How Elida Coffee from Panama Originates and How Panama Coffee Beans Are Graded

Flavor notes: lush tropical fruit, strawberry aroma, black plum, apricot, peach and longan, carried on an intense, wine-like fruitiness.

Product Information

Brand: FrontStreet Coffee

Net Weight: 227g

Packaging: Bulk

Coffee Bean State: Roasted coffee beans

Sugar Content: Sugar-free

Origin: Panama

Roast Level: Medium roast

Typica Varietal Information

Typica is a tall-growing Arabica cultivar that descends from the branch of the family tree running from Yemen to Java, and it began to spread across Java in the early 18th century.

It is Ethiopia's oldest native variety, and every Arabica variety is derived from it. Typica's young leaves are bronze-tipped, and its beans are oval or slender and pointed. It delivers elegant flavors, but the plant has a weak constitution, poor disease resistance and low yields. FrontStreet Coffee's Jamaica Blue Mountain, Indonesia Sumatra Mandheling and Hawaii Kona are all outstanding estate beans of the Typica variety.

The plant is very close to what we now call Java: bronze-tipped young leaves, large fruit and seeds, a very low yield, and susceptibility to every major pest and disease.

Panama Boquete Elida Typica Natural

Product Name: FrontStreet Coffee Panama Boquete Elida Estate Natural Typica

Country: Panama

Grade: SHB

Region: Boquete

Roast Level: Medium roast

Processing Method: Natural

Variety: Typica

Flavor: Rich tropical fruit, strawberry aroma, black plum

Elida Estate

Volcán Barú is a young, still-active volcano whose summit rises above 3,400 meters. It holds seven distinct microclimate zones, which in turn support a rich and varied ecosystem. That diversity of microclimates cuts both ways for coffee growing. In Elida's case, however, the result is a cup more intense and more aromatic than most Panama beans, with a black-berry aftertaste and a shifting mouthfeel that has made the estate a favorite among coffee connoisseurs.

High altitude has its drawbacks, too. At Elida the average elevation of the coffee plantings exceeds 1,700 meters. The combination of steep terrain and cool nighttime temperatures means a tree needs five years after planting before it can be harvested, making the wait unusually long. Even during harvest, the cherries often take more than a month to ripen. Once ripening begins, any spell of bad weather — a typhoon or heavy rain, factors entirely beyond anyone's control — can cause serious losses, because the estate is committed to quality and refuses to pick early. The risk here is far greater than at lower-altitude farms.

Brewing Instructions

Hand-brewed FrontStreet Coffee Panama Elida: 15g of coffee, medium grind (setting 4 on a Fuji conical burr grinder), V60 dripper, water temperature 88-89°C. First pour 30g of water and let it bloom for 27 seconds. Pour to 105g and pause. Wait until the water level in the coffee bed drops halfway, then continue pouring slowly until you reach 225g in total. Avoid the tail end. Water-to-coffee ratio is 1:15, extraction time 2:00.

Boquete Region

Panama coffee is famous for the Geisha from Hacienda La Esmeralda, and the region where this estate sits is nearly as well known: Boquete, in Chiriqui Province. Boquete is a town in Chiriqui near the border between Panama and Costa Rica, close to the famous Volcán Barú. It has beautiful scenery, rich and fertile soil, and a climate and soil ideally suited to producing high-quality coffee.

Quality and Processing

Since 2006, Elida's select lots have placed among Panama's winning batches year after year, and prices have climbed every season. Among Central American estates, Elida is arguably the most "Kenyan black-berry-like" of them all; its black berries and long, complex fruit flavors routinely earn unanimous praise. Judges are also drawn to Elida's distinctive "umami," a term borrowed from Japanese. Today many experts count umami as the fifth basic taste, alongside sweet, sour, bitter and salty. Umami works much like monosodium glutamate, lifting flavor in foods such as dried shiitake mushrooms, aged cheese and kelp. In coffee, umami is linked to a good "aftertaste" — a long, pleasant flavor that lingers after you swallow falls into this category.

Elida's processing facilities, equipment and procedures are all meticulously designed. In general, once coffee cherries reach a certain stage of processing, prolonged moisture content above 20% not only lets the fine components inside dissipate but also opens the door to off-flavors. Because Elida's processing facility sits at high altitude, it has dedicated equipment to control temperature and timing during drying. This step must be managed precisely, and it is crucial to the final quality.

This batch of FrontStreet Coffee Panama Elida uses the natural processing method and is the classic Typica variety. Typica is Ethiopia's oldest native variety, originating in southeastern Ethiopia and Sudan. All Arabica varieties are derived from Typica. It offers elegant flavors, but the plant has a weak constitution, poor disease resistance and low yields.

Estate Characteristics

More than half of Elida Estate lies within the reserve zone of Panama National Park. It is a rare ultra-high-altitude estate in Central America, planting coffee at elevations from 1,700 meters up to nearly 2,000 meters wherever the terrain allows. It is famous for a main flavor axis of "intense and umami."

Elida Estate belongs to owner Wilford Lamastus. The estate grows three varieties — Typica, Geisha and Catuai — with nursery areas raising seedlings of each. The journey to the estate is beautiful. At 1,700 meters the air turns crisp and cold, like walking in high mountains enjoying a forest bath while breathing very fresh air. The estate's terrain at 2,000 meters is steep and rugged. After crossing the ridge line you reach a saddle that is surprisingly flat and open, with terrain that can block the howling mountain winds. Wilford says this is the best place to grow Geisha.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Elida shows what a natural-process Typica can do at altitude: black plum, strawberry and a deep, wine-like intensity. If that kind of richness is what draws you in, the FrontStreet Sumatra range reaches the same depth by a very different road. The FrontStreet PWN Golden Mandheling is screened to 18 mesh and sorted by hand three times to meet the G1 standard, then wet-hulled and roasted medium-dark for dark chocolate, caramel and a heavy, syrupy body.

For an everyday version of that style, the FrontStreet Lintong Mandheling comes from the Lintong district around Lake Toba and carries the earthy, herbal, clove-and-wood notes that the wet-hulled process is known for, again at medium-dark roast. Both make a striking comparison against the fruit-forward Elida natural, and both brew beautifully with the 1:15 V60 method above.