Dogwood Cascara



   Here I have a delicious tea/coffee from Dogwood Coffee Co. Dogwood Coffee Company is a small, quality-focused roaster based in Minneapolis, Minnesota and Winnipeg, Manitoba. Quality is the driving factor behind what they do and building relationships is fundamental to their sourcing process and overall approach to doing business.

   This is their Cascara. Cascara is a dried fruit tea made from the coffee cherry. In the washed coffee process, the first step is to remove the seed (which is the coffee “bean”) from the cherry with a de-pulper. Normally, this skin is considered waste, or a byproduct of coffee processing. It is usually composted for use as a natural fertilizer in the farm later in the season. To create this tea, the pulp is collected and washed and then laid out to dry. This Cascara is from Finca Santa Lucia in the Llano Bonito de Naranjo region in West Valley, Costa Rica. It is 100% Caturra variety and 100% organic. At Helsar de Zarcero, Ricardo has built an entire facility dedicated to creating Cascara. Dogwood notes flavors of white grape, cranberry, apple, and canned pear cocktail with floral overtones. I brew my cascara as a cold brew immersion, at a 1:10 ratio, for a period of 24 hours in my fridge. I love cascara. Almost as much as I love cold brew. The fruitiness and tang from this "tea" is amazing! So fruity & floral, it's hard to believe this would ever be used for compost. I could definitely drink this stuff year round. It's a shame that it isn't more readily available from roasters. This stuff is great brewed hot like traditional tea, as well. Very tasty cascara!

   Many thanks to Ben & Dogwood for the tasty beans & cascara. Top notch goods from these guys so far.

Good check out what these guys are doing:  dogwoodcoffee.com


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