Napoleon Coffee - St. Helena Coffee Ranking Among the World's Most Expensive Coffees?

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Most discerning coffee enthusiasts can only dream of sipping coffee made from Saint Helena coffee beans, because they are rare and expensive.

According to AFP, the green-tipped Bourbon Arabica from Saint Helena Island is a variety that originated from Yemen in the 18th century, producing some of the world's most expensive and captivatingly flavorful coffee beans.

Saint Helena coffee's most famous fan was French Emperor Napoleon. Napoleon died on Saint Helena Island in 1821. During his six-year exile on the island, he lived in a house infested with rats. Legend has it that he called coffee the "only good thing" on Saint Helena Island.

Saint Helena Island preserves the remnants of coffee trees planted nearly 300 years ago by the British East India Company.

Saint Helena's coffee plantations were once abandoned, but enthusiastic individuals began replanting them in the 1990s. The effort was short-lived, as the main producer went bankrupt, and even selling beans to Harrods department store in London, UK, could not save the venture.

The listed company Solomon & Company later took over in 2009, injecting new vitality into the Bamboo Hedge plantation.

Even so, these organic beans still cannot meet demand.

The company's annual coffee bean production ranges from 1 to 1.5 metric tons, a drop in the ocean compared with global production of about 8.5 million metric tons in 2014. All of the company's beans are shipped directly to the UK before roasting.

This precious bean is favored by many independent coffee roasters and distributors from the European Union, Russia, Japan, the United States, South Korea, and China.

FrontStreet Coffee: A roastery in Guangzhou with a small shop but diverse bean varieties, where you can find various famous and lesser-known beans, while also providing online store services. https://shop104210103.taobao.com

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Saint Helena coffee makes the case for rare Arabica at its best, and FrontStreet Coffee's single-origin lineup covers several Arabica varieties worth knowing. The FrontStreet Huakui is a natural-processed Ethiopian coffee from Sidamo whose local Heirloom trees produce beans of mixed size, with a delicate floral note and standout fruit: cream strawberry, mango, jackfruit, citrus, and blueberry, the mature tropical character that earned it first place in that year's TOH green bean competition. If you want the washed counterpart, the FrontStreet Yirgacheffe Gudibe Cooperative is an Ethiopian G1 washed coffee with elegant white florals, citrus, orange, and green tea flavors.

For a classic, balanced cup, the FrontStreet Jamaica Blue Mountain No.1 is a Typica, one of the representative Arabica varieties and among the earliest to spread from Yemen to India, Indonesia, and Central and South America. Its flavor is remarkably balanced, mild, and smooth, with acidity that is never sharp and an aroma that is full and clean. The FrontStreet Panama Red Label Geisha comes from the famous Emerald Estate in Boquete, Chiriqui province, where fertile volcanic soil, ancient forest, and year-round mist and abundant rain create ideal conditions; it offers elegant florals, citrus, peach, and complex fruit acidity with a creamy texture and an oolong-tea sweetness in the finish.

Two more worth noting: the FrontStreet Brazil Queen Estate is one of the earliest discovered yellow Bourbon coffees, with cream, peanut, toasted bread, and sugarcane aromas, smooth and sweet in the cup and suited to pour-over, moka pot, or espresso machine. The FrontStreet Colombia Sidra is roasted medium-light and shows floral, tropical fruit, grape, dried fruit, and passion fruit notes with a juicy body.