, we want them to be distinct from each other.
We avoid ”one-trick pony” type coffees, such as Ethiopians with great aroma but no body or acidity, or coffees with good aroma and acidity but lacking sweetness. These elements, which are often reflections of the growing conditions, are harmonized through good roasting.
And, obviously, defects — even subtle defects — influence our selection. Since we live and work at origin, we’re sensitive to coffee defects like “past crop”, pulpy, and naturals that border on over-ferment. With naturals, we’ll only carry these when great examples are available.
-
Our perspective on roasting is similar: we seek balance and distinction. To expect that a coffee is “best” when roasted to some pre-determined degree (i.e. only light roasting or only dark roasting) is analogous to thinking that each person would look best in the same outfit, or each coffee should be grown in the same way. We believe it’s our job to discover the roast degree which best highlights outstanding qualities in each coffee.
