Catalan 'Red Bourbon' - Guatemala

About the Coffee

Nicholas Hammond inherited Catalan de Las Mercedes in the Chimaltenango region of Guatemala at a young age. Trained as an agricultural engineer with a degree in agronomy, he runs the farm with a precision that shows up in the cup: each variety is sorted and processed separately, and every lot is handled with the kind of care that comes from someone who studied the science behind it.

San Martin Jilotepeque sits in Guatemala's subtropical highlands, where volcanic soil, high mountain ranges, and a climate that supports everything from coffee to cardamom creates strong conditions for growing. Hammond has earned a reputation for his processing methods, and the farm holds Rainforest Alliance Certification, which requires meeting audited standards for environmental and social practices. One of those social commitments is the Catalan Education Centre, run by Nicholas and his wife Angi Hammond. It keeps children looked after on-site while their parents work the harvest, covering teacher wages and educational costs with support from Pilot Coffee Roasters.

Pilot co-founder Andy Wilkin first met Nicholas Hammond while judging at the Cup of Excellence Guatemala. He was impressed enough that the two have been working together since 2012. It's one of those producer relationships that has built up over more than a decade, with Pilot returning to Catalan's Red Bourbon year after year.

About Pilot

Andy Wilkin and Jessie Holmes opened Te Aro Roasted in May 2009 in Toronto's Leslieville neighbourhood. Wilkin, a newly certified Q Grader, named it after the Te Aro neighbourhood in Wellington, New Zealand, where he grew up around the cafes that shaped how he thought about coffee. The space was a former car garage that became a cafe and micro-roastery.

By 2013, the operation had grown and rebranded as Pilot Coffee Roasters, moving roasting to 50 Wagstaff Drive in Toronto. Long-term producer relationships are central to how Pilot sources coffee, and their connection to Catalan de Las Mercedes is a good example of that: over a decade of working with the same farm, season after season.