Top 10 Most Expensive Coffees in the World Ranking - How to Choose Imported Coffee Bean Brands

The World's Ten Most Expensive Coffees

Coffee has long been one of the most beloved beverages, and many varieties with exceptional quality and character have emerged, fetching relatively high prices. FrontStreet Coffee presents the following coffees so you can get to know them and choose according to the flavor profile you prefer.

Geisha Coffee

English Name: Geisha coffee

Reputation: The most expensive coffee bean, a three-time cupping champion

Origin: Ethiopia, Panama, Colombia

Taste and Characteristics: Raw beans are blue-green and roasted beans show some wrinkles, with floral notes, tropical fruit, and intense sweetness.

Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee

English Name: Blue Mountain coffee

Reputation: The world's second most expensive coffee

Origin: The Blue Mountains of Jamaica

Taste and Characteristics: A very rich aroma with lingering fruit notes, perfectly balanced acidity, sweetness, body, and bitterness, an aromatic flavor, and an exceptionally smooth drink.

Colombian Coffee

English Name: Colombian coffee

Reputation: Known as emerald coffee and small-bean coffee; the second largest coffee producer

Origin: Colombia

Taste and Characteristics: A sweet fragrance with an acidity balanced by sweetness. Its moderate concentration makes it a common component of premium blends, and its sweet light fragrance is understated yet elegant.

Brazilian Coffee

English Name: Brazilian coffee

Reputation: The largest coffee producer

Origin: Brazil

Taste and Characteristics: Lower acidity combined with a bittersweet taste, an extremely smooth entry with a light grassy fragrance, sweet and mellow.

Yirgacheffe Coffee

English Name: Yirgacheffe coffee

Reputation: Grown in an ancient wetland

Origin: Ethiopia

Taste and Characteristics: A petite and elegant form, a unique lemon, floral, and honeyed sweetness, soft fruit acidity and citrus notes, a clear and bright taste with a rich texture.

Guatemala Coffee

English Name: Guatemala coffee

Reputation: Known for its tobacco-like character

Origin: Guatemala

Taste and Characteristics: Raw beans are blue-green and the beans are small, one of the more acidic varieties, with an acidic taste and a slightly wild edge. Best suited to blending, it has a rich taste with tobacco notes and a smooth, slightly charcoal finish.

Mandheling Coffee

English Name: Mandheling coffee

Reputation: Also known as Sumatran coffee

Origin: Indonesia

Taste and Characteristics: Raw beans are brown or dark green, very rich, aromatic, bittersweet, and mellow with a slight sweetness. It is also an indispensable variety for blending, with a fragrant aroma, moderate acidity, and a rich, solid taste.

Kopi Luwak Coffee

English Name: Kopi Luwak coffee

Reputation: Also known as civet coffee

Origin: Indonesia

Taste and Characteristics: Produced by collecting and processing beans from civet droppings. Civets eat ripe coffee cherries and excrete them through their digestive system, and the fermentation in the stomach gives the coffee a special flavor that has made it highly sought after on the international market.

Hawaiian Coffee

English Name: Kona coffee

Reputation: Known as Kona coffee

Origin: United States

Taste and Characteristics: A perfect appearance, with exceptionally full beans and a bright luster, considered the world's most beautiful coffee beans. Smooth and rich, with an enticing nutty note and a well-balanced, moderate acidity.

Yunnan Coffee

English Name: Yunnan coffee

Reputation: Known as Yunnan small-bean coffee

Origin: Yunnan Province

Taste and Characteristics: Small, round beans with floral notes mixed with citrus flavor, an acidity with berry notes, an extremely dry taste, and a rich malt flavor that feels understated. Every characteristic is strong yet well balanced.

How to Choose

Many coffee lovers are unsure how to choose, but the answer is simple: start from the flavor profile you already enjoy, then match it to the coffee rather than to the price tag.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

If the balance and restraint of Jamaican Blue Mountain is what draws you in, it is worth seeking out a certified single origin rather than a blend that only borrows the name. Only coffee grown in specific areas of the Jamaican Blue Mountains and officially certified may be called Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee, and the Jamaica Coffee Industry Board has built a strict system around it. FrontStreet Coffee's Jamaica Blue Mountain No. 1 comes from the historic Clifton Mount Estate, an estate that has been growing and processing coffee since the mid-18th century, at an average elevation of 4,300 feet (1,310.64 m) where ample altitude, gentle afternoon cloud, shading forest, abundant sunlight, and mineral-rich soil combine to lengthen the ripening of the cherry.

Blue Mountain No. 1 is the highest grade of the lot, and the flavor is exactly what its reputation promises: very clean, complex, and gently mild, with chocolate sweetness, a strong body, and a complete harmony of sweetness, acidity, and bitterness, almost no bitterness of its own, only a moderate and perfect acidity, and a persistent fruit note at the finish. FrontStreet Coffee roasts it medium-dark to emphasize the rounded body and the classic bittersweet-then-sweet character, and ships it within 5 days of roasting so the beans arrive full of aroma.

For pour-over, FrontStreet Coffee suggests a Kono dripper to build the fuller mouthfeel, 15g of coffee per serving, and resting the beans 4-7 days from the roast date for the best flavor. Grind coarser than you would a light roast, roughly the texture of granulated sugar, and brew with 87-88 degrees Celsius water, since water that is too hot is the usual cause of a scorched, bitter cup while water that is too cool leaves it flat. A 1:15 ratio works well with that grind and temperature. Pour in three stages: bloom with 30g of water for 30 seconds, then pour to 120g with a slow, vertical, small circular stream, and finally pour to 225g with a slightly faster flow and faster circles to keep the bed from clogging and over-extracting.