How is Hainan Coffee? Is Hainan Coffee Delicious? Which Hainan Coffee Brands Are Good?

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Do You Know About Hainan Coffee?

Hainan is situated on the golden latitude of the "coffee growing zone," and many areas are covered with fertile soil that has good drainage and is rich in volcanic ash, making it exceptionally suitable for coffee cultivation. Hainan Province is one of China's main coffee-producing regions, and its quality is comparable to the world-renowned South American coffees. Hainan is a paradise for the "Robusta" variety of coffee. This type of coffee has a strong flavor without being bitter, is aromatic without being intense, and has a slight fruity fragrance, making it truly a premium among coffees.

Coffee trees are evergreen shrubs or small trees. The berries are elliptical and deep red, containing two seeds inside. Originally from tropical eastern Africa, they were later introduced to China from places like Ethiopia and planted in Hainan, Yunnan, and Taiwan.

Coffee is one of the three major beverages in the world. The seeds obtained after removing the fruit skin and most of the seed coat from mature fruits are called raw coffee or coffee beans. Raw coffee is ground into powder after roasting to make coffee powder, which can then be used to prepare beverages. Coffee has a bitter taste with a unique aroma, containing cafestol and 1.3% caffeine alkaloids, making it an anesthetic, diuretic, stimulant, and cardiac medication. Roasted coffee also has digestive benefits.

Foreign coffee brands have long dominated the market, and many people enjoy drinking Nestlé instant coffee. However, Hainan coffee, which is internationally acclaimed as "the best quality coffee," is rarely known by Chinese people. Coffee is suitable for growing between 25 degrees north latitude and 30 degrees south latitude, and Hainan Island is正好 located in this zone. The moderate temperature differences between day and night make the coffee grown there strong without being bitter and aromatic without being intense, earning it the reputation as "the best quality coffee internationally."

This makes coffee more than just coffee—what you're drinking is history and culture. So uniquely special, aren't you ready to have a cup?

How to Order Hainan Coffee?

I remember the first time I drank Hainan coffee, I told my local friends that I wanted to drink black coffee without sugar or milk. My friend nodded with some hesitation and ordered me a pure "Kopi O Kosong" for me. Only after taking a sip did I realize that the bitterness displayed by Malaysian Hainan coffee was completely different from the bitterness of coffee I had drunk before. The coffee I drank in Taiwan was like ink color, showing different depths through water and force—that black color had elasticity and variation.

The bitterness of Hainan coffee is like a bottomless abyss, so dark you can't see your hand in front of your face. Whether your eyes are open or closed, you see the same blackness, like receiving a fatal blow from the very beginning. Because it's fatal, there's nothing after—everything dies from then on. Afterward, I only knew not to order Kopi O Kosong, but anything else was fine. The bitterness of that coffee seemed to complement the bitterness of life—the bitterness of leaving home, the bitterness of homesickness, the bitterness of hard labor, the bitterness of poverty, the bitterness of hunger. Each bitterness is sufficient to be fatal. Bitterness doesn't exist alone but is like a quilt that heaven brings to people as a test (or perhaps a joke)—the bitterness of Kopi O Kosong is like reviewing life's bitterness, without concealment, without escape, swallowed bite by bite from the bottom of the heart to the stomach. In conclusion, knowing how to order drinks in a tea restaurant is very important.

I've heard that when ordering Hainan coffee, even if the shop pulls the coffee the same way, new customers and regular customers will taste different flavors. This is related to whether new powder has been changed and the amount of coffee powder used. Some shops deceive new customers by continuing to brew with already-used coffee powder, which only has color but can't extract much aroma; other shops, although they scoop new powder for brewing, the powder amount isn't as generous as for regular customers. Even so, when you go to a tea restaurant, you should still try ordering. Once you're a stranger, twice you're familiar. After reporting to He Jiu Tea Shop on Petaling Street in Kuala Lumpur for two or three days, I became a regular customer. As for whether the coffee became increasingly delicious? Hehe, when people become familiar, everything tastes good. How should you order coffee when you arrive at a tea restaurant? Some shops will post drink menus on their walls—though they look complicated, there are rules to follow. If there's no menu, you can also refer to the table below to order. The pronunciations in the table are approximate to Hokkien dialect. As for why shops opened by Hainanese people use Hokkien pronunciation for their products? Regarding this question, local people's answers also vary.

The most common and most ordered item is "Kopi," which refers to black coffee with condensed milk and evaporated milk; while "Kopi O" means "dark coffee" in Hokkien, which is black coffee, but although it looks black, it actually has white sugar added. One theory suggests that when British people order coffee, they say "black coffee," so this "O" (dark) might also be a translation of that.

Truly all-black coffee is "Kopi O Kosong," where "Kosong" means empty in Malay, meaning there's nothing in the coffee. As for "Kopi C," it's black coffee with evaporated milk and white sugar. This "C" code is widely believed to come from the "C" of the well-known evaporated milk brand "Carnation Milk" at that time, with three carnations marked on the can. Once you've figured out how to order coffee, the tea (Teh) part can generally follow similar rules.

Additionally, if you want it iced, add the Hokkien word for "ice" (Peng) or the Malay word "Ais" after the item name. For example, to order iced coffee, you say "Kopi Peng" or "Kopi Ais." Just coffee alone can simultaneously combine Malay, Hokkien, and English in one term—from this, can you also feel the diverse and powerful influence of Malaysian languages?

FrontStreet Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee): A roastery in Guangzhou with a small shop but diverse varieties of beans, where you can find various famous and unknown beans, while also providing online shop services. https://shop104210103.taobao.com

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473