Differences Between Coffee Varieties: Characteristics and Flavor Profiles of Typica and Bourbon Coffee

FrontStreet Coffee - A Guide to Common Coffee Varieties

There are more than 500 species and some 6,000 varieties of coffee, most of them tropical trees and shrubs. Of the four main types of coffee tree in the world, only two carry real commercial value and are widely cultivated — and the beans they produce outclass those of all the others.

Typica

The oldest native variety from Ethiopia; every Arabica variety descends from it. Typica has bronze-colored young leaves, and its beans are oval or slender and pointed. The cup is elegant, but the tree is fragile, disease-prone, and low-yielding. Legendary estate beans such as Jamaican Blue Mountain, Sumatran Mandheling, and Hawaiian Kona all belong to the Typica family. Those bronze young leaves are one of its identifying marks.

Bourbon

A variant of Typica that arose after early transplanting to Yemen, with the bean shape shifting from slender and pointed to rounded. In 1715, France carried the rounded Yemen Mocha beans to Bourbon Island off the east coast of Africa (renamed Réunion after the French Revolution), and the variety took the island's name. The rounded Bourbon beans then reached Brazil and Central and South America indirectly in 1727, and in 1732 the British transplanted Yemen Mocha to St. Helena (later Napoleon's place of exile) — also rounded Bourbons. Bourbon is a perennial champion in the cupping competitions of the Americas.

Genetic Mutations

Bourbon Pointu

Discovered on Bourbon Island in 1810, its bean shape turned from rounded back to pointed, with only half the caffeine of ordinary coffee. Low-yielding and delicate, it is extremely precious (and mostly grown in laboratories).

Maragogype (Elephant Bean)

The best-known Typica mutation, first found in 1870 in the Maragogype growing district of Bahia state in northeastern Brazil. The beans run at least three times larger than ordinary Arabica, hence the nickname. At low altitude Maragogype cups poorly, but at high altitude it offers better flavor, mild acidity, and a pleasant sweetness. (The image on the right shows Maragogype beans.)

Geisha

A Typica-family derived variety, exported from Ethiopia's Geisha Mountain in 1931 (Geisha shares its pronunciation with the Japanese word for "geisha"). It languished in obscurity in country after country until it was transplanted to Panama in the 1960s, after which it began winning cupping competitions regularly from 2005 onward.

Kenya's "SL28" and "SL34"

Direct descendants of Bourbon, selected and bred by French and British missionaries-researchers in Kenya in the early twentieth century. Over the past hundred years they have adapted to Kenya's high-phosphate soils, producing the characteristic acidic fragrance of Kenyan coffee. Kenya's finest coffees come from these two varieties, though they lose their distinctive character when transplanted elsewhere.

Bourbon Amarello (Yellow Bourbon)

A Bourbon variety unique to São Paulo state, Brazil, where the cherries never turn red at ripeness, staying orange-yellow instead. It was later found that other Bourbon-derived varieties in the region share the yellow fruit skin.

Caturra

A single-gene mutation of Bourbon discovered in Brazil in the 1950s. It out-yields Bourbon and resists disease better, and its shorter plants make picking easier. Unfortunately it shares Bourbon's vice — a heavy crop one year, a rest the next. Its flavor ranks on par with, or slightly below, Bourbon.

But it adapts well and can be planted at high density without shade trees, thriving even in direct strong sunlight — hence its other name, "Sun Coffee."

Caturra suits altitudes from a low 700 meters up to 1,700 meters; the higher the altitude, the better the flavor, though yields fall accordingly. Yellow Caturra variants exist in Central and South America too, but their reputation never matched Yellow Bourbon's.

Pacas

A Bourbon variety discovered in El Salvador. In 1935, Salvadoran farmer Don Alberto Pacas selected high-yielding San Remo Bourbon trees for cultivation on his farm, and in 1956 they out-produced the other trees of their type. Dr. William Cogwill of the University of Florida confirmed a genetic mutation of Bourbon and named it "Pacas."

High-yielding and excellent in quality, Pacas became quite popular in Central America. Today 68% of El Salvador's coffee is Bourbon-derived, with Pacas accounting for 29%.

Villa Sarchi

A Bourbon variety first discovered in Costa Rica in the 1960s, increasingly appearing at the top of cupping rankings — a dark horse with a bright future. It is a rare variety bred from red Bourbon trees. It resists strong winds, loves high-altitude environments, and delivers excellent acidity and a range of fruit notes: high sweetness, bright delicate citrus acidity, deeper raisin and nut aromatics, high complexity, and excellent balance.

Kona

Though cultivated at only a few hundred meters, Kona from Hawaii's Big Island benefits from gentle sea breezes and fertile volcanic soil, giving it remarkably clean acidity and sweetness. Set against the much higher-altitude Blue Mountain, it can even claim the advantage.

Blue Mountain

Globally coveted and hard to source, Blue Mountain belongs to the Typica family. Why so expensive? Largely because Japan's exclusive purchase contracts lock up most of the crop, and partly because it adapts poorly outside Jamaica, performing below par in foreign environments. After 200 years of domestication in Jamaica, Blue Mountain has evolved better resistance to coffee berry disease than typical Typica.

Arabica Intraspecific Hybrids

Catuai

Catuai is a cross of Mundo Novo and Caturra, making it a second-generation hybrid. It inherits Caturra's short stature and shores up Arabica's fragile fruit: the cherries are firm and resist dropping in strong winds. The great regret is a flavor that feels somewhat flat next to Caturra's.

Catuai comes in red- and yellow-fruited forms, with the red winning awards more often. Catuai, Caturra, Mundo Novo, and Bourbon are Brazil's four main varieties.

Pacamara

A hybrid of Pacas and Maragogype, with beans second only to Maragogype in size. It was developed in El Salvador in the 1950s and has posted impressive cupping results in recent years.

Knowledge Point

Whole coffee beans are the form that best preserves coffee's complete flavor, guaranteeing freshness and original taste.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Want to taste a Typica-family classic? FrontStreet Coffee's PWN Golden Mandheling comes from Sumatra, where the Dutch first planted coffee on Java in the late seventeenth century before leaf rust pushed cultivation north to Sumatra's highlands. Today the Aceh and North Sumatra provinces grow most of Indonesia's Arabica — including Typica-derived Mandheling — dried with the local wet-hulled method that thrives in a climate of 70-90% humidity and 2,000mm of annual rain. PWN applies uncompromising standards: only beans above screen size 18, fewer than 3 defects per 300g sample (meeting the top G1 grade), and three rounds of hand-sorting. The medium-dark roast yields low acidity, a thick, lasting body, herbaceous and dark-chocolate notes with a hint of earth, and rich caramel sweetness.

To brew it, FrontStreet recommends 87-88°C water, 15g of coffee at a 1:15 ratio, a grind like coarse granulated sugar, and a three-stage pour — 30ml to bloom, 100ml to lift the bed, then a gentle 95ml center pour — to bring out the full body, caramel sweetness, and chocolate-nut character. For espresso instead, the FrontStreet Classic Blend adds medium-dark Mandheling to Brazil's creamy nut profile — butter, roasted chestnut, caramel, with sandalwood, herb, and spice notes plus a touch of Robusta for extra crema — perfect for lattes and Dirty espresso.