Coffee Advent Calendar Day 19 - El Salvador H1

Coffee Advent Calendar: El Salvador H1

NOTES: Chocolate, Brown Sugar, Snow Peas

ROAST: Medium

Finca Argentina is our family’s 70-acre farm in the Apaneca region of El Salvador—historically the first area in the country where coffee was introduced more than 175 years ago. Today, Apaneca remains El Salvador’s most important coffee-growing region, defined by rich volcanic soil, ideal altitude, and a climate that produces delicate, complex, and beautifully balanced coffees. Because we manage our own farm, we’re able to reserve some of our best nano-lots each year to share with our customers.

This lot is a washed H1 (Centroamericano)—a very rare variety that’s still hard to find on the market. H1 is an F1 hybrid, created by crossing rust-resistant varieties with the Ethiopian landrace Rume Sudan. It’s only available through clonal propagation, which means every seedling is grown in a lab to match the original parent tree. The variety was created by a consortium including CIRAD (France), PROMECAFE (Central America), and CATIE (Costa Rica). Very few farmers in the world have access to H1, so this is one of those coffees you don’t see every day. It was a unique challenge to procure and plant H1 on our farm (a story for another day) but it's thriving and we could not be happier. A couple of years ago, our H1 even made it into the Cup of Excellence in El Salvador—our first time!