We've been cupping co-ferments for a couple of years and have been lucky to have found a stellar Tamarindo co-ferment from a close friend of the Beard and fellow Tacoma OG, Baylee Engberg, at Ally Coffee. This one comes from La Palestina, Huila in Colombia, pairs a heretofore unfamiliar strain of Caturra, Purple Caturra, and Bourbon, in a fermentation process that we'll let Ally describe for the unfamiliar:

From Ally Coffee: The Tamarind Co-Fermented Washed process begins with creating its unique fermentation culture. First, a culture containing microorganisms like lactobacillus and saccharomyces cerevisiae is derived from Rodrigo’s Purple Caturra coffee cherries. Eighty liters of this culture are then set aside and fed with sugar, molasses, red fruit juices, and a touch of liquor. The fruit mixture contributes flavor to the culture, while the sweetener energizes the fermentation and brings the culture’s sugar content to a level that matches the degrees Brix of the coffee to ferment. This initial fermentation of the mother culture and fruits (with tamarind being a key component) takes 190 hours to reach the appropriate degrees Brix and pH value for coffee processing.

Prior to fermentation, coffee cherries are measured for sugar content, cherry is then floated to remove impurities and deposited into a 200-liter tank. The 80-liter culture is then added to the sealed tank, and coffee fermented for 150 hours under continual observation to insure the environment doesn't drop below a brix of 6 or a pH of 4. The coffee is dried for 2–3 days in direct sunlight and 15–18 days under shaded canopies until it reaches it's ultimate shelf stable humidity levels, between 10–11%. Science!

Farm Description:
Idyllic like it's name, El Eden is located in lush mountainous Palestina de Huila. Under the care of Rodrigo Sánchez and his family, El Edén has grown into a project that combines tradition with exacting technical expertise. The farm has become a space where science and passion work together to reveal the best in every coffee variety and lot garnering annual international coffee recognition and hardware.