The Origin: Cauca — Colombia's Pacific-Influenced Coffee Department

Finca El Paraíso sits in Piendamó, in the Cauca department of southwestern Colombia — a region defined by its proximity to the Pacific Ocean and the distinctive microclimate that ocean influence creates. Humid, temperate winds from the Pacific sweep across the Andean foothills, moderating temperatures and delivering consistent moisture. This climate supports the steady, even maturation of coffee cherries, building the sugars and organic compounds that a complex fermentation process can then amplify.

Cauca stretches across the Western Cordillera of the Andes, with coffee farms operating at elevations between 1,700 and over 2,000 metres above sea level. The department is home to a mix of smallholder farms and indigenous communities, many of whom have grown coffee for generations. The volcanic soils of the region — enriched by the geological activity of the Andes — provide excellent mineral profiles. It is in this environment that Diego Bermúdez began his project in 2008, on land his family already owned but had never dedicated to coffee.

Diego Bermúdez: The Producer Who Turned Coffee into a Science

Diego Samuel Bermúdez Tapia was born in Bolívar, Cauca. His family had no background in coffee farming, but as a student of Agricultural Business Administration at university, he became fascinated by the farms of his friends and saw an opportunity in a 2.5-hectare parcel of his family's unused land in Piendamó. He planted his first coffee trees while still studying, selling his cherries to local cooperatives to fund his education. As he put it himself, he was "adopted by the coffee industry" rather than born into it.

After graduating in 2012, Diego and his family established INDESTEC — Innovación y Desarrollo Tecnológico para la Caficultura (Innovation and Technological Development for Coffee Growing). What began as a small farm project evolved into a research-driven company, with Diego's brother Alexander Bermúdez and cousin Cristian Zúñiga joining the effort. Together they channelled their shared family ethos of pasión y tesón — passion and perseverance — into building a processing infrastructure that had no precedent in Colombian specialty coffee.

The breakthrough came in 2015, when Diego and his family entered their coffee in a regional competition in Cauca for the first time and secured first place. The recognition proved catalytic. It confirmed that their experimental approach had real market value, and Diego accelerated his investment in fermentation research, processing equipment, and microorganism science. He was among the first producers in Colombia to systematically experiment with adding specific microorganisms and yeasts to coffee fermentation — building a proprietary library of microbial cultures selected for the flavour compounds they produce.

"Diego is the manager of INDESTEC, a family business dedicated to the production and marketing of specialty coffee. He likes to be out of his comfort zone — it has always helped him keep evolving." — Good Cup Coffee

Finca El Paraíso and the INDESTEC Operation

What began as a 2.5-hectare planting on the family farm has grown into a multi-farm operation spanning over 70 hectares across Cauca. The flagship property, Finca El Paraíso, now covers 49 hectares and serves as the headquarters of INDESTEC's processing and research work. Six additional farms — Villa Rosita, Villa Alejandro, Villa Esperanza, Sur, El Rubi, and El Manizales — operate under the same system, all processing their coffees through INDESTEC's protocols.

The farm grows Bourbon, Laurina, Gesha, Castillo, and the Colombia variety, giving Diego a diverse genetic palette to work with. INDESTEC's mill facility operates with laboratory-grade monitoring: fermentation tanks are fitted with real-time sensors tracking temperature, pH, and sugar (Brix) levels throughout each fermentation cycle. Diego has also engineered his own condensation-based ecological dryers, which provide precise humidity control during the drying phase — an innovation he developed himself to address the limitations of sun drying under Cauca's unpredictable weather.

INDESTEC also processes coffees from neighbouring farms, extending Diego's precision techniques to other Cauca producers and elevating the regional quality floor. The company has developed more than ten replicable cup profiles across Castillo and Gesha varieties — meaning Diego can produce the same sensory result harvest after harvest, a consistency almost unheard of at this level of experimental processing.

