Indonesia Golden Mandheling Origin Information - Golden Mandheling Coffee Flavor Characteristics

As FrontStreet Coffee's most full-bodied bitter coffee, FrontStreet Coffee's Mandheling coffee not only features rich flavors of dark chocolate, roasted hazelnuts, and caramel, but also carries a unique hint of herbal spice. Located in the upper right corner of FrontStreet Coffee's bean list, FrontStreet Coffee's PWN Golden Mandheling, having undergone multiple manual screenings, exhibits extremely high overall cleanliness, highlighting a rare clarity and sweetness.

Where is FrontStreet Coffee's Mandheling coffee from?

Typically, the Mandheling coffee we drink is dark roasted to weaken the acidity in the coffee and highlight its full-bodied bitter notes. FrontStreet Coffee's bean list features two Mandheling coffees: FrontStreet Coffee's Lindong Mandheling daily bean and FrontStreet Coffee's PWN Golden Mandheling, from the Lindong and Aceh regions of Sumatra Island respectively, both using medium-dark roasts. FrontStreet Coffee hopes to present dark chocolate and caramel flavors while preserving Mandheling's wild herbal notes. This unique aroma originates from Mandheling's growing environment and processing methods.

Mandheling coffee originates from the mysterious island of Sumatra in Indonesia. The entire Sumatra is divided into eight provinces, with only the high-altitude Aceh and North Sumatra provinces cultivating Arabica coffee on a large scale. After belonging to the tropical rainforest region, the mountains and forests are often shrouded in clouds and rain, covering Sumatra with a layer of mystery. Every year from September to April of the next year is the coffee cherry ripening season, where you can see many farmers busy picking in the mountains. Traditional Lindong Mandheling is cultivated by the Mandailing and Batak ethnic groups, while the "rising star" Lake Tawar Mandheling is cultivated by the Gayo people.

Locals plant coffee trees around two major volcanic lakes, Lake Tawar and Lake Toba. The Gayo Mountains around Lake Tawar have ideal coffee growing conditions, widely adopting organic cultivation methods, plus a long history of cultivation, making the coffee quality and yield from this area higher. Many green coffee suppliers also value this area more, including the locally famous Pwani Coffee Company (PWN).

PWN Company mainly purchases high-quality Mandheling green coffee beans. After purchase, they undergo 1 machine selection + 3 manual hand selections to pick out full, flawless beans. The produced coffee beans are all specialty grade, and "Golden Mandheling Coffee" is their flagship product. Early on, to become the exclusive supplier of Golden Mandheling Coffee, PWN Company registered the English trademark "Golden Mandheling," meaning only the Golden Mandheling coffee produced by them is the authentic Golden Mandheling. FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling coffee beans are of course also "authentic products" purchased from PWN Company, using Indonesia's unique wet-hulling method.

The flavor characteristics of Indonesian Mandheling originate from wet-hulling

The biggest difference between Indonesia and many coffee-producing regions is the local humid weather. Indonesia's annual humidity is between 70-90%, typhoons come and go, and annual rainfall even reaches over 2000mm. Such harsh weather simply cannot adopt the sun-drying method that lasts 2-3 weeks like in Africa. The washed process not only takes time but also consumes more labor costs and water resources, which Indonesia, focusing on mass production, cannot afford. Thus, they developed a unique semi-washed method—the wet-hulling process.

Coffee cherries with pulp removed are directly poured into a pool for brief fermentation of several hours. At this time, a small amount of mucilage will still remain on the parchment, which is removed through brushing. Then the parchment beans are dried for the first time, only needing to reach 30-40% moisture content, about 2-3 days, and coffee farmers will sell the green beans to purchasers. The purchasers will directly machine-hull the purchased semi-dry parchment beans to obtain the innermost green beans.

