The Flavor Profile of 90+ Series Guji, How to Brew It? Practical Pour-Over Parameters Coffee Brewing Guide

90+ Candela — FrontStreet Coffee suspects many people hear "90-point Candela coffee" the first time they come across the name, but that is not it. 90+ is an American green coffee company, and Candela is simply one of the coffees in its range. FrontStreet Coffee has carried 90+ Candela for many years and still holds a deep appreciation for it. This natural-processed Candela bursts with rich tropical fruit aromas, light fermented wine notes, and sweet citrus and mango flavors — as sweet as juice. Without further ado, let's get into today's coffee sharing!

Ninety Plus Coffee: Premium Supplier

Ninety Plus Coffee, a premium coffee supplier from the United States, was founded in 2006. In the decade since its founding, Ninety Plus has made coffee professionals worldwide recognize its unique charm, sparking an unprecedented wave of specialty coffee enthusiasm globally. Since its first coffee in 2007, it has been the coveted top choice of industry experts and competition baristas. Today, Ninety Plus is synonymous with the world's top specialty coffee, its taste and quality eclipsing every other premium offering.

Unique Naming Philosophy

90+ beans take a completely different approach to naming than typical specialty lots — no region or estate names. Each coffee is named for its flavor profile; Candela, for instance, means "best approach" in the local dialect. Starting from a flavor concept, then naming it, then choosing the regions and partner farms to realize it — that is the boutique operating style behind the brand.

The 90+ Difference

"Ninety Plus" does not refer to all coffees scoring above 90 points. Great coffee appears one year and disappears the next, sometimes emerging from different estates with different flavor characteristics. "Ninety Plus" is a premium series built on 13 flavor profiles, sourced exclusively from Ninety Plus Coffee, the American specialty coffee innovators. They are all Ethiopian Heirloom old varieties, cultivated in their native ecological environment and processed to almost artistic standards to optimize flavor. Processing is 90+'s specialty: the coffees are separated by variety, microclimate, and harvest timing, each lot tasted individually, with processing methods designed specifically for each flavor profile — much like a major design house, pouring dedicated research and painstaking effort into a craftwork that borders on art. Every natural product undergoes extensive refinement before reaching its most beautiful form.

Product Line Evolution

LEVEL UP will no longer operate as a sub-brand of Ninety Plus but will appear as a Ninety Plus product line, dropping the original independent design. New-season products may do away with the original L grading system (formerly L7, L12, L39, L139), dividing product lines instead by more significant taste differences into four major series: NinetyPlus Ethiopia, NinetyPlus Panama, Ninety Levelup, and NinetyPlus Limited.

Exceptional Processing Quality

The ancient natural method rarely achieves pure flavors, but Drima Zede, with 90+ technical support, uses only hand-selected, fully mature cherries. Drying involves careful, constant stirring to ensure uniformity. The result is a remarkably transparent, pure cup that shifts markedly between hot and cold, with captivating fruit, floral, and oak barrel aromas!

Candela's Exceptional Qualities

Candela, also an Ethiopian natural, undergoes strict supervision and selection that eliminates the harsh earthy impurities and high defect rates common in naturals, instead showcasing the captivating sweetness natural processing is famous for. Candela inherits the enchanting aroma bestowed by traditional Ethiopian naturals, expressing full-bodied, long-lasting sweetness and perfectly vivid fruit acidity. It is also easy to brew day to day — the beans are so flavor-dense that both fresh drip brewing and concentrated siphon brewing show off their inherent character beautifully.

FrontStreet Coffee Sidamo Ninety Plus Candela

Country: Ethiopia

Region: 90+ SNNP, Sidama (Guji belt)

Altitude: 1750-2000 meters

Processing Method: Natural Process

Variety: Ethiopian Heirloom

FrontStreet Coffee Roasting Recommendations - Roaster: Yangjia 600g Semi-Direct Flame

To express its round sweetness and rich floral-fruity aromas, FrontStreet Coffee's barista roasts medium-light. Using a fast-roast profile: preheat the roaster to 200°C, open the damper to 3, then after 30 seconds cut heat to 150°C, damper unchanged. The turning point comes at 1'32", 103.7°C; dehydration ends at 5'21", by which time the bean surface is yellow and the grassy smell has fully disappeared. When dehydration completes, adjust heat once, dropping to 100°C, damper to 4. At 8 minutes 45 seconds, wrinkles and black spots appear on the bean surface and the toast aroma clearly turns to coffee aroma — the prelude to first crack. First crack begins at 9'00; listen carefully and reduce heat to 80°C, fully opening the damper to 5 (adjust with great care — never so low that cracking stops). Unload at 195°C, 1'55" after first crack.

FrontStreet Coffee Brewing Recommendations

Dripper: V60 Dripper

Water Temperature: 90-91°C

Coffee Amount: 15 grams

Coffee-to-Water Ratio: 1:15

Grind Size: BG#6S

FrontStreet Coffee Brewing Technique

Bloom with 30g of water for about 30 seconds. Pour in a small center-spiral to 125g, wait for the water level to drop until the coffee bed is about to be exposed, then continue pouring to 225g to finish. Remove the dripper just before the bed is exposed (timing starts from the bloom). Total extraction time: 2'00".

Flavor Description

Nectarine, tropical fruits, cream, mango, citrus

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation: Kafa Forest, Ethiopia's Wild Side

If Candela's refined profile has whetted your appetite for Ethiopian naturals, also try FrontStreet Coffee's Kafa Forest beans. Unlike the garden-plot planting typical of Ethiopian smallholders, Kafa Forest is the home of wild coffee: trees grow shaded at 1,400-2,100 meters amid pristine microclimates and rich red soils. Roasted medium-light, it offers pronounced white florals on the grind, bright lemon acidity, sweet orange and bergamot, and a finish of melon, fruit, and nut with a green-tea-like texture. Where Candela is juicy and opulent, Kafa Forest is Ethiopia at its most pristine — two sides of the same remarkable origin.