What is the Grade and Quality Level of Yirgacheffe Coffee? Introduction to the Origin and Variety Characteristics of Yirgacheffe Coffee Beans

The Beginning of a Coffee Journey

Like FrontStreet Coffee, many coffee enthusiasts have fallen into the world of specialty coffee after tasting a cup of floral and fruity Yirgacheffe at a café one day. Since then, whenever specialty coffee is mentioned, FrontStreet Coffee first thinks of this most renowned regional flavor.

Yirgacheffe: From the Homeland of Coffee

As the birthplace of coffee, Ethiopia preserves tens of thousands of native Arabica coffee varieties, making it a natural coffee museum. Coffee is a very important economic crop locally, with most regions of the country growing coffee and households having the habit of drinking coffee.

The town of Yirgacheffe is located in the Sidamo province of Ethiopia, with an altitude reaching over 2,000 meters, making it one of the highest altitude coffee-producing regions in Ethiopia. Coffee trees are mostly planted in farmers' own backyards or mixed with other crops in farmland. Each household's production is limited, making it typical garden coffee. These mountain villages are shrouded in mist, with spring-like weather year-round. Summer brings gentle breezes that are cool but not hot, rainy but not damp, while winter brings no frost damage, thus nurturing this unique regional flavor of citrus and floral notes.

The high planting altitude of about 2,000 meters creates significant day-night temperature differences. Coffee trees grow slowly, and the fruit takes longer to mature, consequently storing more aromatic substances. Therefore, the harvest season is also relatively late. Generally, from October to January of the following year, we can see busy farmers harvesting coffee berries in the mountains and their home gardens, gradually producing the next year's Yirgacheffe batches.

The Contribution of Washed Processing

We all know that Ethiopia, located on the African continent, has very scarce water resources. Traditionally, coffee was naturally dried using the sun-drying method. Due to crude techniques, coffee beans were often thrown directly onto mud floors or rooftops for drying. Coffee easily absorbed earthy flavors from the ground or suffered from uneven heating leading to over-fermentation, ultimately affecting coffee quality. To improve coffee quality, the Ethiopian government introduced more advanced washed processing technology and related equipment from Central and South America in 1972. This allowed Yirgacheffe coffee to exhibit fresh citrus notes and elegant white floral aromas, with an overall bright and delicate flavor. Thus, Yirgacheffe became independent from the Sidamo region, becoming today's renowned coffee region in the coffee world.

Washed processing steps: After picking coffee cherries, they are placed in water, using buoyancy to sort out underripe fruits. Then, a pulping machine removes the cherry skin/pulp, followed by resting in fermentation tanks for 18-36 hours until the mucilage layer decomposes. After fermentation is complete, the parchment beans are washed in channels for 30-60 minutes. Through specially designed channels with water flow, low-density, poor-quality beans are removed. The high-quality coffee beans are then drained of moisture and spread on African-style raised beds for drying. Finally, when they reach the target moisture content, they can be packaged and stored.

"Operation Cherry Red"

Of course, Yirgacheffe also has specialty-grade natural coffee beans. The Red Cherry coffee beans on FrontStreet Coffee's bean list are selected from naturally processed Yirgacheffe.

To increase the income of local Ethiopian farmers and improve coffee quality, Dutch trading company Trabocca BV launched the "Operation Cherry Red Project" in 2007. The project mainly focuses on improving processing techniques such as washed, semi-washed, and natural methods in high-altitude regions like Yirgacheffe, Ethiopia. Professional cuppers participate, and different coffee harvest volumes are established for different microclimate zones during harvest season. Only 100% mature red coffee cherries must be harvested, with production approximately 1,500-3,000 KG. The economic loan support, new hardware equipment, and production knowledge provided by Trabocca Company have greatly improved the quality of coffee beans in the Yirgacheffe region and even throughout Ethiopia. Correspondingly, coffee commands higher prices, thereby increasing farmers' income.

Freshly picked red coffee fruits are manually sorted to remove defective beans and those that are overripe or insect-damaged, leaving only good beans. They are then sent to drying areas for processing. Of course, different regions use different drying racks—some might use waterproof tarps, high beds, etc., but the most common is African raised beds. Drying generally takes 27-30 days until the coffee turns dark purple and moisture content drops to 11%. Natural processed FrontStreet Coffee Yirgacheffe has more intense flavors and richer layers, with wine-like fermentation notes and relatively high sweetness.

