Taste the Goodness: Cupping Schedule for Brazil Early Harvest Cup of Excellence Winners Announced

Would you like to taste the best coffees that Brazil has to offer for the 2013 Early Harvest? Each year, Brazil holds two Cup of Excellence competitions, one each for the late harvest and the early harvest. The winning coffees of each competition are then sold via live online auction to participants throughout the world. This year’s Brazil Early Harvest CoE, which took place in early October, was notable for a number of reasons.





More Cup of Excellence Winners



The 2013 Early Harvest produced more winners than any year since 2005. In fact, since Brazil began holding CoE competitions in 1999, there have only been two years awarded more CoE certificates than this year’s panel. The 2004 and 2005 seasons each featured 36 winning farms. This year, 34 farms scored higher than an 85 to win the coveted Cup of Excellence award. Coffees must score at least 85 in five separate cuppings with an increasingly stringent set of judges in order to be awarded the Cup of Excellence.





This is also the first time that first place has gone to a woman farmer, Marisa Coli Noronha, of Sitio Sao Francisco de Assis, whose coffee scored 92.09 in the final cupping with international judges. It was one of 20 coffees from Carmo de Minas that placed among the winning farms. It also scored more than a full point above the second place farm, Fazenda Rainha of Sao Sebastiao de Grama. The remaining CoE winners are considerably closer to each other in scores, with five different two-way ties among the winners.





Preview Cupping for Prospective Bidders



All of the winning coffees will go to a live online auction on November 27, 2013. Want a taste before the bidding starts?





Preview cupping events will take place starting this week throughout the United States. The previews are open to members of the coffee profession who would like to learn more about the Cup of Excellence program, taste the CoE winners from Brazil’s Early Harvest and perhaps sign up to bid in the online auction at the end of the month.





The cupping preview schedule includes events in Seattle, California, Minneapolis, Boston and Portland.





What Does It Mean for You?



If you’re lucky enough to attend one of the cuppings, you’ll have a chance to taste the very best coffees that Brazil has to offer for the early 2013 harvest. Even if you don’t, you can expect to taste some of them on offer from many of our roasters in the upcoming months. Keep your eyes open for coffees from Carmo de Minas, Sul de Minas, Sao Sebastiao de Grama and Dom Vicoso, the four regions that had multiple winners in the top 20 finishers.





If you’re too impatient to wait for the Brazilian CoE winners, you’ll find a number of Cup of Excellence winners currently on offer from our roasters.  They include Barefoot Roasters Malacara B, a 2013 CoE winner from El Salvador, and Barefoot Roasters Palo Blanco, which took first place in Guatemala’s 2013 Cup of Excellence competition. 



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