Introduction to Brazilian Cerrado Bourbon Coffee Bean Varieties: Characteristics, Flavor, and Taste

Introduction to Bourbon Coffee

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Coffee, as one of the three major beverages in the world, is very popular in people's daily lives. Coffee is also an agricultural product, and like growing vegetables and fruits, it has its seasonality. Coffee tree varieties also require daily maintenance, and coffee tree species will continuously produce mutations and variants.

Just as most coffee varieties on the market today are variants of Bourbon and Typica, because Bourbon and Typica are among the world's oldest varieties and their flavors are excellent. Today, FrontStreet Coffee will introduce you to the dissemination history of Bourbon coffee.

Origin and Varieties of Bourbon Coffee

Bourbon coffee is named after its cultivation location, because it was planted on Bourbon Island, so it was named after the island. The previous Bourbon Island is now Réunion Island. However, Bourbon coffee is not the original coffee tree species of Bourbon Island, but was transported from Yemen and then planted on Bourbon Island.

After long-term evolution, the current Bourbon coffee tree species have developed variations in flavor. In today's coffee plantations, you might see Red Bourbon, Yellow Bourbon, and Pink Bourbon, which are determined by the recessive genes of Yellow Bourbon and Red Bourbon. Their names are determined by color. However, most Bourbon coffees are Red Bourbon. Red Bourbon coffee has higher sweetness, while Yellow Bourbon is rarer and has slightly higher acidity.

Bourbon Coffee in Brazil and Its Spread

Brazil's Bourbon coffee is particularly famous. Brazil introduced round Bourbon from Bourbon Island after 1860 to replace the lower-yield Typica. Because South American Typica came from the "European mother plant," its genetic uniformity made it vulnerable to being "completely wiped out" by pests and diseases. This was the first time Bourbon coffee entered Central and South America, and it quickly spread from Brazil northward to other regions of South and Central America. When Bourbon adapted to the climate of Central and South America, it produced many variants, such as the Yellow Bourbon, Pink Bourbon, Caturra, Pacas mentioned above. FrontStreet Coffee will briefly introduce the variants of Bourbon coffee.

Red Bourbon and Its Characteristics

First, the Red Bourbon variety, its coffee cherries turn wine-red when ripe, and the green coffee beans are relatively round. Bourbon varieties planted at high altitudes usually have better aroma and bright acidity, with a flavor similar to red wine when tasted. Among the coffee beans offered by FrontStreet Coffee, besides the daily coffee Brazil Red Fruit which is a Bourbon variety, there is also a coffee bean from the Guatemala Huehuetenango region that is a Bourbon variety, but it is also mixed with Caturra and Catuai, which are variants of Bourbon coffee.

Catimor and Yunnan Coffee

In recent years, the increasingly renowned Yunnan coffee region most commonly plants Catimor coffee, which is a hybrid of Caturra (a Bourbon variant) and Timor coffee. Initially, Yunnan coffee planted Typica coffee. Due to the extremely low yield of Typica, which brought low economic benefits, coffee farmers were reluctant to plant Typica and preferred to plant the higher-yield Catimor coffee. Although Catimor coffee has high production, its flavor cannot compare to Typica coffee, lacking aroma and taste.

Tanzanian Bourbon Coffee

According to FrontStreet Coffee's understanding, Bourbon coffee is also planted in the southern region of Tanzania. The commonly planted coffee varieties in the Tanzania region are Bourbon, Typica, and Kent. This coffee bean from the southern Tanzania region, like Mount Kilimanjaro coffee beans, uses the common Central American washed method, but the variety is Bourbon. Bourbon coffee has very high sweetness, bright acidity, and higher yield than Typica coffee. It is also susceptible to leaf rust disease.

Tasting Notes and Characteristics

FrontStreet Coffee conducted a cupping of Tanzanian Bourbon coffee beans. It uses medium-light roasting to highlight the coffee flavors of the southern region. FrontStreet Coffee found that this Tanzanian Bourbon coffee has very rich floral aromas, with berry and citrus acidity, and some nutty flavors in the finish. Coffee from the southern region has rich floral aromas, wine-like fragrance, and gentle acidity; coffee from the Mount Kilimanjaro region has bright acidity and a mellow mouthfeel, thanks to the fertile volcanic soil, giving it a mineral water-like sweetness. It is precisely because Tanzanian coffee has a mellow texture, suitable acidity, and rich aroma that Europeans used to call Tanzanian coffee the "gentleman of coffee."

Yellow Bourbon and Its Unique Qualities

Yellow Bourbon coffee is a unique Bourbon variant from São Paulo state, Brazil. When the coffee ripens, it doesn't turn red but presents an orange-yellow color. However, Yellow Bourbon's yield is very rare, so FrontStreet Coffee has only listed one Yellow Bourbon, which is the coffee bean from Brazil's Queen Manor Farm. Although the yield is low, when planted at high altitudes, it has excellent flavor performance. Therefore, when you taste this Yellow Bourbon from FrontStreet Coffee, you will find that in addition to having the nutty flavors of the Americas and rich chocolate aroma, it has a very bright and refreshing mouthfeel.

Pink Bourbon from Colombia

As for Pink Bourbon, in FrontStreet Coffee's opinion, Colombian Pink Bourbon must be mentioned. Because a Pink Bourbon coffee that FrontStreet Coffee acquired comes from the Huila region of Colombia. Coffee beans produced in the Huila region are very famous and of very high quality. Because FrontStreet Coffee has cupped many coffee beans from the Huila coffee region, the coffee beans produced in Huila have soft fruit acidity in the front, with good sweetness in the back, and overall excellent balance, making people feel that the coffee beans from this region have strong plasticity. Therefore, FrontStreet Coffee believes that using different green bean processing methods for coffee beans from this region will bring different surprises to the taste buds.

Pink Bourbon was first discovered in the town of Palestine, Huila province, Colombia, and is currently mainly planted in the Huila region of Colombia. It is a natural hybrid variety of Yellow Bourbon and Red Bourbon. Among them, FrontStreet Coffee has conducted cupping and brewing experiments on this Pink Bourbon. When FrontStreet Coffee roasts these coffee beans, they use medium-light roasting to highlight the unique flavor of Pink Bourbon. The FrontStreet Coffee barista uses a 200ml standard cupping bowl, with a grind size that has a 70%-75% pass rate through a #20 standard sieve, using 11.1g of coffee and water temperature of 94 degrees Celsius.

First, grind and smell the dry aroma. This Pink Bourbon's dry aroma has fresh floral fragrance. Then add water to fill the bowl to confirm the wet aroma. Its wet aroma is the fresh fragrance of blueberries. After 4 minutes, break the crust and remove the grounds for flavor identification. FrontStreet Coffee's cupping results show that the overall flavor of this Bourbon coffee is: fresh floral aroma, blueberry and green grape juice sweetness, with cherry notes in the middle section, and a brown sugar-like sweetness in the finish. In terms of acidity, it more presents a complex expression of citrus and berries.

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