Ituango, Antioquia

I remember the first time I roasted this coffee, the cup came out sour.

Not bracing-acidic, the way a good Kenyan can be. Sour. The kind of sour where you take a second sip to make sure, then put the cup down. I cupped it with Adam, my friend who taught me to roast, and he confirmed: he'd had the same result on his own batch, roasting on the same machine I have. We were both pulling the beans too early. Pink Bourbon, at least this lot, wanted more time.

So this issue begins with the recalibration, not the win. At least according to my preference.

Why this bean

I came to find Pink Bourbon out of curiosity more than obsession. I collect bourbon whiskey, and the name caught my eye the first time I saw it on a roaster's menu. Bourbon, but coffee. Bourbon, but pink. I wanted to know what was actually in the cup.

I tried a few Bourbon variants over the next year. Bourbon Sidra was the one that surprised me most, sharp and bright. Pink Bourbon, when I finally got to it, was different. Softer. Floral, with stone fruit underneath. It pulled me in slowly rather than knocking me back. By the time I was looking for the second Folio release, it was the bean I kept coming back to.

The lot I ordered came from Roastmasters. Single producer, single farm. The producer: Gilberto Giraldo. The farm: Finca El Mango.

Ituango, Antioquia, Colombia

Finca El Mango sits in Ituango, in northern Antioquia, at 1,800 to 1,900 meters. Gilberto has been farming there for forty years. He doesn't use chemicals. The beans are transported out of the region by mule, since the roads don't reach the farm.

That last detail is the one I keep coming back to. Mule transport sounds romantic until you read about Ituango. The region has lived through real upheaval, including armed-group displacement during recent harvests. The mules are how you get coffee out of a place where roads aren't always safe.

I don't think this changes how the coffee tastes. I think it changes how I drink it. Forty years of farming in a place that has taken a lot from the people who live there, and somewhere in the middle of that, a bean shows up at my door in San Jose. I owed it to Gilberto to roast it properly.

The recalibration

After the sour cup, I changed two things.

I let it run longer. My first roast dropped at 390°F, about 20°F past the first crack. The bean wanted closer to 395°F, about 27°F past. The difference between medium and medium-dark depending on whose chart you're looking at. On paper it's seven degrees and forty seconds. In the cup it's everything.

I also adjusted the burner steps mid-roast. Adam looked at my curves and pointed out that going from burner 50 to burner 40 was costing me too much energy too fast. He suggested I try 45 instead, and he was right. The rate-of-rise smoothed out. The development phase held more cleanly. The beans came out looking even, no scorched edges, no underdeveloped centers.

I roasted three batches today on that new profile. They were nearly identical. Same first crack at 7:22, same drop at 395°F, same development ratio at 27 percent. The kind of consistency that, until this week, I wasn't sure I could produce.

The recommendation on the bag is medium-dark, which isn't what I'd order for myself. I drink light. I default to light when I buy from other roasters because that's what my palate is used to. But Folio isn't about my palate, it's about what the bean wants, and this bean wants more time in the drum.

You can still ask for light or dark at checkout. Some people prefer one extreme or the other for personal reasons, bright-acid lovers or espresso pullers. I'll roast it the way you want it. But if you're not sure, take the medium-dark. That's the one I'd send to a friend.

The other job

There's a second reason this bean exists.

Nancy and I are getting married on June 26. We wanted something to give our guests. Something that wasn't an Etsy bottle opener or a custom-printed cocktail napkin. Coffee felt right, and personal to us.

Roughly 80 of these bags, each 60 grams, hand-lettered by Nancy, will go home with our wedding guests. Same bean, same roast, same farm in Ituango. The favor isn't a different product line, it's this one, in a smaller bag, with the people at our wedding in mind.

If you're a Folio customer who's also a wedding guest: yes, we're aware we're double-dipping. We hope you don't mind. The coffee is good either way.

A bean from a forty-year farmer in a region that has lived through more than its share, roasted in a garage by someone who got the first cup wrong and the second cup right, going out in two different bags to two different audiences for the same reason.

Thanks for reading this far, and thanks for buying the bag.

— JM
San Jose, June 2026