La Colada Gourmet – The culture of Cuban coffee seen from within

La Colada Gourmet was a place created to celebrate Cuban culture, to value the history and good name of a country that, despite its current situation, is proud of its history, its culture, its past, and looks to the future with hope.

Only by creating a place that pays tribute to quality and excellence can Cuba be remembered and honored for what it was and what it will be again.

I have managed to live and enjoy my two great passions: Tobacco and coffee.

La Colada Gourmet is a Cuban café located on the iconic Calle 8, 1518 SW 8th St, Miami, 33135, Miami (Little Havana). It opened its doors in 2016 and now has nine years of history behind it.

Behind the project is a fascinating story that combines culture, craftsmanship, entrepreneurial spirit, and a bit of chance. Its founders, Judith González and Ernesto Borges, a Cuban couple who arrived in Miami around 2013, transformed their professional careers to bring this space to life.

Ernesto, originally from eastern Cuba and based in Havana before emigrating, was then a renowned trader and entrepreneur in the tobacco industry, with factories in Mexico, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic. He developed his own brands, manufactured cigars, and marketed them in the United States, Latin America, and the Caribbean. When they settled in Miami, both he and Judith missed Cuba and, in particular, its coffee culture.

Their lives took a turn after the law signed in June 2009 by President Obama, which placed the tobacco sector under the supervision of the FDA and removed hundreds of previous brands from the registry.

That regulation restricted production, commercialization, and marketing, accelerating the industry’s adaptation. In the midst of business growth, Ernesto saw his main activity slow down; without imagining it, that door that was closing would open another: that of coffee.

La Colada Gourmet was founded in 2016, initially run exclusively by Judith and Ernesto. Three years later, they hired their first employee. Since then, the café has established itself as one of the landmarks of Calle 8, celebrating Cuban coffee and the daily gathering of its community.

What had just begun was not the opening of a simple coffee shop, but the start of a project that sought to celebrate all that is good about Cuba through the coffee culture that its two founders missed so much.

To be a master coffee roaster, you need to master the art, with technical rigor and sensory judgment.

We arrive at Colada Gourmet and immediately crave a coffee and a guava pastry. While we grab a pen and paper to begin the interview, the master coffee roaster is already preparing the machine to roast the first batch of the day.

At Colada Gourmet, artisan coffee is roasted practically all day long. It is one of the few coffee shops in Miami that can offer hot coffee fresh out of the roaster. So much so that sometimes, just like in bakeries, queues form to buy coffee.

What is the secret, we ask Ernesto?

Ernesto smiles and remarks, this interview is going to be a long one.

Ernesto begins by explaining everything in detail, from his family’s history upon arriving in Miami to the coffee culture in Cuba.

It all began in 1791 with the start of the Haitian Revolution, when many coffee planters fled Haiti to Cuba to start a new life. Cuba was then part of Spain, and it welcomed many French entrepreneurs, planters, merchants, and officials to settle on the island.

As a curious fact, Ernesto comments that both the coffee culture in Cuba and its roasting are strongly influenced by France, and now we understand why.

Ernesto gives us a master class on coffee roasting, with a wealth of details, from the different varieties of coffee that exist to how harvesting, washing, and roasting are independent processes but at the same time decisive in the final result.

Do you like bitter or sour coffee?

This question makes it clear that coffee culture goes far beyond what consumers generally know about coffee.
It is also an excuse to start explaining how coffee is roasted, the different types of roasting, the importance of the roasting curve, and how exquisite coffees can be produced with artistry and knowledge.

So is that the secret of La Colada Gourmet? “That is one of the secrets of this business, Yes ; Ernesto responds.”

We select high-quality coffees, mainly Arabica, grown in different regions around the world, but mainly between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. We also like mountain coffee because it gives us much more scope to process it and obtain much better results.

We work with variety, blending, and above all, roasting, which allows us to achieve balanced results in order to obtain a traditional Cuban roast, optimized with my years of experience. (Each roaster has their own formulas).

As a result, we offer a smooth coffee with a near-perfect balance between acidity and bitterness, with sweet notes and just the right amount of caffeine for one serving.

Is it possible to control the level and amount of caffeine with roasting? Not with roasting alone, but it is possible to obtain balanced, low-caffeine coffees that are a real pleasure to drink, as in Cuba. We also have roasts that give us a bean with more caffeine for those who like caffeine.

In any case, my recommendation to my customers is not to add sugar to their coffee. Sugar is used to hide poor quality or poorly processed coffee, although that debate is for another time. The truth is that people get used to a certain type of coffee and a certain way of drinking it, and even though they don’t know what they’re missing, they choose to repeat the same formula over and over again.

Wynwood

La Colada Gourmet opened in the heart of Little Havana, and almost 10 years later you opened another one in the popular neighborhood of Wynwood. Why?

We created this café as a way to spread the culture, history, and importance of Cuba to the Caribbean and the region.

Winwood is currently the cultural center in the United States and Latin America, so we had to be there, doing our bit.

Artists love coffee and deserve good coffee, which is why we opened a business in the heart of Wynwood (2749 NW 3rd Ave, Miami, FL 33127).

In addition, this new location has allowed me to return to one of my passions (tobacco). Now, at Colada Gourmet Wynwood, in addition to excellent coffee, we can enjoy high-quality cigars.

Let’s just say that I am very excited to have opened this place. Even though it means I have to work much harder, I am now bringing my beloved Cuba closer to this country for which I am so grateful.

What is your message to coffee lovers?

Come and try our coffee, and savor the result of Cuba’s tradition and history. Our coffees are very famous in the city because people love them and because we have created a beautiful and welcoming space to enjoy a quality brew.

We continue to work to import high-quality coffee, improving our processes and evolving to achieve a product of unique quality in the US that we would like to share with the rest of the world. In fact, last year we had customers from more than 34 different countries around the world.