Guatemala Lattisha Flavor Description Which Guatemala Coffee Brand is Best

Bourbon

Bourbon (French: Café Bourbon) is coffee from Arabica trees of the Bourbon cultivar. The variety was first grown on Réunion—called Île Bourbon before 1789—and French colonists later spread it across Africa and Latin America. Today it is one of the two most widely grown Arabica lineages in the world, typically cultivated at altitudes of 3,500 to 6,500 feet (1,062-1,972 meters).

Caturra

Caturra is a single-gene mutation of Bourbon, discovered in Brazil in the 1950s. It out-yields Bourbon and resists disease better while matching it for cup quality. It grows well between 700 and 1,700 meters and adapts readily across that range, though yields taper at the highest elevations.

How Coffee Beans Are Classified

There is no single worldwide grading system for coffee. Every producing country has its own classification scheme and naming, which is why packaging may read "SHB," "AA+," "Supremo," "Extra-Fancy," or "Peaberry." These are grade names. Roasted single-origin coffees sometimes display their grade—the more detailed the grading information, the better the coffee usually is—while most commercial coffees omit it entirely.

Pour-Over Brewing Method

For pour-over Guatemala La Tisha: 15g of coffee at a medium grind (setting 4 on the Fuji Rikyu grinder), V60 dripper, water at 88-89°C. Start with a 30g bloom for 27 seconds, pour to 105g, and pause. Once the water level in the bed drops to half, pour slowly again to 225g and cut the tail section. Water-to-coffee ratio 1:15; extraction time about 2:00.

Guatemala Finca Las Delicias

Country: Guatemala

Grade: SHB

Region: Fraijanes, Guatemala City

Altitude: 1,675 meters

Harvest Period: October to February of the following year

Processing Method: Washed

Varieties: Bourbon, Caturra

Processing Plant: Finca Las Delicias

Guatemala Coffee History

Coffee truly arrived in Guatemala in 1750 with Jesuit priests, and German settlers built the industry in the late nineteenth century. Today production is concentrated in the country's south. Guatemala has seven main coffee regions—Antigua, Cobán, Lake Atitlán, Huehuetenango, Fraijanes Plateau, Oriente, and San Marcos—each with its own climate quirks, so each produces beans with its own character. Across the country, Guatemalan coffee shows a gentle, mellow texture, elegant aromatics, and a pleasant fruit-like acidity: genuinely the aristocrat of coffees.

Flavor Notes: Black tea, florals, rich caramel

Fraijanes Plateau Terroir

Volcanic soil, high altitude, a humid and rainy climate, and active volcanism together created the Fraijanes Plateau's singular conditions. The Pacaya volcano—the most active of Guatemala's three still-erupting volcanoes—often dusts the plateau in a thin layer of ash, feeding its soil with abundant minerals. The bean-drying season coincides with the plateau's sunniest months; mornings are often cloudy and foggy, but the haze burns off quickly, guaranteeing excellent sun exposure for drying.

Coffee cultivation at Finca Las Delicias on the Fraijanes Plateau began in 1920. The farm grows Bourbon, Caturra, Pacamara, and other varieties—a genuinely diverse lineup. Of its 205 acres (1 acre = 4,046.8 square meters), 173 are planted with coffee while the remaining 32 acres of native forest shelter local wildlife. Several natural springs cross the farm, providing ample high-quality irrigation during the dry season and powering the wet mill that supplies the water for washed processing.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

If Guatemala's caramel-sweet, tea-like elegance appeals to you, FrontStreet Coffee's Brazil range offers the comforting other half of the Americas. Brazil is the world's largest coffee producer, and its beans' moderate acidity and fine balance of sweet, bitter, and full body make them a natural for medium roasts and a nutty, fragrant cup. The FrontStreet Brazil Cerrado Red Bourbon—a classic half-natural lot—shows creamy peanut, toasted bread, caramel, and hazelnut notes in a rounded, non-acidic brew that suits pour-over, moka pot, espresso SOE, siphon, and French press alike.

Brazilian beans are also the backbone of FrontStreet's espresso lineup: the Classic Blend, Premium Blend, Black Cocoa Blend, and café-grade Commercial Blend all contain Brazilian coffee, contributing chocolate and cream aromas, gentle sweetness and bitterness, and a stable, balanced extraction. For a single-origin treat, the FrontStreet Fazenda Rainha (Queen Estate) Yellow Bourbon from Mogiana adds a clean sugarcane sweetness with fruit and chocolate—proof that the same balanced character found in Guatemalan classics lives across Latin America.