Yirgacheffe Aricha/Aricha idido Green Bean Grade Classification and Brewing Flavor Introduction

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FrontStreet Coffee wants to share a heavyweight coffee today - this is a natural processed coffee bean from Yirgacheffe, the 2019 TOH Natural Process Champion, named Aricha. Aricha has been rated as G1, the highest grade by Ethiopia's ECX, and this bean has achieved an astonishing score of 95 on the international cupping website Coffee Review, demonstrating its exceptional quality. From the appearance, consistency, and freshness of the raw beans to the dry aroma and flavors presented in the coffee, everything is quite outstanding. Natural processed Yirgacheffe Aricha is produced at the Kebel Aricha processing station, hence named after this processing station. How can this bean achieve such performance? Let FrontStreet Coffee help you understand the story behind it from the beginning.

Region Introduction

Yirgacheffe is a small town in Ethiopia with an altitude of 1700-2100 meters, making it one of the world's highest altitude coffee-producing regions and synonymous with Ethiopian specialty coffee. Lake Turkana, Lake Abaya, and Lake Chamo bring abundant moisture to this area. In the rift valleys represented by Misty Valley, fog is perennial, seasons are like spring, gentle breezes blow, cool and humid conditions persist, and thousands of coffee trees thrive and reproduce, nurturing Yirgacheffe's unique terroir where floral and fruity notes ambiguously intertwine in ever-changing patterns. Yirgacheffe Misty Valley: Since Yirgacheffe region introduced washed processing methods in the late 20th century, washed processing has greatly reduced defective beans, making this region's coffee beans popular among coffee enthusiasts worldwide. Local coffee merchant Abdullash Bagersh, missing the flavor of traditional natural processed beans, improved the natural processing method to enhance flavor and reduce defect rates. He launched three extremely famous Yirgacheffe natural processed beans: "Idido Misty Valley, Beloya, and Aricha." Yirgacheffe Aricha: Originally named Idido, it's a well-known coffee bean processing station near Yirgacheffe town.

Grading System

Since the Ethiopia Commodity Exchange (ECX) began operations in 2009, the current practice is to divide the more well-known sub-regions within the broader Yirgacheffe area, including Yirgacheffe, Wenago, Kochere, Gelena Abaya, etc., into those with "classic Yirgacheffe flavor" and those without, conducting A/B classification. Having the flavor means A, not having it means B. ECX has a further classification method: freshly harvested coffee beans from the current year must first undergo primary grading, and only beans receiving g1-g3 ratings will be further classified into Q1 and Q2 grades using SCA cupping standards for coffee quality.

Q1 Highest Grade: Coffee beans receiving g1 or g2 in primary grading with scores above 80 points + specialty grade evaluation scoring above 85 points, making it the highest grade coffee beans. Q2 High Grade: Coffee beans receiving g1 or g2 grades in primary grading + specialty grade evaluation scoring between 80-84.75 points, making it the second-highest grade coffee beans.

ECX classification includes Yirgacheffe, Wenago, Kochere, and Gelena Abaya. Raw bean grading levels: Q1 is the highest, Q2 is second. Common classifications are only g1-g4. Regardless of washed or natural processed beans, choosing g1 should yield fewer defects and delicious coffee beans.

Adorsi Processing Station

This year's Ethiopian harvest season cupping competition's natural process category was won by Adorsi processing station. Adorsi processing station is owned by Testi Coffee, a coffee export company operated by the Yonis family, established in 2009 by Faysel A. Yonis. In terms of competition results, this champion batch scored 91 points, while last year's Mudan achieved 88 points in the same competition - Adorsi scored 3 points higher this year.

T.O.H

Taste of Harvest (TOH) is a raw bean competition held among African producing countries by the African Fine Coffees Association (AFCA), similar to the Cup of Excellence in Central and South America. Currently, there are seven member countries: Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia, and the Republic of Congo. It consists of regional competitions and the entire African competition, where batches with cupping scores below 80 points are eliminated in the preliminary round. TOH selects the highest quality raw beans from each region, which are cupped and scored by domestic and international judges based on Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA) standards. This batch achieved the highest score of 88.58 points this year to win the championship!

Variety Introduction

This bean's variety is local heirloom. Coffee drinkers who frequently enjoy Ethiopian coffee should have heard of the "Heirloom" variety. Most Ethiopian varieties are named this way because Ethiopia has too many varieties - it's like a natural gene bank for Arabica. On one hand, there are numerous varieties with difficult identification and classification; on the other hand, the Ethiopian government,出于 protection considerations, is unwilling to disclose information about these varieties, so they are collectively called "Heirloom." Ethiopia's coffee varieties recorded include nearly 2000 varieties, of which 1927 are native varieties and 128 are introduced varieties. So judging by appearance alone, Ethiopia's coffee varieties are like a "grand garden" - everything is there: long, short, thin, fat...

Processing Method

This bean is natural processed.

1. Harvest mature coffee cherries
2. Initial removal of impurities and defective beans
3. Floatation screening: Coffee cherries are poured into water tanks; mature, full cherries will sink to the bottom, while immature or damaged cherries will float to the surface.

4. Natural drying: The mature coffee cherries that sank to the bottom are scooped out and spread on drying beds for natural drying, reducing moisture content from 70% to about 10-12%. They need to be turned several times daily for even drying, and covered at night to avoid moisture absorption.

5. Removal of outer shell: After about two to four weeks of drying, the outer layer of the coffee seeds becomes dry and hard, at which point a hulling machine is used to remove the outer shell to complete the process.

FrontStreet Coffee Roasting Analysis

Roasting machine: Yangjia 800N (300g batch size)

Heat to 165°C, then load beans, heat at 120, air damper at 3; Return temperature point at 1'36", when temperature reaches 148°C, open damper to 4, heat unchanged; When temperature reaches 166°C, bean surface turns yellow, grassy aroma completely disappears, entering dehydration phase, heat unchanged, damper at 5; At 7'37", bean surface shows ugly wrinkles and black spots, toast aroma clearly transforms to coffee aroma, can be defined as prelude to first crack. At this point, listen carefully for first crack sound. First crack begins at 8'38", damper unchanged, develop for 1'45" after first crack, discharge at 195°C.

FrontStreet Coffee Aricha Color Values

Agtron bean color value 66.2 (below image), Agtron ground color value 78.9 (above image), Roast Delta 12.7 value

FrontStreet Coffee Cupping Flavors:

Grape juice, jackfruit, fermented wine aroma, citrus, lemon

Yirgacheffe Aricha Natural

Region: Yirgacheffe Adorsi Processing Station

Altitude: 1900-2000m

Processing Method: Natural

Grade: G1

Variety: Heirloom

FrontStreet Coffee Pour-over Recommendations

Dripper: V60
Water Temperature: 90-92°C
Coffee-to-Water Ratio: 1:15
Grind Size: Medium-fine, similar to raw sugar granule size (Grind level BG-5R (Chinese standard 20-mesh sieve pass rate 60%))

Brewing Method: Multi-stage extraction. Use 30g of water for 30-second bloom, then continue pouring with small circular motion to 125g for stage separation. When water level drops and is about to expose the coffee bed, continue pouring to 227g and stop. When water level drops and is about to expose the coffee bed again, remove the dripper. (Timing starts from bloom) Total extraction time is 2 minutes.

When brewing with V60 dripper, it smells like ripe fruit aroma. Upon tasting, there's obvious fermented aroma and green grapes. As the temperature cools slightly, there's lemon acidity and creamy smoothness, with mature grape juice sensation in the finish.

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