90+ Chelbessa Coffee Beans - Ethiopian Sidamo Natural Premium Varieties: Origin, Cultivation & Market Overview

Understanding Ninety Plus Coffee

"Ninety Plus" doesn't mean "any coffee scoring above 90 points." Great coffees appear one year and vanish the next, emerging from different farms with different flavor characteristics. "Ninety Plus" is actually the name of a premium coffee series built on 13 distinct flavor profiles, all produced by Ninety Plus Coffee, an American specialty coffee creator. Every one is an Ethiopian Heirloom variety, grown in carefully managed ecological conditions and processed to an almost artistic standard in pursuit of flavor. Processing is Ninety Plus's real specialty: they separate coffees by variety, microclimate, and harvest timing, taste each one individually, and design a specific processing method for each profile — much as a luxury designer crafts each piece. Natural products go through extensive refinement before being presented in their most beautiful form.

Drima Zede: Exceptional Natural Processing

Traditional natural processing rarely achieves a clean cup, but with Ninety Plus's technical support, Drima Zede uses only hand-selected, fully ripe cherries, dried with meticulous constant stirring to ensure uniformity. The result is an exceptionally transparent, clean flavor profile with dramatic changes between hot and cold — the aromas of fruit, flowers, and oak barrels are utterly captivating.

Zhuma Mang: The Essence of Ethiopian Natural Coffee

Zhuma Mang is another Ethiopian natural, but under strict supervision and selection it avoids the earthy impurities and high defect rates that plague conventional natural processed beans, showcasing instead the captivating sweetness that makes natural processing so beloved. Its enchanting fruit character inherits the alluring aromas of traditional Ethiopian naturals: a full-bodied, lingering sweetness with perfectly balanced fruit acidity that makes the mouth water. It's also easy to brew day to day — the beans are so flavor-rich that both clean drip filtration and rich siphon brewing express their character beautifully.

Flavor Profile

Ninety Plus Level Up series Zhuma Mang: nectarine and tropical fruits with a clean, bright mouthfeel — stunning from the very first sip.

Product Information

Manufacturer: FrontStreet Coffee
Shelf Life: 90 days
Net Weight: 227g
Packaging: Loose coffee beans
Roast Level: Roasted coffee beans
Sugar Content: Sugar-free
Origin: Ethiopia
Roast Degree: Light roast

Origin Details

Country: Sidamo
Altitude: 1750-2000m
Region: Sidamo
Roast Level: Light roast
Processing Method: Natural
Variety: Local indigenous varieties
Processing Station: Ninety Plus
Flavor Notes: Nectarine, tropical fruits, oak barrel aroma

Ninety Plus Philosophy

Ninety Plus names its coffees completely differently from conventional specialty brands: no region or estate names. Each coffee is named for its flavor profile — Zhuma Mang, for example, means "best approach" in the local dialect. Starting from a flavor concept, they name the coffee first, then choose regions and partner farms to realize it — the hallmark of a true boutique operation.

Ethiopian Coffee Diversity

Ethiopia grows coffee in every way imaginable: vast wild coffee forests, semi-developed land, traditional smallholder plots, and modern plantations. Roughly 50% of the coffee grows above 1,500 meters. Based on these four production models, Ethiopia divides into nine major coffee regions — five specialty areas (Sidamo, Yirgacheffe, Harar, Limu, and Lekempti) and four commercial regions (Djimah, Illubabor, Tepi, and Bebeka). Each region processes its coffee either naturally or washed, and the method strongly shapes the final flavor; today naturals account for about 80% of output and washed about 20%.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

FrontStreet Natural Huakui (Flower Queen) Yirgacheffe — From the Hambella district of Guji, Sidamo, this farm spans 200 hectares and uses traditional natural processing. To keep the drying fruit from molding or picking up earthy odors, workers sun the ripe cherries on raised beds for 21 days, turning them constantly for even drying and hand-removing moldy or defective beans every 3-5 days; once the skins have dried hard, they're hulled by machine, and the green beans face one final hand sort. Because the fruit dries intact around the bean, a medium-light roast reveals light fermented wine aromas, florals, citrus, and mango — a noticeably richer, more complex cup with honeyed sweetness, a cocoa undertone with a hint of spice, a thick body, and a long finish.

FrontStreet Sidamo Natural Hamasho 74158 — Also from Sidamo, the Hamasho processing plant is a perennial winner at Ethiopian green bean competitions. Its coffee is built mainly on the JARC (Jimma Agricultural Research Center) 74-series disease-resistant varieties; the 74158 has smaller beans and outstanding floral-fruity character. FrontStreet's Hamasho 74158 is intensely aromatic — perfume lemon, strawberry, and starfruit sweetness on the nose, with vivid strawberry, starfruit, and green grape sweetness on the sip and a gentle floral note emerging as it cools.