Hillside Blend

Our one and only blend! When I started Hillside Coffee back in 2020 I was very out of love with blends, I felt like they were all pretty boring and they mostly tasted the same. 
Now a few years down the line, we have a blend that I’m happy with!

The Taste:

When as espresso, you can expect a complex coffee with a fruity cherry flavour to start off that melts into allspice with a rich molasses sweetness. When you add milk you can expect a rich chocolate taste with dried cranberries and spices hiding in the background.

The Coffees:

The current iteration of the blend is half each of these gorgeous coffees:

1. Santa Petrona, El Salvador, Washed

2. Blue Batak, Indonesia, Wet Hulled

Santa Petrona

Petrona Palacios de Díaz purchased this wonderful tract of land in 1927 with the intention of planting bourbon coffee trees. It was inherited by her daughter, Petrona Díaz de Pacas, in 1950, who four years later planted the first Pacas trees in the “Pacas Viejo” lot. Petrona divided the land into three sections when she was ready to retire from coffee production. She had one for each of her sons. Federico Pacas Díaz became the proprietor of Finca Santa Petrona in this manner. Since 2012, his only son, Federico Pacas Lopez, has maintained the farm, which consists of 11 lots. The Parras System is utilised on all bourbon trees on this farm, with branches stretched as horizontally as possible. 

This single farm lot is a perfect example of a washed El Salvador and its fruitiness and acidity pair perfectly with the Blue Batak.

Blue Batak 

Blue Batak is sourced from Lintong (officially Lintong Nihuta), at the southern tip of Lake Toba in North Sumatra. Lake Toba is the largest volcanic crater lake in the world. For decades, coffee has been grown in this richly volcanic region by the indigenous Batak tribe, who have lived in this area since settling in the 13th century. This richly volcanic region is known for fertile soils and myriad microclimates created by small valleys. Around 70,000 years ago, a massive supervolcano erupted in Lintong. The eruption must have been enormous and left behind many lakes and incredibly fertile soils. In fact, the soil is so rich that the Batak have a saying about it “You can put a chair in the ground, and it will become a table”. Most farms are small, and self-sufficiency is an important value here. Local farmers sometimes grow more than 10 different crops on their small estates.

The Blue Batak is truly a specialty coffee and a premium product from the Lintong region. From cultivation to drying, everything is done by hand and processed according to the local wet-hulled tradition known as Giling Basah. At sunrise, farmers start picking the ripe cherries before pulping them with manual pulpers. After storing the wet parchment in bags to ferment overnight, the parchment is spread out on patios to dry. When the parchment is dry enough, it takes on a deep blue-greenish colour and is ready for hulling. Another two or three days are needed for further drying before the coffee is triple-handpicked and packed. The Giling Basah process gives the coffee an excellent body and a unique, complex cup profile. Its complexity and distinct forest and camomile flavours make this coffee very special. The floral and herbal notes that characterise the coffee are accompanied by a fruity cranberry note and a citric acidity