Origin, Variety, Planting History of Indonesian Mandheling Coffee Beans and the Story Behind Golden Mandheling's Name and Flavor Characteristics

Anyone who enjoys coffee has likely heard of Mandheling coffee beans. They come from Indonesia, known as the country of a thousand islands. To this day, Indonesia's Mandheling remains exceptionally distinctive, attracting countless coffee enthusiasts.

The Origin of the Name Mandheling Coffee

The naming of this bean is quite interesting—it's neither the name of a producing region nor a coffee variety, but rather a name that emerged from a double misunderstanding. According to FrontStreet Coffee's research, the story goes like this: during World War II when Japan occupied Indonesia, a Japanese soldier tasted an incredibly aromatic coffee at a café. He asked the owner for the coffee's name, but the owner misunderstood and thought he was asking where he was from, so he replied: "Mandailing." However, the soldier misheard it as "Mandheling." After the war, the soldier recalled drinking the aromatic "Mandheling" coffee in Indonesia and wanted to start this coffee business in Japan. So he commissioned an Indonesian coffee merchant to ship 15 tons to Japan, which surprisingly became very popular. The name Mandheling spread this way, and that coffee merchant is now the founder of the renowned PWN (Pawani Coffee Company).

It was this double misunderstanding that made the name Mandheling famous worldwide. The origin of Mandheling coffee beans is also quite interesting—by definition, only Arabica coffee beans from North Sumatra can be called Mandheling coffee beans. Therefore, Robusta grown in southern Sumatra, or coffee from Java and Sulawesi islands, cannot be called Mandheling.

Mandheling Coffee Growing Regions

In North Sumatra, there are two excellent areas for growing Mandheling coffee: one is the Lintong production area centered around Lake Toba, and the other is the Aceh production area centered around Lake Tawar.

Lintong Production Area

The Lintong production area is a traditional and famous region. Here, the high mountains have an altitude of 1,000-1,500 meters, and multiple volcanoes in the area bring rich volcanic soil. Lintong's Mandheling has always been a high-quality, sought-after product. FrontStreet Coffee's Indonesian daily beans come from Mandheling coffee beans in the Lintong production area. After FrontStreet Coffee evaluated multiple Mandheling coffee beans, we found that Lintong Mandheling coffee has a mellow taste, rich chocolate and nutty tones, and local herbal flavors, representing the characteristic flavor of Mandheling coffee.

Aceh Gayo Mountain Production Area

Aceh experienced independence movements in its early years, making the local situation turbulent. Therefore, despite how delicious the coffee was, few coffee merchants were willing to take risks to acquire beans. It wasn't until 2005, when the situation in Aceh eased, that the Aceh production area regained attention from coffee merchants.

Aceh's Gayo Mountain is located at the northernmost tip of Sumatra Island, with coffee growing areas mainly surrounding the town of Takegon and the mountain slopes around Lake Tawar. The average altitude ranges between 1,100-1,600 meters. The famous Golden Mandheling coffee beans from Pwani company come from this production area, showing that the quality of Aceh's coffee beans is superior to those from Lintong.

The coffee variety grown here is called "Ateng." This seems like a very unfamiliar coffee variety. In fact, local Indonesian names for coffee varieties differ somewhat—for example, what Indonesians call Tim Tim is what we call Timor. And Ateng is the local Indonesian name for Catimor. The Ateng variety is very suitable for cultivation and flavor development in the Aceh region.

PWN's Golden Mandheling coffee beans are famous for their extremely high green bean quality. One reason for this guaranteed quality is that after processing, they undergo three rounds of manual sorting, ensuring minimal defective beans, with full, uniform-sized beans. Under the sun, each bean is plump and large, emitting a golden-like radiance.

Because of this, Golden Mandheling is generally more expensive than other Mandheling coffee beans. Consequently, some dishonest merchants use Mandheling G1 to pass off as Golden Mandheling. How can consumers verify if they've purchased genuine Golden Mandheling coffee beans? The simplest method is to ask the merchant to show the Golden Mandheling coffee burlap bags and the PWN certificate with the same serial number as the bags.

How to Brew Mandheling Coffee?

Although Mandheling has excellent quality, if brewed improperly, it's easy to extract bitter and mixed flavors. However, friends troubled by this issue might want to refer to FrontStreet Coffee's brewing method.

When brewing dark roast coffee beans like Mandheling, FrontStreet Coffee recommends choosing a Kono dripper. This can enhance the mellow texture of the coffee beans. If you don't have one, you can use a V60 dripper.

Use 15g for a single serving standard. It's recommended to let the chosen coffee beans rest for 4-7 days (with the roast date as day one), as this will result in better coffee flavor when brewed. For coffee grind size, Mandheling coffee should be ground slightly coarser than light roast coffee beans because Golden Mandheling uses dark roasting, which creates a looser structure that more easily absorbs water and releases coffee substances. If ground to the fineness of light roast beans, it's easy to extract burnt bitter flavors; if ground even coarser, the coffee will become thin and tasteless, with a watery texture. The coarseness should be 70% pass-through rate on a #20 sieve.

For water temperature, FrontStreet Coffee recommends using 87-88°C water for brewing. Many cases of burnt bitter flavors come from water temperature being too high. Of course, water temperature that's too low will also make the coffee flat and tasteless.

For the coffee-to-water ratio, FrontStreet Coffee recommends using 1:15. Although some brewing methods suggest using 1:13 or smaller ratios for a more intense flavor, this approach of reducing the ratio is partly to avoid the bitter mixed flavors in the tail section, which consequently affects the aftertaste. FrontStreet Coffee believes that as long as you master the relationship between water temperature and grind size, using a 1:15 ratio can better showcase the overall flavor profile of Golden Mandheling.

The brewing method uses the common three-stage pouring technique. Dividing the pour into three stages can better express the mellow texture of Mandheling coffee and the sweetness of caramel. The specific water distribution is: first stage—bloom with 30ml of water, completely wetting the coffee grounds for degassing to better extract flavor substances in subsequent pours; second stage—pour 100ml, mainly to bring out all the golden foam of Mandheling.

The final stage involves gentle center pouring of 95ml, which can enhance the coffee's sweetness, overall expressing a thick, mellow texture with caramel sweetness and chocolate, nutty flavors.

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