030 - San Jerónimo Miramar

We anticipate this coffee will be roasted for full season subscribers the week of September 6, 2026, with public release to follow.

The ninth coffee of our 2026 season takes us to the slopes of Volcán Atitlán where the Bressani family—fourth-generation coffee growers—operate a dairy and coffee farm, San Jerónimo Miramar, using a regenerative, agroforestry model. The farm's variety library is a living catalog both of traditional and exotic cultivars from around the world—including Typica San Roque, a mutation of SL28 hailing from Costa Rica that presents in the cup with vibrant, juicy notes of tangerine, mango, peach, and tamarind.

From Christopher: "My fascination with Kenyan coffees and the breeding program run by Scott Labs that produced some of the most-famous and sought-after cultivars in the world motivates much of the work that I do as a buyer. For this reason, Colombians that taste like Kenyans (such as those from Lino Rodriguez), and apparently-Kenyan cultivars appearing where they were previously unknown (such as SL9/Inca Gesha in Peru) anchor Aviary's 2026 season.

"On the slopes of Volcán Atitlán lives one of the largest germplasm libraries in Guatemala at Finca San Jerónimo Miramar—the product of four generations of farming by the Bressani family, countless experiments by Anacafe, abandoned variety trials by WCR, and the migration of plants and people from other coffee-growing countries. The farm's use of adaptive genetic management—a conservation practice that uses data about a plant from its productivity to nutrition requirements to quality to disease resistance—means that, through decades and generations, the farm's collection has adapted to the conditions at FSJM and continues to thrive, sometimes even long after the predecessors in their homes of origin have disappeared.

"Tucked away in that library was an uncommon cultivar known by the place it was first identified, San Roque in Costa Rica.

"San Roque, believed to be a mutation of SL28, shares the famous Kenyan cultivar's structured acidity and tendency toward blackberry-like cups. A famous agronomist who had worked at the experimental farm owned by Starbucks in Costa Rica came to work at FSJM and brought with him San Roque. It lived quietly there—until my friends, fellow Ohioans and longtime partners to San Jerónimo, Deeper Roots, came across it on a blind cupping of the farm's cultivar collection. Impressed, Giorgio Bressani and his team went on to plant 4 hectares of San Roque below the farm's dense forest canopy.

"This year, for Aviary's 2026 season, Giorgio sent along offers of some of FSJM's most-prized and unusual cultivars including a small honey-processed lot of San Roque. Like my friends from Cincinnati, I was impressed and committed to buying the lot—finding the cup vibrant and juicy with notes of tangerine, mango , peach, tamarind and orange."

Watch our mini-documentary from last season's visit to Finca San Jerónimo Miramar, with more deep history and context about the farm and its operations: