What Does Honduras Taste Like? How to Brew Honduran Coffee

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Producer

COMISAJUL Cooperative Association

San Juancito: A Hidden Gem in Honduras

San Juancito is a small village in central Honduras, located 40 kilometers northeast of the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa. The town belongs to the Francisco Morazán jurisdiction, which also takes in Nuevo Rosario, Guacamaya, and Plan Grande, and which is home to a total population of roughly 1,400.

San Juancito was once known for its mineral deposits, but today it is best known for sitting inside the buffer zone of La Tigra National Park, a rainforest ecosystem and Honduras' first national park. The park functions as an enormous reservoir, supplying drinking water to 500,000 residents of the capital.

Flavor Profile

Clean, roasted nuts, milk chocolate.

Honduras Coffee Regions

Coffee production in Honduras is divided into six major regions spread across the western and southern parts of the country: Santa Barbara, El Paraiso, Copan, La Paz, Comayagua, and Olancho. The average growing altitude sits above 1,100 meters. All of the coffee is Arabica, with 69% graded HG "High Grown", 12% graded SHG "Strictly High Grown", and 19% graded CS. The main varieties are Typica, Bourbon, Caturra, Villa Sarchi, and Lempira.

Bourbon Coffee

Bourbon coffee (French: Café Bourbon) is produced from trees of the Arabica Bourbon cultivar. It was first cultivated on Réunion, an island known as Île Bourbon before 1789. France later occupied the island and linked it to both the African continent and Latin America, and today Bourbon is one of the two most widely planted Arabica lines in the world. Bourbon is typically grown at altitudes between 3,500 and 6,500 feet (1,062–1,972 meters).

Product Information

Manufacturer: FrontStreet Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee)

Address: No. 10, Bao'an Front Street, Yuexiu District, Guangzhou

Contact: 020-38364473

Ingredients: In-house roasted

Shelf life: 30 days

Net weight: 227g

Packaging: Bulk

Taste: Mellow coffee beans

Bean state: Roasted coffee beans

Sugar content: Sugar-free

Origin: Honduras

Coffee type: Other

Roast level: Medium roast

Honduras San Juancito Lot#1

Country: Honduras

Region: San Juancito

Altitude: 1,450-1,550 meters

Processing method: Washed

Brewing Instructions

To brew this Honduras lot as a pour-over, use 15g of coffee ground to a medium setting (Fujiyama serrated burr grinder #4), a V60 dripper, and water at 88-89°C. Begin with a first pour of 30g of water and let it bloom for 27 seconds, then pour to 105g and pause. Wait until the water level drops to the halfway point before pouring again. Continue slowly until you reach a total of 225g, and avoid the tail end of the extraction. Use a water-to-coffee ratio of 1:15 and aim for a total extraction time of 2:00.

Climate and Geography

Because Honduras lies in the tropics, San Juancito sees relatively little temperature variation across the year. What would be called winter here is in fact the rainy season, while summer is the dry season. In tropical regions, altitude shapes temperature far more than the timing of rainfall does. Sitting at an altitude of 1,239 meters above sea level, San Juancito stays slightly cool all year round. In summer (March to June) the high typically reaches around 26°C, while the low averages around 18°C. In winter, the average high is 20°C and the low sits around 14°C.

Modern Economy and Coffee Production

The modern economy of San Juancito depends largely on agriculture, most of it small-scale coffee farming. The local climate and altitude are exceptionally well suited to growing high-quality coffee. COMISAJUL, a cooperative association that represents hundreds of smallholder coffee farmers in central Honduras, is based in San Juancito. It was formed by several hundred growers from the surrounding area, and here the coffee grows on mountains at altitudes of 1,450-1,550 meters, shaded by banana, avocado, and papaya trees. During harvest, farmers hand-pick the ripe cherries, which are then washed and sun-dried. The fermentation water carrying pulp and skin from the washing stage is collected and reused as fertilizer for the coffee trees. This lot drinks remarkably clean, with high sweetness, very gentle acidity, and clear milk chocolate notes.

Variety

Bourbon

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Bourbon is one of the oldest and most respected branches of the Arabica family, and its clean, sweet, low-acid character is exactly what makes the Honduras San Juancito washed lot so easy to love. If this gentle milk-chocolate-and-roasted-nut profile appeals to you, FrontStreet Brazil Queen's Estate is a natural next step: it is an early-discovered Yellow Bourbon with cream, peanut, toast, and sugarcane aromas, a rich yet clean sweetness, and it performs equally well as a pour-over, in a moka pot, or as espresso.

For drinkers who want the same clean cup built around the washed process rather than Bourbon genetics, FrontStreet Yirgacheffe Gedingding Cooperative is an excellent counterpart. It is an Ethiopian G1 washed coffee showing elegant white florals, citrus and orange, and a green-tea finish, and its clarity directly echoes the washed San Juancito lot described above. Both coffees are at their best as a pour-over, where a medium grind and water at 88-89°C let the sweetness and aroma unfold without any bitterness.