Costa Rica

Santa Elena Estate Honey
Women Produced – Woman Owned
SHB, EP
Luz Marina Trujillo grew up in a family of coffee producers, and talks happily about
spending her childhood playing with coffee beans instead of dolls. Now, she produces
one of the finest coffees available on her estate Santa Elena in the highlands of Costa
Rica’s most famous coffee growing region, Tarrazú. Luz Marina’s coffee is grown under
shade, and the perfectly ripe cherries are hand-picked, and sorted for quality at her own
mill. The cherries are then carefully de-pulped, washed and dried slowly on the patios at
Finca Santa Elena to fully develop acidity and depth of flavor. Additional care is given to
her coffee in the “reposo” stage resting in parchment for at least 30 days after drying
before being milled and shipped up to Atlas.
Like many of our favorite growers, Luz Marina takes a holistic approach to sustainability,
minimizing synthetic inputs and utilizing a closed-loop fertilizing system that composts
discarded coffee pulp using red-wiggler worms. Her water treatment system meets the
Costa Rican government’s high environmental standards, and preserves the cleanliness
of the river that flows through the estate. She offers her seasonal employees
outstanding housing and health care, as well as a state of the art drinking water filtration
system.
Tarrazú coffee is known for being crisp, clean, and bright, and Luz Marina’s coffee
offers that classic profile plus a lightly syrupy body and sweetness, and an elegant
finish. Luz Marina was one of the first estate owners in Costa Rica to produce Pulped
Natural “Honey” (Miel) coffee in volume, adding a dimension of complex sweetness and
butterscotch to the sophisticated washed profile.
Score: 85.00 
Notes: Surprisingly mild intensity overall given the fruity flavor notes of nectarine,
orange- lemon, chocolate, and browning sugar with a medium acidity and body.