Gedeb Cooperative

With the arrival of the specialty coffee era, consumers not only actively seek to learn about and discover more excellent single-origin regions and growers but are also willing to pay higher prices for high-quality coffee, which in turn gives back to each farmer. Regions we often hear about like Kochere, Wenago, and Worka are all very renowned micro-regions under the Yirgacheffe coffee-producing area, each with excellent cooperative production teams and distinctive coffee characteristics.

Gedeb Cooperative, with 300 member smallholder farmers, is famous for growing some of Ethiopia's highest quality coffee. Their processing method follows the most traditional washed processing style, earning them the reputation as "Yirgacheffe's last pure land." Among guests who come to FrontStreet Coffee for coffee, if they hope to drink washed fruit-forward coffee, FrontStreet Coffee's baristas will recommend the FrontStreet Coffee Yirgacheffe Gedeb Cooperative beans from the shelf. The washed processed Gedeb Cooperative coffee not only lacks the intense bitterness of traditional black coffee but instead presents fresh, bright citrus and lemon acidity, as well as jasmine fragrance, making many coffee enthusiasts fall in love at first sip.

Yirgacheffe Varieties: Native Heirloom

In the Ethiopian coffee beans we often purchase, the variety is listed as local native or Heirloom native. The beans are small, variously shaped, and quite different in appearance from coffee beans of other regions.

This is because in Ethiopia's original forests, coffee varieties are numerous, with countless gene types, making identification extremely difficult. Additionally, the local government hopes to protect these varieties by not publicly disclosing them, thus using "Heirloom" as a general term for these coffee categories. Yirgacheffe coffee varieties are local native types, small-grained, relatively round in shape, with very small beans, mostly between 14-15 screen size.

Why Do So Many People Love Yirgacheffe Flavor?

Unlike that "bitter coffee" era, lightly roasted Yirgacheffe can be said to have opened the "new era of fruity acidity coffee." The main reason coffee is intensely bitter is that roasters roast coffee beans deeply, with the main flavor direction being nuts and dark chocolate. With the emergence of specialty coffee concepts, to preserve more acidity, roasters only roast FrontStreet Coffee's Yirgacheffe coffee to an appropriate light level, allowing Yirgacheffe to express pleasant fruit sweetness and white floral aromas.

Preferring sweetness and fearing bitterness happens to align with popular taste preferences, which is one of the reasons why Yirgacheffe is so popular worldwide. For such popular Yirgacheffe coffee, FrontStreet Coffee has of course added it to FrontStreet Coffee's daily bean series for coffee beginners. High-value FrontStreet Coffee daily beans allow friends new to the coffee world to taste the basic regional flavors at ultra-low prices, while small packaging design avoids waste from unfinished coffee.

FrontStreet Coffee's Yirgacheffe Brewing Parameters:

Filter: V60
Water temperature: 92-93°C
Dose: 15g
Ratio: 1:15
Grind size: Fine sugar consistency (20# sieve screen to 78%)

First pour 30g of water for 30-second bloom, then pour 95g (scale shows around 125g), finishing in about 1 minute. When the water level drops to 2/3 of the coffee bed, pour the remaining 100g (scale shows around 225g), finishing in about 1 minute 35 seconds. Complete drip filtration at 2'10", remove the filter, and finish extraction.

FrontStreet Coffee's Ethiopian Yirgacheffe Natural Red Cherry coffee flavor: Lemon, licorice, citrus, berries, sweet orange, with overall high sweetness, caramel and cream notes in the aftertaste, and tea-like aroma in the finish.

FrontStreet Coffee's Ethiopian Yirgacheffe Washed Gedeb Cooperative coffee flavor: Citrus and tea notes upon entry, with cream, caramel, and almond notes appearing as temperature changes, with a distinct clean and sweet aftertaste.

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

For more specialty coffee beans, please add the private WeChat of FrontStreet Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee), WeChat ID: qjcoffeex

Important Notice :

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