The best coffees of 2021

Mar 16, 2022 | Let's talk about coffee

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Leer en español: Los mejores cafés del 2021.

Determine coffee quality

Deciding among several samples of coffee which is the best is not an easy task. It is not enough to choose the one we like the most but describe what makes it stand out from the rest. One of the ways to determine the quality of coffee quantitatively is through a tasting, also known as cupping.

Coffee cupping consists of sensory analysis, its objective is to perceive, identify and appreciate the characteristic properties through the senses.

The stimuli (olfactory, gustatory, and visual) that the tasters obtain from the cupping, allow them to analyze, describe, compare and establish preferences between the samples evaluated.

The properties evaluated in cupping are fragrance, aroma, flavor, aftertaste, acidity, body, uniformity, balance, sweetness, clarity, and coffee defects. Each of these properties is assigned a numerical value, and the sum of these will result in a rating. Based on this, it is determined which are the best coffees.

Cupping to determine the quality of coffee.

Cup of Excellence Program

The “Alliance for Coffee Excellence” is an American non-profit organization that carries out the “Cup of Excellence” program every year.

The Cup of Excellence program is a global project that was born in 1999 designed to help coffee growers receive more money for their high-quality coffee. It is the most prestigious competition and auction of high-quality coffee.

The level of scrutiny Cup of Excellence coffees experience is unparalleled. Every year, thousands of coffees are submitted for consideration, and the winning coffees are sold at global online auctions at premium prices, with the vast majority of auction proceeds going to coffee farmers.

This competition is rigorous, with cupping evaluations conducted in a multi-stage process by industry experts. The coffee samples are first evaluated by a national jury of approximately a dozen qualified jurors from the country of origin, and then by an international jury, made up of approximately 20-25 experienced jurors from around the world.

At the end of the competition, the top 10 coffees go to the auction stage, where they can fetch hundreds of US dollars per pound.

May interest you: The best coffees of 2019.

The best coffees of 2021

Now that you know what the Cup of Excellence competition consists of and the organization that carries it out, we show you the winning coffees of the Cup of Excellence of the countries that participated in 2021 and that are therefore considered the best coffees of 2021.

Rank	Country	Region	Farm	Farmer	Score	Variety	Process
1	El Salvador	Alotepec, Metapan	Mileydi	Ever Leonel Diaz Perez	91.68	Pacamara	Semi washed
2	Mexico	La Concordia, Chiapas	Santa Cruz	Cruz José Arguello Enriquez	91.58	Gesha	Natural
3	Nicaragua	Nueva Segovia	Jesus Mountain Coffee Company	Jesus Mountain Coffee	90.96	Pacamara	Washed
4	Costa Rica	Tarrazú	La Esmeralda	Ivan Daniel Gutiérrez Ureña	90.89	Gesha & Kenia SL-28	Washed
5	Honduras	Comayagua	Santa Lucia	Desarrollos Santa Lucia S.A.	90.67	Gesha	Washed
6	Colombia	Nariño	Obraje	Pablo Andrés Guerrero Pérez	90.61	Gesha	Washed
7	Ethiopia	Sidama	–	Tamiru Tadesse Tesema	90.6	74165	Anaerobic
8	Guatemala	Huehuetenango	El Injerto I	El Injerto Sociedad Anonima	90.51	Gesha	Washed
9	Brazil	Cerrado Mineiro	Cachoeira	Vitor Marcelo De Queiroz Barbosa	90.5	Catuaí amarillo	Natural
10	Ecuador	Loja	Arashi	Abel Salinas Pacheco	90.39	Typica mejorado	Washed
11	Peru	Cusco	Nueva Alianza	Dwight Aguilar Masías	90.2	Gesha	Washed
12	Indonesia	Aceh	Pantan Musara	Dilen Ali Gogo	89.28	Ateng, Gayo 1, P88	Honey