The highest-scoring coffee in Nicaragua’s 2026 Cup of Excellence is a Natural Geisha from Los Alpes farm, which earned 92.00 points and sold at auction for $140 a pound. It is the third time the farm has taken first place in the country’s natural category, having also won in 2023 and 2024.
The Coffee
Los Alpes sits at 1,600 meters in the Dipilto Mountains of northern Nicaragua, near the Honduran border, the highest farm in the region. It is run by the Valladárez family through Inversiones Valladarez Acevedo S.A. The winning coffee is a Natural Geisha (also spelled Gesha), a delicate, aromatic variety originally cultivated in Ethiopia that has become the defining variety of high-end Central American auction lots. In the natural process, cherries are dried whole with the fruit intact around the seed, a method that concentrates sweetness and builds complex, fruit-forward cups. Tasting notes on the 2026 lot include jasmine, passionfruit, and milk chocolate.
The washed category winner came from a neighboring farm. El Cambalache, also in Dipilto and operated by Abner Samuel Zavala, scored 91.44 points with a Washed Geisha. In the washed process, the fruit is removed before drying, producing a brighter, cleaner cup that puts the variety’s intrinsic character at the front. Those lots sold at $67.70 a pound.
Where to Buy
NOZY COFFEE in Tokyo purchased the top Los Alpes natural lots at the June 25 auction and has the 2026 Geisha listed in their online store. The site is primarily in Japanese, and international shipping options may be limited.
Proud Mary Coffee, a specialty roaster in Portland and Melbourne with an established sourcing relationship with Los Alpes, also has the farm’s Natural Geisha available online and ships internationally. Full buyer details for all 29 winning lots are listed on the Alliance for Coffee Excellence website.
The Win
The Cup of Excellence is the specialty coffee world’s oldest farm-lot competition, run by the non-profit Alliance for Coffee Excellence since 1999. Coffees are entered by producers and blind-cupped twice: first by a national jury, then by an international panel. Only lots scoring 87 points or above earn the designation. The 2026 Nicaragua competition selected 29 lots from 160 submissions.
Los Alpes also won Nicaragua’s top natural spot in 2023 and 2024, results that put the Dipilto farm on the shortlist of serious specialty buyers worldwide. The farm’s Geisha trees were planted specifically for auction competition; their first harvest was in 2023, and the 2026 result at 92.00 points is the farm’s highest score to date.