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El Salvador, Las Brumas, Wild Forest SL28, Honey
El Salvador, Las Brumas, Wild Forest SL28, Honey
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In 2017 our founder won the World Barista Championship, with an SL28 Ernesto had grown in his new project at Las Brumas, where he had planted a range of varieties under a canopy of 100 years old wild growing forest. The impact of the cooler and wetter microclimate, and the nutrient rich soil transformed the flavours of his already impressive coffees.
This Honey-processed SL28 lot takes those factors to another level, creating a coffee that I feel really balances quality, flavour intensity, and balance, whilst showcasing the variety, Netos processing skill and Salvadoran coffees potential.
Producer: Ernesto Menéndez
Variety: SL28
Location: Apaneca-Ilamatepec Mountain Range, Santa Ana
Process: Wild Forest Project > Honey
+ Broader Context
Las Brumas isn’t just a farm. It’s the living legacy of three generations of the Menéndez family, stretching back to 1930 when Ernesto’s grandfather, Dr. Carlos Menéndez Castro, began cultivating coffee in El Salvador’s highlands. The tradition passed to Ernesto’s father and then, when Ernesto was just 19, he inherited his first farm. Since that day, he has devoted himself entirely to the craft of coffee.
Over the years, Ernesto honed his skills in quality control with some of El Salvador’s leading coffee companies, mastering the art of cupping and quality assurance across the production and export chain. His expertise earned him a place as a National Jury member for the Cup of Excellence in El Salvador from its very first edition in 2003 through 2011.
When he began entering Cup of Excellence with his own farms, Ernesto’s talent quickly became clear—achieving top rankings year after year, including multiple 1st place wins with Finca La Ilusión, his brother's Finca Suiza, and Las Brumas itself. His coffees have powered multiple world champions too—from Alejandro Méndez’s historic World Barista Championship win in 2011 (the first barista from an origin country to win) to my own in 2017, when I used his SL28 washed coffee from Las Brumas to take the title.
Las Brumas is a place where quality is nurtured from the ground up. The farm uses no herbicides, follows sustainable practices, and employs local community members—around 30 during the growing season and 40 during harvest. Ernesto is relentless in his pursuit of innovation, experimenting with extended fermentation and anaerobic processing, work that led to his most recent triumph: 1st place in the 2024 Cup of Excellence Experimental Coffee category.
For us, working with Neto is about more than sourcing great coffee—it’s partnering with a producer whose life’s work has shaped not only his family’s legacy, our coffee journey and success, but also the reputation of Salvadoran coffee on the world stage.
+ Roast & Brewing Information
This coffee is roasted to highlight the sweetness and body of the processing whilst retaining the bright characteristics of the SL28 variety
As espresso it will shine with fruit notes of blood orange, raspberry, and pomegranate, balanced with a caramel and dark chocolate finish. As filter, when hot the fruits will be more tempered, and it will give classic brown sugar and milk chocoalte notes with a citrus edge, but as it cools florality and red fruits will come to the fore.
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