What Does Golden Mandheling Taste Like? How to Brew Indonesian PWN Golden Mandheling Coffee?

For those who appreciate a rich, full-bodied coffee, Mandheling is surely no stranger. As the coffee with the highest body and deepest roast level on FrontStreet Coffee's pour-over menu, FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling has always been the top recommendation from FrontStreet Coffee's baristas to customers who love strong coffee. To extract FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling coffee in a way that showcases its unique spicy and herbal notes without becoming bitter and unpalatable actually requires attention to some details. This article will share the techniques for pour-over Mandheling coffee.

The Mandheling Flavor

Since 1699, when Dutch colonists introduced coffee to Indonesia for cultivation, coffee has become a primary cash crop for local farmers. Traditional natural processing would be too time-consuming, making it difficult to sell to merchants for profit in time, as both dry and washed processing require at least 2-3 weeks of drying time. Most critically, Indonesia's various islands frequently experience wind and rain with high humidity, so coffee beans often become moldy and spoiled before they can dry completely.

The initial steps of wet-hulling are the same as washed processing. Indonesians first remove the pulp from coffee cherries, ferment them in water for 3 hours, wash away the mucilage, then dry the parchment coffee for a short 2-3 days. When the moisture content reaches 20-24% in a semi-soft, semi-hard state, the hulling machine removes the parchment, and drying continues until the coffee's moisture content reaches 13% for packaging.

Due to the significant friction used by the hulling machine to tear away the tightly adhering parchment layer, the coffee beans are also more easily crushed or injured during the friction process, particularly at the ends, forming small cracks that create "elephant beans." The dehulled "naked beans" dry very quickly while being directly exposed to humid environments, allowing certain microorganisms to flourish. This gives Indonesian coffee its unique woody, spicy, and herbal characteristics—what we call the "Mandheling flavor."

What is Golden Mandheling?

Golden Mandheling coffee is an exclusive signature product of PWN company. Since they registered the "Golden Mandheling" trademark early on, only Mandheling produced by PWN company can be called "Golden Mandheling." The characteristic of this coffee bean lies in its multiple screenings of green beans, resulting in overall very high quality, thus extracting coffee with considerable cleanliness. PWN purchases Mandheling green beans above 18 mesh size, with defective beans fewer than 3 in 300g samples—G1 grade, which is the highest grade for Indonesian green beans. Subsequently, strict standards are followed for 1 machine selection + 3 manual defect bean selections, ensuring uniform color, shape, and size of Mandheling coffee beans.

After FrontStreet Coffee acquired PWN's Golden Mandheling, they used medium-dark roasting to present the classic caramelized flavor of Mandheling. Freshly roasted FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling was first cupped and tasted by FrontStreet Coffee. FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling in the dry aroma stage reveals cedar wood, nuts, spices, and herbal plants. With the injection of hot water, notes of licorice and caramel emerge. When tasted, it presents flavors of dark chocolate, cocoa, nuts, and spices, with overall cleanliness, noticeable sweet aftertaste, and high body. With such rich flavors, FrontStreet Coffee naturally wants to extract and taste it through pour-over. Below, FrontStreet Coffee will discuss the pour-over details of this premium coffee bean focusing on several key parameters.

How Coarse Should Mandheling Be Ground for Pour-Over?

Grind size is one of the most critical factors affecting coffee flavor. After coffee beans are ground into powder and come into contact with hot water, they release large amounts of water-soluble flavor compounds. With the same steeping time, smaller particles extract more substances, while larger particles extract fewer. Simply put, the coarser the grind, the milder the coffee flavor; the finer the grind, the more intense the coffee taste.

FrontStreet Coffee uses a tool to adjust grind size—China No. 20 0.85mm standard sieve. For medium-light roasted coffee beans, FrontStreet Coffee consistently uses 75-80% pass-through rate, while for medium-dark roasted coffee beans, FrontStreet Coffee uses 70-75%. Compared to light-roasted coffee, the internal structure of medium-dark roasted Mandheling beans is looser, thus absorbing water better and easily releasing large-molecule bitter substances. To avoid over-extraction, FrontStreet Coffee chooses a grind size with 75% pass-through rate using the No. 20 standard sieve.

When using it, FrontStreet Coffee first weighs 10 grams of coffee beans, grinds them according to the estimated setting, then places the ground coffee in the upper sieve and shakes vigorously. Particles smaller than 0.85mm will fall into the lower layer. Finally, the coffee powder collected in the lower layer is weighed and divided by 10 grams to get the pass-through rate. If the pass-through rate is lower than the target parameter, it means the coffee powder is too coarse and needs to be adjusted finer; if it's higher, it means it's too fine and needs to be adjusted coarser.

What Water Temperature is Suitable?

Water temperature plays a similar role to grind size. The higher the water temperature, the higher the coffee extraction efficiency, making it easier to release various substances and resulting in higher concentration. If using near-boiling hot water for brewing, it's easy to extract unpleasant bitter substances. Therefore, when brewing medium-dark roasted coffee beans, FrontStreet Coffee uses different brewing parameters than for light-roasted beans. The caramelization reaction is greater than in light-roasted beans, making it easier to release bitter large-molecule substances. To avoid extracting too many off-flavors, FrontStreet Coffee lowers the water temperature slightly. For light roasted coffee, the brewing water temperature is 91-93°C, while for medium-dark roasted coffee beans, FrontStreet Coffee recommends 87-88°C.

Dripper Selection

If you regularly read FrontStreet Coffee's brewing suggestions, you should know that FrontStreet Coffee prioritizes KONO drippers when brewing coffee beans that express body. We can observe from the KONO dripper's shape that it only has ribs in the middle and lower parts, while the upper part is a smooth curved surface. This way, when we wet the dripper, it fits tightly with the filter paper, restricting coffee's degassing during extraction. Therefore, hot water stays longer in the dripper, increasing coffee extraction rate and concentration, making the coffee taste richer and more full-bodied. KONO dripper is also suitable for beans with full-bodied flavor profiles like FrontStreet Coffee's Brazil Queen Estate coffee.

Segmented Pouring

If you're a beginner with limited water control skills and unstable flow, segmented pouring is the simplest and most compatible pouring method. For example, if our total brewing time is 2 minutes, and the initial pouring takes more time than planned, subsequent pouring needs to increase the flow rate. Conversely, if the initial flow is too fast, you can control it with slower, smaller water streams.

FrontStreet Coffee typically uses three-segment pouring with a 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio. For 1-2 servings, 15 grams of coffee, meaning total water injection of 225 grams.

The first segment gently injects 30 grams of water for blooming, with a bloom time of 30 seconds. The second segment injects water to about 125 grams, evenly and steadily circling outward. Then wait for the coffee liquid to drop, and when it reaches halfway, inject the final segment of water to 225 grams. Wait for all coffee to finish dripping, with total extraction time typically around 2 minutes.

The pour-over FrontStreet Coffee's PWN Golden Mandheling coffee has a solid, full-bodied richness upon entry. After swallowing, you can feel a caramel-like sweetness and aftertaste. As the temperature slightly drops, the aromas of cedar, spices, dark chocolate, and hazelnuts become more intense, with a clean sweet aftertaste and very rich layers.

For professional coffee knowledge exchange and more coffee bean information, please follow Coffee Workshop (WeChat official account: cafe_style).

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Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473