About
From a mountain we call home
In the northeastern corner of El Salvador, where the slopes of Monte Cacahuatique push up into the clouds, there is a cooperative that has been farming the same land for over fifty years. More than 200 families tend it. Volcanic soil runs deep through the mountainside. Wild guava, cacao and banana grow between the coffee rows. Ocelots move through the forest at the edge of the farm.
That mountain is where our family is from. Painted Leopard is how we bring it here.
The farm
San Carlos Dos sits at the summit, surrounded by acres of forest the cooperative actively stewards. Up here the air is thinner, the soil darker, the seasons more unforgiving. Rainy seasons arrive hard and fast, and when they come too early the whole harvest schedule shifts, because the shrubs flower in response to rain and the window between a perfect harvest and a lost one closes fast.
The altitude does something to the seeds that lower ground cannot replicate. The volcanic soil, rich in minerals from centuries of nearby activity, feeds the plants in a way that shows up directly in the cup. The seeds grow denser, the flavors more layered, the character more distinctly its own.
The cooperative was founded in the 1970s, after the land reforms and before the civil war reshaped the country. An elected leadership council runs it, rotating on a term cap, with members holding generational ties to the land going back further than the cooperative itself. This is something older and more considered than a single family farm.
What grows here
Production lots run Bourbon, Pacamara, Pacas, Caturra, Catuai and Cuscatleco. In the surrounding forest, Geisha and Marigogype grow alongside wild cross-pollinating crops. The whole mountain functions as one ecosystem.
The cooperative runs a serious experimental processing program. The mosto process, borrowed from winemaking, uses fermented coffee juice to produce cups that land somewhere between fruit and sweetness in a way that catches people off guard. Natural anaerobic lots come out tart and complex. Honey process, co-ferments, yeast inoculation, cherry ferment, pressure maceration are all running, each designed to draw out what the mountain already put into the seed rather than layer something new on top.
These lots are small by design, and the supply reflects that.
Why Painted Leopard
The ocelot is native to El Salvador. Our family grew up in Osicala, in the shadow of Monte Cacahuatique. Nearby, the town of Usulután takes its name from Nahuat, meaning city of ocelots. This small cat earned the nickname painted leopard, for its spotted coat. It covers enormous ground, moving through Central America and up into California without fanfare.
Our family made that same journey. Our coffee does too.
One farm
We source exclusively from San Carlos Dos. Every bag traces back to one cooperative on one mountain in El Salvador. When you want to know where your coffee came from, we can tell you exactly whose hands touched it and what the weather was doing when it was harvested.