Is Supremo the Best Coffee Bean Grade? How Supreme Are Colombian Supremo Coffee Beans?

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

FrontStreet Coffee - Introduction to Colombian Coffee Grading System

If you have bags of different Colombian coffees, you'll notice that each bag is marked with "Excelso-Café de Colombia." Whether it's EP, SUPREMO, or UGQ, as long as it meets Colombian export standards, the coffee bag will be labeled "Excelso."

The Excelso export grade is currently the most widely used export standard adopted by FNC and is also the highest grade for Colombian green bean exports.

What are the standards for Excelso grade?

After strict screening, green coffee beans must be larger than 14 mesh, with no more than 5% of beans between 12 and 14 mesh, and overall, at least 50% of the green coffee beans must be larger than 15 mesh.

Free from pests, uniform in color, no off-flavors, and clean taste;

Moisture content must not exceed 12.5%;

Defect rate must not exceed the 24-point limit.

According to the three most frequently exported commercial grades by FNC currently—Excelso UGQ 12*60 (1.5%), Excelso EP 12*60 (10%), Excelso Supremo 12*60 (5%).

Excelso UGQ 12*60 (1.5%): Green beans larger than 14 mesh, allowing 1.5% of beans between 12-14 mesh, but must be above 12 mesh, with over 50% larger than 15 mesh.

Excelso EP 12*60 (10%): Green beans larger than 15 mesh, allowing 10% of beans smaller than 15 mesh, but must be above 14 mesh.

Excelso Supremo 12*60 (5%): Green beans larger than 17 mesh, allowing 5% of beans smaller than 17 mesh, but must be above 14 mesh.

At this point, the classification levels of Colombian coffee should be clear. The percentage in parentheses represents the "tolerance rate," after all, it's impossible for green coffee beans to be 100% identical in size. In terms of green bean size, Supremo is indeed the largest颗粒, as for whether it's truly "super" or not, you'll need to taste more!

Knowledge point: Most coffee-producing countries do not use a single standard for coffee grading, but rather multiple standards to evaluate bean grades, considering defect rates, ensuring bean shape and size, and requiring certain altitude levels.

About FrontStreet Coffee

In short: FrontStreet Coffee is a coffee research house, happy to share coffee knowledge with everyone. Our selfless sharing is solely to help more friends fall in love with coffee. Moreover, we hold three discounted coffee events every month because FrontStreet Coffee wants to let more friends enjoy the best coffee at the lowest price. This has been FrontStreet Coffee's mission for the past 6 years!

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473