Colombia – Cascara Finca Alcatraz

Cascara, also known as coffee cherry tea, is a beverage somewhere between coffee and tea. This is the dried skin of coffee cherries, a by-product of coffee, which does not taste like coffee. A unique drink on its own treated to be its own specialty product. Next to tea infusions, cascara can be at the basis of products, such as fruity energizing soda (about 25% of the caffeine compared to coffee) or making coffee flour for baking bread with caffeine.

Producer Wilfredo Ule Vargas is a young man who runs Finca Alcatraz with his family. Located in the municipality of Oparapa in Huila. The uniqueness of this farm lies exactly in its production of high quality, almost black coloured, cascara. Wilfredo’s family has been producing coffee for appr oximately 15 years, of which the last seven years has been dedicated to the production of high-quality coffees. In the 7,5 Hectares around Finca Alcatraz, about 5 Hectares are intended only for coffee planting, where crops grow at an altitude rising towards 1850 m.a.s.l.