Because the hulling machine uses greater friction to tear off the parchment layer tightly attached to the green beans, at this stage, white or green viscous liquid usually flows out. Due to long-term soaking in this liquid and the humid environment, the final green beans become soft, pale and swollen, forming a gray-green color. Through friction stirring, the green beans are also more easily crushed or squeezed, especially at both ends, forming small gaps and creating "elephant beans." The "naked beans" without parchment dry very quickly and are also directly exposed to the humid environment, breeding various microorganisms. This gives Indonesian coffee its unique woody, spicy, and herbal plant notes—what we call "terroir flavor."

I believe some friends have started to get curious about what Southeast Asian flavors taste like. If you haven't tasted FrontStreet Coffee's Mandheling coffee yet, FrontStreet Coffee suggests starting with the small-packaged FrontStreet Coffee's Lindong Mandheling daily beans. FrontStreet Coffee's Lindong Mandheling, processed using the wet-hulling method, will present classic Mandheling flavors after brewing, making it convenient for us to try at home.

The best pour-over method for FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling coffee

To brew the best aroma of FrontStreet Coffee's Mandheling coffee, here FrontStreet Coffee uses the most popular FrontStreet Coffee's PWN Golden Mandheling coffee beans in the store as an example to explain FrontStreet Coffee's pour-over approach.

For coffees with full-bodied flavors like FrontStreet Coffee's Indonesian Mandheling coffee, FrontStreet Coffee's Brazil Queen Estate coffee, and FrontStreet Coffee's Jamaica Blue Mountain coffee, FrontStreet Coffee's baristas will preferentially use KONO drippers for brewing. Compared to V60, KONO drippers have smooth curved surfaces. This design is actually to ensure that after wetting the filter paper, it closely adheres to the dripper wall, while having only one-quarter height of flow ribs, limiting upward airflow. Water can only flow downward through the bottom. This increases the water absorption time of coffee powder particles, allowing the coffee powder layer and hot water to form a soak-extraction, making the coffee taste more rounded, full-bodied, and concentrated.

Medium-dark roasted coffee beans have significantly changed the internal structure of the beans, making them loose and more absorbent when ground into coffee powder. If brewing parameters are not adjusted properly, the coffee will easily become over-extracted and bitter. To have enough aroma without over-extraction, it's necessary to reduce the extraction rate. FrontStreet Coffee will use lower water temperature and raw sugar grinding degree to reduce the release of bitter macromolecules in the coffee. FrontStreet Coffee's stores use EK43S grinders set to 10 scale, with water temperature at 87-88 degrees Celsius.

Dripper: KONO
Water temperature: 87 degrees Celsius
Coffee amount: 15 grams
Coffee-to-water ratio: 1:15
Grind size: 70% pass-through rate on China standard #20 sieve
Pouring method: Three-stage pouring

First stage: Pour 30g of water for bloom for 30 seconds. Start timing while pouring, using a small water stream to pour from the center point outward in circles, ensuring the entire coffee bed is moistened.

After 30 seconds, start pouring the second stage of 95g water with a slightly larger water stream, aiming to raise the entire coffee bed. The water stream needs to be poured vertically and evenly. At this time, the timer scale shows 125g, completing the pour in about 55 seconds.

When the liquid level drops to half, start using a small water stream to pour the third stage of 100g in small circles. Try to control the water stream to not circle too widely, as this can easily scatter the coffee bed and cause under-extraction. Finally, the total pour amount is 225g, and the drip completion time is about 2 minutes. After removing the dripper, shake the coffee liquid in the sharing pot evenly and you can start tasting.

Hand-poured FrontStreet Coffee's PWN Golden Mandheling coffee: Rich dark chocolate aroma, with very integrated flavors of roasted hazelnuts, caramel, and sweet melon. Obvious spice notes in the mouth, with a full-bodied, clean texture and a persistent finish.

For professional coffee knowledge exchange and more coffee bean information, please follow Coffee Workshop (WeChat public account: cafe_style). For more specialty coffee beans, please add FrontStreet Coffee's private WeChat (FrontStreet Coffee), WeChat ID: qjcoffeex

Important Notice :

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FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473