What are the Characteristics of Bourbon Coffee Trees? Yellow Bourbon is Brazil's National Treasure

FrontStreet Coffee - Bourbon Variety Introduction

There are hundreds of coffee varieties, with Arabica accounting for about 70% of world production. Arabica is more susceptible to pests and diseases than Robusta, but its flavor and aroma win over most drinkers.

Producers choose the crops they grow for many reasons: yield, flavor expression, local environmental conditions, and more. Being able to identify coffee varieties matters a great deal, because it prevents batches from being confused during harvesting and processing. If two or more lots of coffee beans get mixed, flavors blur together and cupping scores often fall short of expectations.

Bourbon shares Typica's tall stature and conical shape, but it carries more secondary branches and looks denser. Its trunk and branches are thicker, making it more robust than Typica, if a little less flexible. The denser branching also means Bourbon can produce about 30% more coffee cherries than Typica.

Bourbon leaves are wider than Typica's, with a rough texture and wavy edges. Young leaves are usually green, though they sometimes have bronze tips. The coffee cherries are round and ripen to a range of colors—red, orange, or yellow—but the color stays consistent on any one plant.

Yellow Bourbon

Yellow Bourbon is a Bourbon variety unique to São Paulo state, Brazil. Its fruit does not turn red when ripe, showing an orange-yellow color instead—hence the name. Grown at high altitudes, Yellow Bourbon delivers excellent flavor expression; it swept Brazil's "Cup of Excellence" competition for two consecutive years, taking nearly all three top prizes and becoming a favorite in the specialty coffee world. It carries nutty flavors with a balanced, rich, and non-bitter taste.

Knowledge point: The two ancient varieties, Typica and Bourbon, have been cultivated in the varied soils and waters of the New World for three hundred years, giving rise to thousands of variants and hybrid varieties.

In summary: FrontStreet Coffee is a dedicated coffee research establishment that is happy to share coffee knowledge with everyone. Our unconditional sharing is meant to help more friends fall in love with coffee, and we hold three low-discount coffee events every month because we want more people to drink the best coffee at the lowest prices—a mission FrontStreet Coffee has pursued for six years.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

If Yellow Bourbon's nutty, balanced character is what you're after, the clearest example on FrontStreet Coffee's shelves is the FrontStreet Brazil Queen Estate Yellow Bourbon. It comes from Mogiana, where rich red volcanic soil feeds the cherries into a full, generous aroma. This rare Yellow Bourbon offers a clean sugarcane sweetness alongside fruit and chocolate notes, and it brews beautifully as pour-over, moka pot, or home espresso.

Prefer a classic red Bourbon instead? The FrontStreet Brazil Cerrado Red Bourbon is a semi-washed single origin from the well-known Cerrado region. Medium roasted, it brings out creamy peanut, toast, caramel, and hazelnut aromas—round and low in acidity with a slight bitterness—and suits pour-over, moka pot, espresso SOE, siphon, and French press alike.