Puerto Rico's Escogido Growing Region | What is the cultivation history of Yauco Selecto Yauco Special Coffee?

The History of Escogido Yauco Selecto Coffee from Puerto Rico's Escogido Growing Region

Yauco Selecto Coffee is one of the world's finest varieties.

In 1736, coffee trees were introduced to Puerto Rico from Martinique. Early coffee was mostly cultivated by Corsican immigrants. By 1896, Puerto Rico's coffee exports ranked sixth in the world, with most coffee shipped to France, Italy, Spain, and Cuba. Coffee plantations thrived in the 19th century, but the rise of sugarcane and pharmaceutical cultivation, along with hurricane damage and the effects of war, caused the coffee industry to stagnate. It is currently recovering.

Puerto Rico operates a low-wage system, with the average hourly wage per person standing at $4.20 in 1991. Even so, the income of manual laborers is still higher than that of laborers in many other coffee-producing countries, comparable only to Hawaii and Jamaica. Another problem facing Puerto Rico's coffee industry is that, within the Caribbean region, Puerto Ricans have relatively high educational attainment and therefore better employment prospects. Yauco Selecto Coffee is grown on only three farms in the southwestern part of the island. Its flavor is aromatic and intense, with a long-lasting aftertaste. It commands a high price, and its aroma can rival any other coffee variety in the world. In the Yauco region the coffee is owned and operated by local plantation owners. The mountain climate here is mild, giving the plants a longer maturation period, from October to February of the following year, and the soil is high-quality clay. Some old varieties of Arabica coffee are grown here. Although their yield is lower than other varieties, they are generally of superior quality. People here have long adopted an eco-friendly, intensive cultivation method, using only low-toxicity fertilizers and chemicals and practicing mixed-crop planting to make the soil more fertile. When it is time to harvest, workers walk back and forth between the coffee trees, picking only fully ripe cherries, which are then placed in drum devices and washed for 48 hours.

Today, Puerto Rico's gourmet coffee is exported to the United States, France, and Japan. The country's coffee is generally carefully cultivated, with pure flavor, aromatic qualities, and heavy beans. Among them, the finest varieties rank among the world's famous brands. The highest-quality coffee is Yauco Selecto, where "Selecto" means "selected." Grand Lares Yauco Coffee is produced in the southwestern part of the island, while Lares Coffee is produced in the south-central region.

Yauco Selecto coffee beans are always stored with their parchment on until shipment, when the outer skin is removed to ensure optimal freshness. When goods are submitted, relevant U.S. government personnel, such as from the FDA and USEA, are present. Their job is to supervise whether producers comply with federal regulations. Staff from local appraisal committees also select one bag from every 50 bags as a sample and use international measuring devices to assess its quality.

The president of the Escogido Yauco Agency, Jaime Fortuno, quietly monitors all this work every year, down to the smallest details. Fortuno is an investment banker who graduated from Harvard Business School, and he set out to seize every opportunity to create a premium Puerto Rican coffee market. He anticipates a maximum annual production of 3,000 bags, each weighing 45 kilograms, which is less than 1% of the island's total coffee production.

Yauco Selecto is a fascinating coffee with a full range of flavors, no bitterness, rich nutrients, and an intense fruitiness worth savoring. Taylors of Harrogate in England once imported 50 bags of Yauco Selecto coffee.

FrontStreet Coffee's Recommended Brewing Method

Dripper: Hario V60

Water Temperature: 90°C

Grind Size: Fuji Royal grind level 3.5

Brewing Method: Brew ratio 1:15, 15g coffee grounds. First pour 25g water for a 25-second bloom. Second pour to 120g water, then pause. Wait until the water level in the coffee bed drops halfway, then continue pouring slowly until reaching 225g total. Drawdown approximately 2:00.

Analysis: A three-stage brew clearly distinguishes the front, middle, and back-end flavors of the coffee. Because the V60 has many ribs and drains quickly, pausing during the pour helps extend the extraction time.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

In the world of coffee varieties, Arabica is the most numerous and the most complex and pure in flavor, which is why it is the most popular, and the beans that reach a cup as specialty coffee are almost all Arabica. The old Typica variety behind a coffee like Yauco Selecto is one of its representative ancestors, transplanted early from Yemen to India, Indonesia, and Central and South America, where it spread widely. Typica is balanced, gentle, and smooth, with a non-abrasive acidity and a full, pure aroma, though its weak disease resistance and low yield are its great weaknesses. FrontStreet's Jamaica Blue Mountain No. 1 is also a Typica, and Blue Mountain Typica has evolved better disease resistance over the 200-plus years since it was transplanted from Martinique in the 1720s, particularly against coffee berry disease. FrontStreet's cupping of its Jamaica Blue Mountain Typica finds a balance that, so far, no other region's coffee has fully approached.

For the fruitier side of Arabica, FrontStreet's Huakui is the sun-dried representative from Ethiopia, grown from the country's most common heirloom varieties. Because several unidentified varieties are mixed together, the beans vary in size, and the cup carries a light floral note with a particularly prominent fruit aroma. The classic sun-dried process brings out cream strawberry, mango, jackfruit, citrus, and blueberry, the mature tropical profile typical of a FrontStreet Sidamo natural, and it was this rich berry fragrance that won first place in the TOH green bean competition. FrontStreet's Yirgacheffe Gotingding Cooperative is the washed counterpart: clean, bright lemon and citrus, graded G1, washed, with elegant white florals, citrus, orange, and green tea in the cup.

A balanced, no-bitterness coffee like Yauco Selecto or Blue Mountain is best brewed simply. FrontStreet uses a Hario V60, water at 90°C, a Fuji Royal grind setting of 3.5, and 15g of coffee at a 1:15 ratio. Bloom with 25g for 25 seconds, pour to 120g and pause, then finish slowly to 225g once the bed drops halfway, for a total drawdown around 2:00.