Where Do the Floral and Fruity Aromas of Coffee Beans Come From - Is It Determined by Roasting? How to Brew Coffee for Sweetness

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Understanding Coffee Through Packaging Information

When we get a package of specialty coffee beans, the packaging always displays a series of information: origin region, estate, altitude, variety, roast level, and flavor notes, among others. Each piece of information serves as an important factor in measuring the quality and flavor profile of coffee beans.

This is because the flavor of coffee beans is gradually established through the terroir that nurtures them and the processing methods used. But how can we accurately read coffee flavors through this information?

Why can this coffee bean from Ethiopia exhibit such rich fruity aromas?

Flavor Determined by Terroir and Cultivation Systems

Altitude

The altitude of coffee-producing regions is considered a crucial factor affecting coffee bean quality. This issue's Ethiopia Buku Abel is located at a high altitude of 2250-2350 meters.

Compared to lower-altitude growing areas, high-altitude regions have lower temperatures and significant day-night temperature differences. Just like why Hami melons from Xinjiang are so delicious - the temperature difference causes coffee to grow more slowly, resulting in higher content of precursor aromatic compounds in coffee cherries, such as sucrose, organic acids, trigonelline, and fruit esters.

Therefore, high-altitude coffee beans have higher density and richer organic matter. In terms of flavor, they exhibit prominent acidity with pleasant fruity notes like grapefruit, citrus, and berries.

Meanwhile, low-altitude coffee beans have lower density and balanced but relatively plain flavors.

For specialty beans, although some good-flavored beans still come from low-altitude regions, high altitude has become a recognized important parameter for measuring coffee bean quality.

Therefore, based on altitude advantages, this issue's FrontStreet Coffee Ethiopia Buku Abel can present rich fruity aromas: passion fruit, guava, strawberry jam, berry sweetness and acidity, and apricot.

Cultivation Systems

The optimal growing regions for coffee trees are countries with mountainous terrain between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn.

Within these regions, different cultivation systems directly affect coffee flavor. Taking Ethiopia as an example, coffee cultivation systems can be divided into forest coffee, semi-forest coffee, garden coffee, and plantation coffee.

Among these, forest and semi-forest coffee are nearly wild: wild coffee trees are distributed in forests, and during the red fruit season, coffee farmers enter the forests to harvest them under government protection. Or they regularly enter the forests to prune and perform simple maintenance.

In this nearly primitive state, coffee trees are of mixed varieties, naturally resulting in more diverse flavors.

It is for this reason that when you taste our FrontStreet Coffee Ethiopia Buku Abel, you can experience rich spice notes like cinnamon amidst the bright fruit aromas.

Coffee Varieties

Coffee varieties are an important factor affecting taste. But just like any plant, coffee varieties are numerous and difficult to remember.

However, you should know about the veteran Typica variety, which possesses excellent aroma and mild acidic taste. Indonesian Mandheling, Jamaican Blue Mountain, and Yunnan Xiaoli are all derived varieties of Typica.

Additionally, there's the veteran Bourbon variety, which has rich body, strong aroma, and very bright sweetness.

This issue's FrontStreet Coffee Ethiopia Buku Abel features coffee tree varieties known as Heirloom.

Strictly speaking, Heirloom is not a specific variety. Because in Ethiopia, there are so many coffee varieties - like a natural gene bank of Arabica - with numerous types that are difficult to classify.

To protect local coffee beans, the government is unwilling to disclose specific variety information, so they collectively call the native varieties Heirloom.

Processing Methods

This issue's FrontStreet Coffee Ethiopia Buku Abel uses the natural processing method. The most common coffee bean processing methods fall into three major categories: natural, washed, and honey processing. Natural processing is the most ancient coffee processing technique.

Traditionally, Ethiopia has naturally used the water-free natural processing method since ancient times: using sunlight and heat to naturally remove moisture. When it's time to sell, the dried fruits are crushed and taken to market.

Natural processed beans have many advantages: they better retain the beans' fats, acids, sugars, and other organic compounds, presenting richer and more intense aromas.

However, there are too many uncontrollable factors in the natural processing process. If there are too many defective beans, various indescribable wild flavors may emerge: bleach water, fermented tofu, onion, or even durian and chicken manure flavors.

But this issue's bean hunter Mr. Li Lin, using modern techniques and meticulous processing methods, has effectively overcome the defects of natural processing.

Therefore, this FrontStreet Coffee Ethiopia Buku Abel, while eliminating strange wild flavors, fully highlights the advantages of natural processing: the intense fruit flavors bestowed by the origin region present even more exotic passion fruit notes under natural processing.

And this exotic fruit flavor is unique to natural processed beans.

Roasting Techniques

Chen Hao, the roaster for this issue's coffee subscription program, deeply understands that coffee flavor is formed through the interplay of various factors.

Therefore, the same variety will present different flavors when grown in different regions.

For example, the same Caturra variety, when grown in the Canet Estate in Tarrazú, Costa Rica, and processed with raisin honey method, exhibits flavors of fermented grapes, passion fruit, strawberry, black tea, and toffee.

But in the Pital region of Huila, Colombia, after washed processing, its flavor profile is cocoa, hazelnut, caramel, and almond.

So, how to more accurately and comprehensively present a bean while maximizing the restoration of its origin characteristics is his passion.

If we read coffee science books, we learn that coffee roasting is mainly divided into light roast, medium roast, and dark roast. During the roasting process, the roast level can be controlled through the phenomena of "first crack" and "second crack."

But for Chen Hao, these are just surface phenomena. The essence of roasting lies in the manifestation of the Maillard reaction. Specifically, it's the important moment when caramelization begins within the Maillard reaction.

The Maillard reaction is a complex chemical reaction widely present in food cooking, and it's this reaction that makes coffee aromatic.

Chen Hao believes that extending the reaction time during roasting increases flavor complexity; increasing heat and shortening reaction time reduces flavor complexity but increases flavor intensity.

Coffee's floral and fruity aromas are products of the most intense Maillard reaction at 150-170 degrees.

Nut, caramel, and chocolate aromas are products after 170 degrees.

For example, this issue's FrontStreet Coffee Ethiopia Buku Abel belongs to the floral and fruity acid category of coffee and should follow this roasting curve:

He believes that extending the 150-170 degree reaction time increases the diversity and complexity of flavors during the Maillard stage, then increasing heat after 170 degrees to achieve strong sweetness and a slight nutty aroma.

Based on these principles, Chen Hao will repeatedly test and cup during coffee roasting until finding the most perfect curve and flavor. And what is this most perfect curve?

Chen Hao believes the most perfect curve should maximize the restoration of its origin characteristics, allowing baristas and consumers to clearly perceive the bean's personality.

And this issue's FrontStreet Coffee Ethiopia Buku Abel was also born through such a process.

Belonging to FrontStreet Coffee's Ethiopia Goro Estate Buku Abel, under the roaster's hands, it's blended into a full cup of bright and clear tropical fruits: passion fruit, guava, strawberry jam, berry sweetness and acidity, and apricot. And the rustic charm belonging to the Hambela girls permeates as a faint spice aroma.

Important Notice :

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