Introduction to the Development History of Baoshan Coffee Industry_Xinzhai Manor Coffee Price_Xinzhai Coffee Estate Experience

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The Essence of Coffee Culture

When you think about coffee, what does it make you feel? The smell of it in the morning wakes you up for the day ahead. Coffee is not only about taste and aroma—it brings a kind of emotional pleasure too. Some call it romantic; others call it refined.

Defining Good Coffee

What is the yardstick for "good coffee"? I believe the standard is simply this: finding the taste that suits you best.

Yunnan's Arabica Heritage

Why come to Yunnan to look for small-grain coffee? Yunnan's small-grain coffee has a name for itself. Small-grain coffee is Arabica—originally from Ethiopia or the Arabian Peninsula—and in China it is grown in provinces such as Yunnan and Fujian.

The main production area is in Yunnan, which makes Yunnan China's principal coffee-growing region. Yunnan small-grain coffee is rich without being bitter, fragrant without being overpowering, with a hint of fruitiness. Both its cultivation methods and its flavor are widely recognized by experts.

The History of Baoshan Coffee

In the years after 1949, the development of Baoshan's coffee industry passed through four main stages.

First Stage: Early Growth

The first stage was early growth. In the 1950s, Baoshan small-grain coffee was successfully promoted and planted on a large scale in Lujiangba. By 1960, the city's coffee planting area had reached nearly 10,000 mu.

Second Stage: Decline

The second stage was decline. In the early and mid-1960s, market pressures and disease caused plantings to shrink. By the late 1970s, the city's coffee planting area was only 0.3 mu.

Third Stage: Restart

The third stage was a restart. In the late 1980s, with help from United Nations Development Programme projects in Yunnan and the participation of professional coffee groups such as Nestle and Maxwell House, prices rose, reaching as high as 30 yuan per kg. Baoshan coffee started up again, and by 1997 the city's coffee planting area reached nearly 30,000 mu.

Fourth Stage: Rapid Development

The fourth stage was rapid development. Since the province's biological resources development project began, Baoshan's coffee industry has grown quickly.

Baoshan Coffee Culture Festival

The Second Baoshan Coffee Culture Festival has opened. In Xinzhai Village, known as the "First Village of Ten Thousand Mu of Coffee," at the foot of Gaoligong Mountain, the day's events include the Gaoligong Mountain Small-Grain Coffee Brewing Competition and professional cupping sessions.

At the venue there are displays and tastings of locally owned coffee beans, and competitors are hard at work. The whole place smells of coffee. To find China's most beautiful coffee, start with the Baoshan Coffee Culture Festival.

Xinzhai Coffee Base

Xinzhai Coffee Base, on the eastern foothills of Gaoligong Mountain, grows well-known small-grain coffee. The plantings sit at elevations of 1,000-1,500 meters. The base has an average annual temperature of 21°C and annual precipitation of 700 to 1,000 millimeters. Altitude and climate are very well suited to coffee, and this is the core growing area for "Baoshan Small-Grain Coffee," a product with national geographical indication protection, producing over 1,100 tons of coffee beans a year.

Coffee Harvest in the Mountains

Deep in the mountains of Gaoligong, there is a small town where everyone knows how to grow and drink coffee. We met Lisu and Dai girls picking coffee on the slopes. They pick quickly, filling a small bamboo basket in no time, singing as they work. The mountain songs are lovely and the people are warm, smiling like sunshine, cheeks as rosy as coffee cherries.

From Cherry to Bean

Fresh coffee fruit is also called coffee cherry, and it really is red and very much like a ripe cherry. Everyone is curious about how Yunnan small-grain coffee turns from red cherries into brown beans.

At Hemei Gezhi Coffee I got a firsthand, close-up look at hulling, washing, and sun-drying. I learned how the beans we drink every day are produced. At Jinglan Coffee I visited and learned about the production and packaging processes.

The Art of Coffee Roasting

Depending on the roast level and brewing method, coffee flavors will vary slightly. I can only say that freshly roasted coffee smells wonderful. To meet market demand, well-known local brands such as Hemei Gezhi and Jinglan, besides selling green coffee beans, also run their own factories to process coffee and make instant coffee.

Coffee Culture in Baoshan

Drinking coffee in a cafe at the source carries its own flavor. In Baoshan there is a shop called "Biden Coffee," which means "us" in the Dai language—"our coffee." Baoshan has atmospheric coffee houses like this too.

What surprised me is that Baoshan is not only a production area concerned with growing and processing. Biden Coffee has created a coffee culture museum so that everyone can learn about coffee at the source. The first floor is a coffee culture corridor introducing the basics of coffee.

The Famous Kopi Luwak

And what exactly is the world-famous Kopi Luwak? On this trip I visited the Guoxin Kopi Luwak Coffee Farm in Baoshan, Yunnan. In recent years we have had our own domestic production of Kopi Luwak. As for what it is: civet cats eat coffee fruit and pass the beans intact, and people recover the beans from their droppings and process them.

Palm civets share many traits with civet cats but lack scent glands, and they are also used to produce Kopi Luwak. This farm produces Kopi Luwak from palm civets. The palm civet housing follows strict hygiene standards, and entry and exit require disinfection. In Indonesia, civet coffee is more common. According to the owner of Guoxin Coffee, because civet cats are a nationally protected species in China, breeding permits are not easy to obtain.

Bringing Yunnan Coffee to the World

And good coffee needs good channels to leave Yunnan. The Baoshan E-commerce Service Center was set up in early 2016 under the Baoshan Municipal Commerce Bureau. It is a third-party service platform that promotes e-commerce development in Baoshan and handles government extension functions. The center covers about 1,588 square meters, with more than 168 e-commerce enterprises based in the park.

The park's special exhibition hall is a display and sales platform for specialty products from Baoshan's four counties and one district, currently featuring over 300 product lines. The park also has a dedicated coffee display center and experience center, with professional brewing equipment. The center is staffed by professionally trained baristas who can give brewing demonstrations for visitors.

About FrontStreet Coffee

FrontStreet Coffee: a roastery in Guangzhou with a small shop but a wide range of beans, where you can find both famous and lesser-known coffees, along with online store service. https://shop104210103.taobao.com

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

If this look at Baoshan has you curious about Yunnan coffee, FrontStreet Coffee ships the region's flavors directly. The FrontStreet Yunnan Small-Grain is drawn from the Baoshan growing area, washed and medium roasted, showing soft nut and chocolate sweetness with a light plum acidity—an easy, welcoming first taste of Yunnan. As a step up to the region's older genetics, the FrontStreet 2013 Natural Typica is grown from Typica on the estate FrontStreet established in 2013; sun-dried and medium roasted, it brings dark berries, caramel, chocolate, and a hint of dried apricot with a black-tea finish.

To taste Yunnan in an espresso, the FrontStreet Black Cocoa Blend combines Yunnan small-grain with Brazil Cerrado: Brazil supplies the mixed-nut aroma and balance, while Yunnan contributes chocolate and citrus. It pulls an Americano that balances sweet, sour, and bitter with nut and brown sugar notes, and a latte with the smoothness of almond and cream—an easy pick for beginners.