Comparison Between 2018 Indonesia BIWA Top Gold Mandheling Coffee Beans and PWN Gold Mandheling

Professional coffee knowledge exchange. For more coffee bean information, please follow Coffee Workshop (WeChat public account: cafe_style)

FrontStreet Coffee · Indonesia BIWA Gold Top Mandheling Introduction

"Gold Top Mandheling" (also written "Golden Top Mandheling") comes from the Lintong area of Sumatra Island, Indonesia. It has a rich aroma and a thick body with low acidity, and it shows more caramel sweetness than a typical Mandheling.

The green beans undergo strict manual selection with zero defects.

100% Japanese-standard coffee beans.

"Gold Top Mandheling," internationally known for its four rounds of manual screening and its clean, rich flavor, is the result of years of work by Japanese coffee merchants on Sumatra. Traditionally, Japanese drinkers prefer coffee with low acidity, a clean taste, high sweetness, and a distinct aroma. "Gold Top Mandheling" is a product built precisely for the Japanese market.

Strict Quality Control Management:

FrontStreet Coffee · Indonesia Gold Top Mandheling BIWA-Gold Top Introduction

Estate Introduction:

The predecessor of Gold Top Mandheling was Golden Mandheling. Golden Mandheling was originally a Japanese product, introduced to Taiwan about ten years ago and translated as "Golden Mandheling." A few years ago, however, a local Indonesian company registered Golden Mandheling as its trademark, forcing every Japanese company importing the product to stop using the name. Japanese importers therefore changed Golden Mandheling to Gold Top Mandheling, and the translated name changed along with it to "Golden Top Mandheling."

Produced in the Lintong area of northern Sumatra, Indonesia. Harvesting is limited to fully hand-picked individual ripe fruits to secure the initial bean quality. The cherries are processed using the semi-washed method and naturally sun-dried, then given a further drying and refinement step after hulling, along with two rounds of green bean cleaning and four rounds of hand-picking. Gold Top Mandheling can therefore be described as a strictly selected premium Mandheling.

Gold Top Mandheling Selection Process:

Specialized coffee procurement companies buy perfectly ripe red coffee fruits directly from farmers.

The same day, the pulp is removed to extract the green beans, which are then placed in small water tanks and washed to remove impurities completely.

The washed beans are sun-dried and then transported to the export company in Medan. The export company gives the beans two more days of sun-drying and hulling.

Because the processed beans still hold moisture as high as 40%, they must be sun-dried further to bring moisture down to 12.5%.

Fully dried beans must go through density processing, air separation, and screen sorting to remove silver skin, small beans, defective beans, and foreign objects. Finally they undergo hand-picking to achieve the highest-quality green beans before being exported as Gold Top Mandheling.

Gold Top Mandheling is packed in special straw mats in 10kg units for buyers worldwide.

Flavor Description:

The dry aroma gives off the characteristic grass and forest scents of rainforest coffee, with a faint sweet aroma of dried longan. After brewing, the distinctive rainforest cedar aroma becomes more pronounced, with an obvious bittersweet chocolate note that turns into honey sweetness in the aftertaste. The mouthfeel is rich and full-bodied, with relatively low acidity and a subtle sweet finish.

The Difference Between Golden Top Mandheling and FrontStreet Coffee's PWN Gold Mandheling:

Both Golden Top Mandheling and FrontStreet Coffee's PWN Gold Mandheling are produced in the Lintong area of northern Sumatra, Indonesia. Harvesting is limited to fully hand-picked individual ripe fruits to secure the initial bean quality. The cherries are processed using the semi-washed method and naturally sun-dried, then given a further drying and refinement step after hulling, along with two rounds of green bean cleaning and four rounds of hand-picking. Both can therefore be described as strictly selected premium Mandheling.

Gold Mandheling was registered as a trademark by Indonesia's Pwani Coffee Company, which makes "Gold Mandheling" exclusive to PWN. The Gold Mandheling produced by PWN goes through three rounds of manual screening and one machine screening, which results in very beautiful beans. "Gold Mandheling" is simply the name the company gave the product.

The predecessor of Golden Top Mandheling (Gold Top Mandheling) was Golden Mandheling. Golden Mandheling was originally a Japanese product, introduced to Taiwan about ten years ago under that name. Because Indonesia's Pwani Company registered Golden Mandheling as its trademark, every Japanese company importing the product had to stop using the Golden Mandheling name. Japanese importers therefore changed Golden Mandheling to Gold Top Mandheling, and the translated name changed along with it to "Golden Top Mandheling."

The "PWN" mark on Gold Mandheling is the abbreviation of Indonesia's Pwani Company. The Gold Mandheling coffee it produces is registered in Indonesia. Coffee beans produced by Japanese companies in the same region can therefore only be sold as "Golden Top Mandheling," with "BIWA" marked on the packaging.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

If this comparison has you curious about the PWN side, FrontStreet Coffee's PWN Gold Mandheling is the reference bottle. PWN selects green beans at 18 screen and above and requires fewer than three defects per 300g sample to meet the top G1 standard, then puts the beans through three rounds of hand-picking — which is why the cup is noticeably cleaner and sweeter than an ordinary Mandheling, with a thick, syrupy body and clear dark chocolate and caramel. Brew it as a pour-over with water at 87-88°C, 15g of coffee at a 1:15 ratio, a coarse grind like raw sugar, and a three-stage pour; this best expresses the body and the caramel sweetness.

If you want to compare the two styles, the Lindong Mandheling Daily Bean is the more affordable counterpart. It uses the same wet-hulling method and a medium-dark roast, so it keeps the wild herbaceous and woody notes alongside nut, chocolate, and caramel, and comes in a small 100g package that makes it easy to try. For a Mandheling-based espresso, the Classic Blend layers medium-dark Mandheling onto creamy Brazilian character for butter, roasted chestnut, and caramel flavors, with a small addition of Robusta rounding out the crema.