Gui Ben Natural

Deep in a remote corner of Yunnan, in a region better known for centuries of tea than for coffee, the Gui Ben Natural is grown east of Pu'er City, close to the Laos border - a landscape of snow-capped mountains, deep valleys and subtropical jungle, and home to a rich mix of ethnic minorities including the Hani, Miao and Dai.

Each cherry is hand-harvested from smallholder farms before being floated in water to sort out the under- and over-ripe fruit, then spread across raised beds to dry slowly for 4–5 weeks - the process that gives this natural its character. Once dried, the cherries are milled to remove the outer fruit layers before grading and bagging.

Behind the coffee is Mr Tian Cai, Farm Operations Manager for origin partners Yunnan Coffee Traders (YCT), working alongside family member Mr Tang, who manages the farm day to day. Together with a small group of farming families in the Guiben region, they're not just growing exceptional coffee - they're restoring biodiversity to land traditionally given over to single cash crops, planting macadamia, mango and orange alongside the tea and coffee fields, all nurtured with organic fertiliser.

This is one of the standout coffees to come out of China's still-young specialty scene - a scene that only began taking shape in the last decade, in a country where coffee cultivation itself is barely 150 years old.