How we make Kahlúa

Yep, it takes up to 7 years to produce a bottle of Kahlúa. Here's why...

Growing and Growing

What’s up with the 6 years of growing coffee?

It can take up to 6 years to get the perfect coffee beans for our coffee liqueur. That's a pretty long time for a drink. Why? The coffee cherries are grown in the shade, which simply takes a lot longer than growing them in the sun. Coffee cherries? Am I drinking fruit now? Nope – the cherries are simply the safeguard that protect our precious beans. After that, our coffee cherries grow into beautiful dark red cherries, and that's when they're ready to be opened up.

Harvesting

The beauty and the bean

So now that our beautiful deep dark red cherries are ready, it's time to rip them apart to get the coffee bean out. Come on, we all know it's the inside that counts.

Drying and resting

The beans RIP

That whole 'ripping apart thing' was pretty intense for our beans. So it's time to wait again, but this time in huge burlaps bags. This takes about 6 months. We know, waiting for something good is exhausting!

DISTILLING

Making the rum

So the whole coffee stuff is great, but what about the spirits in Kahlúa? Our Rum is made from sugarcane, from which the juice is extracted, boiled and mixed with water. Once we've got the alcohol, it's time for the distillation process. Kahlúa is distilled to perfection!

ROASTING AND BLENDING

The bean and spirits affair

After up to 7 years the time has finally arrived: the beans and rum spirits meet in our distillery. The coffee that is perfectly roasted for the occasion, finally meets its spirits friend and they rest together for 4 weeks. After these weeks of catch-up, it's time to bottle and seal the goodness of Kahlúa.

People say that good things come to those who wait. We couldn’t agree more.