How to Brew Yunnan Small Bean Coffee & Flavor Profile Introduction

FrontStreet Coffee: How to Brew Yunnan Catimor

Catimor is the workhorse variety across Yunnan Province's coffee-growing regions, including Dehong, Baoshan, Pu'er, Xishuangbanna, Lincang, Wenshan, and Yuxi.

The variety has an interesting backstory. In 1959, Portuguese researchers transplanted Caturra — a Bourbon mutation from Brazil — to East Timor and crossed it with the Timor Hybrid, which carries Robusta genetics. The result was Catimor, a variety with outstanding disease resistance and productivity. When leaf rust swept through coffee-producing countries around the world, international organizations helped producing nations promote Catimor widely as a way to fight the disease and raise yields.

Processing Method

This coffee is washed (wet-processed).

Sorting the cherries — pulping — fermentation — washing — drying — hulling

Farmers run the cherries through depulping machines to strip away most of the fruit, then channel the parchment coffee into clean-water tanks to soak and ferment, which removes any remaining mucilage. Washing gives the coffee a distinct fruit acidity and a much cleaner cup.

FrontStreet Coffee's Yunnan Catimor Brew Guide

Recommended method: pour-over

Dripper: V60

Water temperature: 90–92°C

Coffee-to-water ratio: 1:15

Grind size: medium-fine, similar to fine granulated sugar (57% pass-through on the China standard #20 sieve on a Vario grinder)

Technique: segmented pouring. Bloom with 30g of water for 30 seconds, then pour in slow circles up to 124g. When the water level drops and the coffee bed is about to break the surface, pour again up to 227g. Lift the dripper just before the bed is fully exposed, timing from the start of the bloom. Total extraction time: 2 minutes.

Brewed through a V60, this coffee shows a pronounced nutty aroma, with herbal, chocolate, and caramel notes up front and a finish that carries a light fruit acidity.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

FrontStreet Yunnan Small Bean (Baoshan). If you are just getting into Chinese specialty coffee, start here. Grown in Baoshan's dry-hot river valley around Lujiangba, where big day-night temperature swings and moderate rainfall give the coffee its signature sweet finish, it is washed and roasted to a medium level. The cup shows gentle nut and chocolate sweetness, a touch of caramel, and a light plum-like acidity — a friendly, affordable introduction to Yunnan's terroir.

FrontStreet 2013 Yunnan Natural Typica. For a more expressive Yunnan cup, try this lot from FrontStreet's own estate, planted with Typica — the variety French missionaries first brought into Yunnan's Zhugula Village, Binchuan County, back in 1904. Only fully ripe cherries are picked, then sun-dried using the most traditional post-harvest processing. Roasted medium, it is fuller-bodied with more pronounced sweetness and acidity: dark berry and citrus tones, caramel sweetness, chocolate, a whisper of dried apricot, and a black-tea finish.