Colombia Agua De Dios — Washed | Sugarcane Decaf

About the Collective Producers
This coffee comes to us from a collective of producers united by a drive to elevate their craft and strengthen their community, called CDNT — Caficultores Diferenciado del Norte del Tolima (Association of Differentiated Coffee Growers of Northern Tolima).

This partnership is connected by our friends at LaREB — La Real Expedición Botánica, a producer-owned Colombian specialty coffee collective and export network co-founded in 2017 by Herbert Peñaloza and Ana Mustafá. You may recognize Ana’s name from former decaf offerings on our menu over the years. Herbert has also hosted a presentation at our Training Lab inside our Ferndale Cafe + HQ!

The word "Differentiated" is key in the association's name — the collective differentiates itself from commodity coffee production by investing in quality, traceability, and specialty market accessisbility. The group operates in the Vasabianca region in Northern Tolima.

CDNT has essentially served as the early model for what Herbert and the team later shaped into LaREB. It grew out of a simple idea: build something that actually reflects what coffee‑growing communities need. By sharing knowledge, labor, and resources, producers can push quality forward and claim more control in an industry that’s historically tilted away from them.

La Real Expedición Botánica is that concept expanded across the region. It’s a cooperative of growers who’ve decided to create their own pathways in coffee, ones that genuinely return power to producers in Colombia. Members support each other with agronomy guidance, quality oversight, and shared infrastructure, including running their own milling and export operations — no small feat in this industry.

With those pieces in their hands, LaREB farmers can participate in the market on their own terms and build a livelihood with real agency. From our perspective, that’s exactly the kind of structure the future of coffee needs. These coffees have been carried by many exceptional roasters, and we’re honored to partner with them!

Process & Varietal
This particular lot — a Colombia varietal — is a Washed process with a 24hr in-cherry fermentation, sun-dried, and then decaffeinated through the Sugarcane process, or EA process.

Cup Profile
A clean and sweet cup, you can expect notes of red apple, chocolate, and caramel. Approachable yet bright and complex.