Central American Coffee Bean Recommendations: Honduras Oak Barrel Fermented Lychee Lan Sherry Coffee Bean Flavors

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

Honduras Finca Mocha Lychee Lan

Basic Information

Country: Honduras
Region: Masaguara
Estate: Finca Mocha
Altitude: 1500-1700m
Varieties: Caturra, Catuai
Processing: Refined Washed + Brandy Barrel Fermentation

Honduras

Honduras is located in northern Central America, bordering the Caribbean Sea to the north and the Pacific Ocean's Gulf of Fonseca to the south. It shares borders with Nicaragua and El Salvador to the east and south, and Guatemala to the west. The country is predominantly mountainous and plateau, featuring a tropical climate with moderate temperatures and abundant rainfall, making it an ideal region for coffee cultivation.

Honduras has approximately 280,000 hectares of coffee plantations, primarily small-scale farms with most coffee plots being less than 3.5 hectares. These small coffee plantations account for sixty percent of Honduras's total coffee production.

Honduran coffee has undergone significant improvements in processing techniques and transportation capabilities, achieving remarkable development in the coffee market over the past 20 years. In the coffee plantations, due to the mountainous terrain, coffee beans are hand-picked and carefully processed to produce higher quality coffee beans. Honduras harvests three million bags of coffee annually, providing coffee lovers with abundant and high-quality beans, and has now become one of the world's top ten coffee exporting countries.

Honduras has six main coffee producing regions: Copán, El Paraiso, Comayagua, Opalaca, Montecillos, and Agalta. The average growing altitude ranges from 1000-1600m, with main cultivated varieties including Bourbon, Caturra, Typica, Catuai, and Pacas.

Honduran coffee beans are characterized by their large, uniform size and consistent, glossy color. For harvesting convenience, farmers prune coffee trees to not exceed 150 centimeters in height, as taller trees would require ladders for picking, which is time-consuming and potentially damaging to the trees from bending branches. Since each coffee fruit matures at different times, manual harvesting is essential to maintain coffee quality, followed by careful selection of ripe red cherries. Coffee fruits on the same branch often require several weeks to complete harvesting.

Honduran coffee offers a rich, mellow flavor profile that is neither astringent nor acidic, with excellent body and aroma, giving it quite a distinctive character. Honduran coffee can reveal multi-layered flavor profiles depending on different roast levels.

Masaguara

Masaguara is a municipality located in the Intibucá department of Honduras, situated in the southern part of the Jesús de Otoro valley, surrounded by mountains and hills. The region is primarily dedicated to coffee growers, who serve as the main economic engine for the area. In contrast, the corresponding valley regions focus on growing basic grains and livestock. The name's origin comes from Alberto Membreño's "Indigenous Place Names," where Masaguara means "place of deer."

Varieties: Caturra, Catuai

Caturra is a natural variant of Bourbon, discovered in Brazil in 1937. Its plant structure is shorter and more compact than Bourbon. While inheriting Bourbon's lineage, it has relatively weak disease resistance but higher yields than Bourbon. Although discovered in Brazil, Caturra is not well-suited for Brazilian growing conditions and therefore was not widely cultivated there. Instead, it became popular in Central and South American regions such as Colombia, Costa Rica, and Nicaragua. The higher the altitude where Caturra is grown, the better the quality, but correspondingly, the lower the yield.

When lightly roasted, Caturra exhibits prominent acidity with overall brightness. With proper processing, it can display excellent sweetness. However, compared to Bourbon, Caturra has relatively lower body and slightly less clean cup profile. Typically, Caturra produces red cherries, but in very rare regions, yellow Caturra can be found, such as the minimal yellow Caturra cultivation in Hawaii.

Catuai is a coffee variety resulting from artificial hybridization between Caturra and Mundo Novo. Catuai demonstrates good resistance to natural disasters, particularly strong resistance to wind and rain. The Catuai tree is relatively low-growing, and compared to other coffee trees, Catuai fruits grow more densely and are harder to harvest. The fruits come in both red and yellow varieties.

Processing Method

What is barrel fermentation?

Barrel fermentation is borrowed from winemaking techniques. Its greatest impact on wine is that moderate oxidation through the barrel stabilizes the wine's structure and infuses barrel flavors into the wine. It plays a similar role in the coffee fermentation process.

Barrels allow minimal amounts of air to pass through the barrel walls, penetrating into the barrel to cause moderate oxidation of the coffee beans. The appropriate amount of oxygen entering also accelerates coffee fermentation, smoothing the tannins while gradually transforming fresh fruit aromas into rich, complex mature wine aromas. The barrel's moderate hardness ensures good waterproofing and storage safety. Additionally, barrels contain certain amounts of tannins, which during the storage process of green coffee beans, penetrate into the beans, giving the coffee layered complexity and rich wine-like aromas.

This refined washed, brandy barrel-fermented Lychee Lan coffee bean first undergoes refined washing of freshly picked coffee cherries, then is placed in brandy oak barrels for low-temperature fermentation for 30-40 days (at approximately 15-20°C), allowing the green coffee beans to absorb the barrel's flavors, followed by shade drying.

Coffee beans processed through brandy barrel fermentation have delicate lychee and honey sweetness, while also integrating full-bodied brandy aromas and oak barrel fragrances.

Roasting Profile Analysis

Heat the roaster to 220°C, with damper setting at 4 and heat at 200. Return temperature point at 1'32", when roaster temperature reaches 140°C, maintain heat and open damper to 6. At this point, bean surface turns yellow, grassy aroma completely disappears, entering dehydration stage. At 151°C, reduce heat to 120, and at 176°C, reduce heat to 80, keeping damper unchanged.

At 8'28", ugly wrinkles and black spots appear on bean surface, toast aroma distinctly transforms to coffee aroma, which can be defined as the prelude to first crack. At this moment, listen carefully for the first crack sound. At 9'15", first crack begins, adjust damper to 8 (adjust heat very carefully, not so low as to eliminate cracking sounds). After first crack, develop for 2'10", then drop at 195°C.

Agtron bean color value 70.1 (upper image), Agtron ground color value 76.6 (lower image), Roast Delta value 6.5.

Cupping Profile

Lychee Lan coffee bean flavor notes: Lychee, honey, brandy, dark chocolate.

Brewing

FrontStreet Coffee shares brewing parameters:

Recommended brewing method: Pour-over
Filter: Hario V60
Water temperature: 90°C
Dose: 15 grams
Ratio: 1:15
Grind size: Medium-fine grind (BG 6k: 58% pass-through rate on China standard #20 sieve)
Brewing technique: Segmented extraction

Use 34g of water for 36-second bloom, then continue pouring in small circular motions to 120g for segmentation. When water level drops and is about to expose the coffee bed, continue pouring to 229g and stop. Wait for water level to drop and just before exposing the coffee bed, remove the filter cup. Extraction time is 2'00" (timing starts from bloom).

Lychee Lan coffee bean flavor profile: Initial notes of lychee and brandy with creamy texture. As temperature changes, wine notes and dark chocolate become prominent, with thick mouthfeel and obvious honey sweetness in the aftertaste.

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473