Awards and Recognition

• 20151st place, Cauca Regional Coffee Quality Competition — first major recognition that launched El Paraíso into the specialty world
• 20163rd place, Yara Champions Program
• 20178th place, Fourth Cauca Coffee Quality Fair
• 2018Top 10, Colombia Cup of Excellence — double anaerobic washed Bourbon
• 2019Cup of Excellence winner — washed anaerobic Castillo lot

The Variety: Castillo — Colombia's Most Misunderstood Bean

Castillo carries a complicated reputation in specialty coffee. Developed by Cenicafé — Colombia's National Coffee Research Centre — over 23 years of breeding work and released in 2005, Castillo is a cross between Caturra and the Timor Hybrid, itself a natural cross between Arabica and Robusta. The Robusta lineage gives Castillo its most important agronomic trait: resistance to coffee leaf rust (la Roya), the fungal disease that devastated Colombian crops in the 1980s and threatened Central America as recently as 2012.

The Robusta ancestry also earned Castillo a poor reputation among some specialty buyers, who associated hybrid varieties with lower cup quality. Cenicafé responded by developing six regionally adapted versions of Castillo — each tuned to different Colombian climates — and the latest generations have repeatedly achieved scores above 88 points at specialty cupping. Today Castillo accounts for the majority of Colombia's coffee production, having replaced Caturra and older Bourbon plantings on most commercial farms.

What Diego Bermúdez demonstrated — and what the Milky Cake lot embodies — is that Castillo's cup potential depends enormously on what happens after harvest. In a conventional processing environment, Castillo delivers a clean, smooth, citric cup. Under INDESTEC's bioreactor-controlled fermentation with precisely selected microorganisms, it produces something that few would ever associate with a hybrid variety: rich, pastry-like sweetness, spice, and creamy body. The variety becomes a vehicle; the fermentation protocol is the instrument.

The Process: Anaerobic Fermentation and Thermal Shock

The Milky Cake lot was developed in collaboration with Cata Export, building on Diego's core thermal shock protocol. Every step is documented, monitored, and reproducible.

1. Selective harvest — only cherries at peak ripeness are picked. Diego monitors Brix levels to confirm maturity before picking.
2. Ozone disinfection — cherries are washed with ozone-treated water to remove surface microorganisms, creating a clean, controlled environment for the inoculated fermentation to follow.
3. 48 hours of anaerobic fermentation at 20°C — cherries ferment in sealed tanks at a precisely controlled temperature. Real-time pH and temperature monitoring ensures the process stays within designed parameters.
4. Thermal shock wash — the fermented cherries are subjected to alternating cold and hot water. This thermal shock arrests fermentation at exactly the desired point, locking flavour precursors into the bean structure and enhancing their absorption.
5. Controlled drying — 34 hours at 35°C with 25% relative humidity in Diego's condensation-based ecological dryers, until grain moisture reaches 10–11%.

The thermal shock step is Diego's signature innovation and the technique most associated with the Finca El Paraíso name globally. The temperature differential causes a rapid change in the cellular structure of the bean, which research suggests improves the fixation of volatile aromatic compounds developed during fermentation. The result is a cup where those fermentation-derived flavours — in this case spice, vanilla, and creamy sweetness — present with unusual intensity and persistence without tipping into sourness or alcoholic notes.

Other Notable Lots from Finca El Paraíso

The Milky Cake is one profile in a wide and growing catalogue. Other documented lots from Finca El Paraíso include a Gesha processed with double anaerobic fermentation at low temperature with tropical yeast — delivering jasmine, white peach, and milk tea — sold under the "Letty" profile name. A second Gesha lot, "Salma," uses overripe cherries with 72-hour submerged anaerobic fermentation and dehumidifier drying, producing mango, dulce de leche, and elderflower. The "Castillo 720" is Diego's most extreme experiment: a 720-hour natural fermentation conducted in bioreactors — 30 consecutive days — producing what buyers describe simply as "wild." A Lychee Peach lot processed with ozone disinfection followed by 72-hour anaerobic fermentation is perhaps El Paraíso's most globally celebrated profile, featured by top-tier roasters from Europe to Asia. The Birthday Cake lot in Pink Bourbon is a close relative of Milky Cake in spirit — dessert-forward, creamy, and spiced — but driven by different variety genetics.

Across all these lots, Diego's approach is consistent: use fermentation as a precision tool, not an accident. Each profile is designed, named, and documented with the same rigour a winemaker applies to a classified cru.

Brew Guide

Milky Cake's spice-forward, creamy profile is generous but benefits from extraction parameters that let sweetness and body lead rather than acidity. A longer, lower-temperature extraction draws out the cardamom and vanilla character most effectively.