El Salvador - Bosque Lya

Finca Bosque Lya sits in the heart of the Apaneca mountain range where the Valdes family has farmed since the 1930s. The name translates to 'Lya's Forest' - after the founder's newly born daughter.

We have sourced coffee from Bosque Lya since we started back in 2014 and if the sweet complexity of this year's crop is anything to go by there are plenty more amazing coffees to come from this Farm.

Our tasting notes: Caramel, stewed plums and delicious chocolate on the finish. Great depth of flavour with delicious sweetness.

Bosque Lya is a medium roasted, beautifully balanced coffee.

In Central America, El Salvador has the nickname ‘Pulgarcito’, which means ‘little thumb’ – a reference to the diminutive size of this coffee producing nation. But packed into this little country there are some of the best farms in the whole of Latin America, and many of the coffees El Salvador produces are capable of scoring very highly on the cupping table. More than half of the nation’s coffee is Bourbon, so there is plenty of sweetness, complexity and high acidity coffee being produced. Around 90% of the country’s coffee is also shade grown, which maintains the rich biodiversity that thrives in rural El Salvador. Micro-lots are now a common feature, and it benefits from being a nation where traceability to farm level encourages foreign buyers.

This is a land of volcanoes, many of them active, so the soil is rich and fertile whilst the views are strikingly beautiful and always dramatic. Volcano Santa Ana is the largest but Izalco, with its typical conical shape, is a national icon. Such conditions are perfect for the production of high quality coffee.

Coffee has been produced commercially in El Salvador since the 1850s and by 1880 the country was the fourth largest producer of coffee in the World. These days El Salvador produces far less coffee, but the country does have an unusually high proportion of heirloom Bourbon trees, these flourish in the well-drained and mineral-rich volcanic soils that have the potential to produce incredibly sweet coffees. Around 90% of of the country’s coffee is shade grown, which maintains the rich biodiversity that thrives in rural El Salvador.

We were particularly drawn to the Apaneca Mountain range in the west of the country, as the coffees here have such good character. Finca Bosque Lya is the farm that we source our coffee from in this region. Finca Bosque Lya is a 96 hectare farm – 64 of which are under coffee, the remainder being left as natural rainforest. The farm was established in 1932 when Gustavo Vides Valdes named his property in honour of his newly born daughter, Lya. The farm name Bosque Lya translates to – Lya’s forest.

Bourbon is the most prevalent variety – mainly red, but there is a little orange and yellow too – though there are many other varieties grown for experimentation and diversity and these include pacamara, caturra and typica. An altitude growing range of 1,473 to 1,650 metres above sea level brings about coffees of great complexity that are sweet and lively.