Mi Raza Coffee Beans

Café Mi Raza is produced in the western mountains of Risaralda near the Tatamá Natural Park in the Municipality of Apia, Agrícola San Luis farm, located in the San Rafael village at 1,850 meters above sea level. surrounded by the mountains of Cerro Tatamá and bordered by two rivers: San Rafael and the Rio Apia. Its flavor is residual, for people who like a good coffee of Colombian origin and connect with a higher purpose of loving and supporting the origin of our race. Our policy is to deliver selected coffees at their optimum point of maturity, dried in the sun and with a cup of more than 84 points; its characteristics are: sweet coffees, with fragrances of citronella, caramel and medium acidity. The coffee is collected by indigenous hands of the Embera Chami ethnic group and their wives make handicrafts, the manillas are handmade jewels that each bag of Mi Raza coffee carries with it as a present that symbolizes a social concept that rescues and promotes one of the oldest arts of the indigenous communities: the elaboration of manillas made with seeds that later were replaced by beads, these represent a good luck charm because they are woven only when they have good thoughts.

Mi Raza, social fabric

Café Mi Raza is produced in the western mountains of Risaralda, near the Tatamá Natural Park in the municipality of Apia. The San Luis Agricultural farm, where the beans for this product are harvested, is located in the town of San Rafael at 1,850 meters above sea level, surrounded by the mountains of Cerro Tatamá and bordered by two rivers: San Rafael and the Apia River. For people who enjoy a good coffee of Colombian origin and connect with a higher purpose of loving and supporting the origin of our race, this coffee is the right one. Mi Raza's policy is to deliver selected coffees at their optimum point of maturity, sun-dried and with a cup of more than 84 points; its characteristics are: sweet coffees, with fragrances of citronella, caramel and medium acidity.

The coffee is harvested by indigenous hands of the Embera Chami ethnic group, while their wives make handicrafts that are delivered together with the final product. The manillas are handmade jewelry that each bag of Café Mi Raza coffee carries with it as a gift that symbolizes a social concept that rescues and promotes one of the most ancient arts of the indigenous communities: the elaboration of manillas made with seeds that were later replaced by beads and which represent a good luck charm because they are woven only when they have good thoughts.

Café Mi Raza brings together a social concept that rescues and promotes one of the most ancient arts of the Colombian indigenous communities; the elaboration of brightly colored manillas. These represent a powerful symbolism of connection with nature and feelings towards mother earth. The coffee offered to the public is produced under the concept of sustainable agriculture and promotes Colombian indigenous art.

Coffee Cultural Landscape

Colombia has been for many years one of the main exporters of coffee to the world, being this crop our largest export among agricultural products throughout history. This bean has made us one of the best known regions for its coffee culture, giving way to the recognition by UNESCO in 2011 as a Coffee Cultural Landscape, making the region a World Heritage Site.

This recognition has been widely promoted by tourism as part of a special segment for coffee lovers from around the world who want to learn more about coffee growing and our coffee customs. By dint of hard work in the farms, Colombian coffee growers strive year after year to have millions of bags of coffee available, with the best beans to be sold abroad in order to maintain the world's love for our Colombian coffee.  

There are several aspects that help to make this happen:

- The perfect geography and climate: We have majestic mountains located in the Andes mountain range, sheltered under the name of Paisaje Cultural Cafetero that includes the central zone of the country with municipalities in the departments of Risaralda, Caldas, Quindío and north of Valle. The coffee farms in this region, with altitudes ranging from 1200 to 1800 meters above sea level and temperatures between 8 and 26 degrees Celsius, have fertile volcanic soils, rainfall, sunny days, shade and winds that, together, favor the good development of the crop and make our coffee an earthly paradise.

- The perfect type of coffee: It comes mainly from high quality Cofea arabica bushes. Colombian Coffee is recognized worldwide for its delicious and smooth flavor, fragrance and aroma of citrus, fruits and spicy notes. We are fortunate to have different types of coffee for all tastes. Tasters describe it as smooth, well balanced, full-bodied and medium acidity. It tends to have floral notes, red fruits, traces of tropical fruits and sweet caramel or chocolate.

- Bean Harvest: Our way of harvesting coffee also has its charm and magic. Most of our crops are located in the high and steep slopes of the mountains, which makes the use of machinery for harvesting impossible; therefore, only our pickers can do this work on foot and with their baskets to pick by hand and one by one, the ripe coffee cherries. Each one of them can pick up to 90 or 100 kilos in a day.

More than coffee

In Colombia, the harvesting of ripe coffee beans is done by hand and in general there are two harvests per year, although some farms that produce specialty coffees carry out the task continuously throughout the year. The coffee harvest moves hundreds of nomads, men and women with their families that go from region to region working. It is a task that must be carried out with great care, detaching the cherry colored beans one by one. The pickers can be seen in the coffee plantations carrying their baskets full of fruit while they talk, gossip and tell each other stories. Women's hands are appreciated for the delicacy with which they pick the beans, but at Café Mi Raza, women's hands are in charge of creating beautiful handles that support the economy of their homes.  

Once they have filled full sacks with the beans, we can see the famous jeeps through the coffee mountains carrying the final product to the place where it will be commercialized. These cars, so famous for being the military transport of the United States during the Second World War, are filled to the roof with countless sacks of coffee and other elements. Brightly colored, they give life to the landscape and are the pride of the coffee transporters of the country.

There is in coffee something as stimulating as its aroma and flavor: the desire to drink it, the need to think that it will be good for us and to know that behind it there are stories unknown to us. That delicious and intoxicating aroma that is released from the cup, becomes a deep and delicate smell that stimulates our senses preparing us for a pleasant experience, the taste of sipping the first hot and aromatic sip, feeling the warm and bitter liquid slide down the throat, are some of the points that enter the conversation when we talk about coffee. This drink that clears the mind opens the way for conversation and reflection.

Drinking coffee before starting the day, after an intense physical or mental activity, between conversations or to take a break has become a must for Colombians. Coffee is our friend and we go to it with emotion and gratitude. As we already know what it awakens in us and the relationship we have with coffee, we are prepared to begin to try other varieties and experience what aroma, what acidity, what bitterness, what delicacy, smoothness or robustness adjust to our palate. Coffee is no longer just coffee. Coffee is a ritual and for this reason, it is no surprise that more than 400,000 million cups of this beverage are drunk every year.

Brand Pillars

Café Mi Raza is a specialty coffee with community integration and purpose. Some of the pillars of the brand are:

- It is a specialty coffee with controlled processes, clean cup, seals, diversity in seven varieties and with integrated value.

- Environmental care: agroecological production, biological corridors within the farm, protection of birds, planting of trees and protection of water sources within the farm.

- Social awareness through support to indigenous communities of women artisans, integration with other producers and direct price transfer.

- Its main purpose is to educate the consumer, integrate production with the social fabric, rescue the tradition of making handicrafts and contribute to improving the quality of life of those involved in the project.

Café Mi Raza seeks to deliver a coffee with a clean cup to the consumer, produced in an agroecological manner and supporting the art of making handles with beads, as an ancestral culture of the indigenous people of Risaralda.