STiR coffee and tea magazine

42 STiR coffee and tea | 2024 Issue 4 (August / September) Taste, Terroir, and 20 Years of Esmeralda Geisha's Influence on the Coffee Industry By Amanda Paparelli Hacienda La Esmeralda in Boquete, Panama, set records in 2004 when its Geisha fetched $21/lb at the Best of Panama Auction. I t's 2004. The first college students are signing up for Facebook. Prepa- rations are well underway for the summer Olympics in Athens. George W. Bush will be re-elected and Martha Stewart will go to prison. Justin Timberlake causes Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction, and in the town of Boquete, Panama, seven coffee roasters join together to purchase a lot of coffee for a then-unheard-of $21 per pound. It wasn't even the biggest ticket in town. A flower festival nearby seemed to draw more attention from locals and coffee visitors alike. Tom Owen of Sweet Maria's was one of the few roasters and green buy- ers cataloging his coffee learnings then, often in real-time. On May 1, 2004, he recorded the details of his shared win, noting, "The coffee is grown on a farm called Jaramillo operated by the well-known Finca Esmeralda and the Peterson family. The coffee has an extraordinary character, quite out of place for a Panama, that comes from a combination of a unique environment, high altitude, and a little-known Coffea Arabica cultivar called Geisha." The coffee was a mystery, but it wouldn't be for long. That "extraordinary character" would come to be synonymous with Panama. The Panama Geisha was born in the highlands of Panama, and this year, Hacienda La Esmeralda, managed now by siblings Rachel and Daniel Peterson, is celebrating the 20th anniversary of its discovery with a private auction taking place on August 22, paying tribute to the unique flavors of the Panama Highlands. Geisha vs Gesha There is much debate in the coffee world about whether the variety should be spelled Geisha or Gesha. History claims that in 1936, unique coffee plants were found growing wild in the rainforest on Mt. Gesha in south- western Ethiopia. The British consul collected samples and labeled them 'Geisha,' a phonetic spelling of the Ethiopian word. The coffee variety has no connection to the geisha culture of Japan; it is merely a coincidence. As the seeds traveled to Central America, it con- tinued to be labeled Geisha. Hacienda La Esmeralda uses this spelling because that is how the variety came to them from Costa Rica. In other parts of the world, the variety is spelled gesha. In this article, the author uses Geisha when referring specifically to Panama Geisha and gesha when discussing the broader gesha varieties grown around the world. A Panama Geisha coffee plant from Hacienda La Esmeralda. Photo courtesy Hacienda La Esmeralda

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