Origin
Mt. Apo, Davao del Sur
Elevation
1,500 - 1700mASL
Varietal
Catimor
Process
Natural Process
When we first spoke with Ate Marites, there was no ceremony to it. She knew her natural process from her washed. They were methods shaped by repetition and by seasons that taught her what worked and what didn’t.
We tasted her naturals and found them clean in every way that stayed with us. It made us wonder what else the coffee could become, if given the chance to move differently. In 2020, we took that risk and we tried something simple. We took what could have been a science project and made it into something that could be explained over a phone call. There were no labs but it was fueled only with conversation, trust, and the willingness to try.
Mt. Apo, Davao del Sur
1,500 - 1700mASL
Catimor
Natural Process
When we first spoke with Ate Marites, there was no ceremony to it. She knew her natural process from her washed. They were methods shaped by repetition and by seasons that taught her what worked and what didn’t.
We tasted her naturals and found them clean in every way that stayed with us. It made us wonder what else the coffee could become, if given the chance to move differently. In 2020, we took that risk and we tried something simple. We took what could have been a science project and made it into something that could be explained over a phone call. There were no labs but it was fueled only with conversation, trust, and the willingness to try.
That lot went on and gave her a win at the Philippine Coffee Quality Competition.
Since then, her name has traveled farther than her land ever asked it to. It appears on bags now, carried into spaces she may never see. We’ve watched those wins accumulate as proof of work that had always been there.
Life, of course, did not make things easy. There were obstacles that had nothing to do with coffee, the kind that test whether you stay or step away. Ate Marites stayed.
And so did we, in the ways we could, because relationships, if they are to mean anything, have to exist beyond transactions.
When we turned the machine back on, her coffees had changed. They had matured, carrying more depth, more shape. But her steadiness remained the same, and she remained rooted in her care for her family, and in a kind of quiet commitment to her craft that does not ask to be noticed, only continued.
Some stories move quickly. This one didn’t, and that, perhaps, is what made it last.
Work happens early in Sitio Pluto. Coffee trees stand alongside other crops, part of a landscape that has learned to survive by not depending on a single promise. It portrays a scene reflecting a system of care built over time.
Coffee in Pluto is tied to land that must also feed families. It must weather amidst change, and is made with choices that are often taken with more caution than certainty. Many farmers here grow coffee alongside other crops, not because diversification is trendy, but because it is necessary, echoing the same sentiment of most coffee-growing laborers in the country. Resilience is a condition for staying.
In recent years, attention has begun to turn toward places like Balutacay. From having been overlooked, the language of “specialty” reached these hills, bringing with it both opportunity and tension. Opportunity, because better prices and recognition became possible. Tension, because the standards of quality are often written elsewhere, and must be translated into realities that do not always align.
This is where the work becomes relational.
From building trust slowly through shared learning from both mistakes that are allowed to happen and conversations that return even when there is no immediate outcome, progress breathes. Coffee improves through technique, continuity, and a community that chooses to stay in dialogue.
Sitio Pluto might continue to grow in names or titles but what matters is that farmers continue to experiment within their means, knowledge moves, and the agricultural scene is room for learning.
If there is something to understand about coffee from places like this, it is that value is rarely immediate. The most important thing is not how quickly a place becomes known but how carefully it is allowed to grow.