How to Pour Over Guatemala Yulaxan Estate Coffee Beans and What to Do If It's Over-Extracted

Professional Coffee Knowledge Exchange

Guatemala Huehuetenango Cup Competition 9th Place: Finca Yolaxan Estate Coffee Beans

Guatemala Coffee - Huehuetenango Finca Yolaxan Introduction

Finca Yolaxan sits in La Libertad, Huehuetenango — a region blessed with gorgeous mountain scenery and a gentle climate. The estate lies between two towering peaks with two rivers running through the valley, making for a genuinely stunning environment.

The coffee grows at altitudes above 1,500 meters, with annual rainfall of 1,500 to 1,800 millimeters and average yearly temperatures ranging from 10°C to 30°C.

The varieties are Bourbon and Caturra. Yolanda tends the estate with great care, and the singular microclimate here is a big part of why this Huehuetenango coffee stands out so far above its neighbors.

This competition lot — Finca Yolaxan's Caturra — took 9th place in the 2016 Best of Huehuetenango Cup competition. What sets Huehuetenango apart is its "sandy volcanic limestone soil," a foundation whose flavor and quality performance is rarely matched in the region's harvests.

Run through meticulous stages — picking, hulling, washing, and cupping — this has become one of the most prestigious and highest-quality estate coffees in the region.

☕ Flavor Description:

Floral, papaya, pistachio, green apple, and cherry, with crisp, juicy acidity and a smooth mouthfeel.

☕ Mouthfeel Description:

Gentle acidity, abundant sweetness, a strong and lingering aftertaste.

The region's singular geography produces a flavor you won't find elsewhere: gentle acidity, sweetness in abundance, and a long, commanding finish — a coffee good enough to win 9th place in the 2016 Huehue Best Cup!

How to Brew Guatemala Coffee [Finca Yolaxan] Well?

FrontStreet Coffee Pour-Over Reference:

Weigh out 15g of Finca Yolaxan coffee and grind it to a medium grind — the particles should sit slightly coarser than table salt. We use grinder setting BG 5R (60% standard sieve pass rate), 89°C water, and a V60 dripper for extraction.

Pour hot water from the kettle in clockwise circles centered on the middle of the dripper. Start the timer as brewing begins, and within 15 seconds, bring the coffee up to 30g, then stop pouring. At the 1-minute mark, make the second pour — again clockwise circles centered on the dripper's middle, keeping the stream away from where the grounds meet the filter paper to avoid channeling.

When your circles reach the outermost ring, leave one ring untouched, then keep spiraling inward circle by circle. At 2 minutes 20 seconds, the coffee should reach 220g and the brew is complete.

｜ Japanese-style Iced Pour-Over [Finca Yolaxan]

FrontStreet Coffee Iced Pour-Over [Finca Yolaxan] Reference:

Guatemala coffee [Finca Yolaxan], light-medium roast, grinder setting BG 5M (67% standard sieve pass rate)

20g of coffee, 150g of ice, 150g of hot water. The water temperature runs 1°C higher than the normal pour-over recommendation, at 90°C. Normal grinding uses a small Fuji grinder at setting 3.5; for iced pour-over, go slightly finer — half a setting down, to 3.

Bloom with 40g of water for 30 seconds.

Segmented pouring: first segment 60g of water, second segment 40g. Use a relatively fine but tall water column, pouring briskly so the grounds tumble completely — but take care not to let the liquid level climb too high, and avoid hitting the filter paper at the edges.

Total extraction time runs about two and a half minutes — right in line with the normal extraction time for 20g of coffee.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

If you're brewing Finca Yolaxan in a V60, you're in good company — the V60's cone shape and signature 60-degree angle route the water to the center before it drips through, extending the contact between water and grounds so aroma and flavor extract fully. FrontStreet Coffee is especially fond of the resin Hario V60: the material holds heat in, and in mass production it shapes most precisely with the smallest tolerance errors. For bright, floral-fruity beans, that fast extraction is exactly what draws out layered aromatics and lively acidity.

Looking for beans that shine in a V60? Try FrontStreet Coffee's Ethiopia Guji Huazhen (Huakui), one of the recent stars of specialty coffee — its tropical fruit aromatics are unmistakable, with strawberry, passion fruit, jackfruit, even lychee, an obvious sweetness, almost no bitterness, and a silky, juice-filled texture. Or start with FrontStreet Coffee's Yirgacheffe Gedingding: bright citrus, berry, and floral notes with a green-tea-like sweetness on the return, its gentle, luminous acidity a welcoming first step into pour-over.