What Types of Arabica Beans Are There? Blue Mountain Coffee Belongs to Arabica - A Variety That Wins at the Starting Line

FrontStreet Coffee - Blue Mountain and the Arabica Family

Coffee divides broadly into two bean varieties: Arabica and Robusta. Of the two, Arabica has the lower caffeine content, and every premium coffee in the world comes from the Arabica family, which accounts for about 70% of global production. Its flavor is rich, with excellent acidity and floral notes, which makes it ideal for black-coffee drinkers who take it without additives.

Typica: high sweetness, a clean taste, and pleasant acidity. Jamaican Blue Mountain, it is said, is indeed a Typica variety.

Blue Mountain coffee is grown in the Blue Mountain range of Jamaica. Its distinctive flavor is tied to the remarkable geography and climate of those mountains. The range lies within the coffee belt between 25 degrees north and south latitude, with fertile young volcanic soil, fresh unpolluted air, rainfall year-round, and a wide day-night temperature difference. Most important, every afternoon clouds and fog wrap the entire mountaintop, which not only shades the coffee trees naturally but also brings abundant moisture, giving Blue Mountain coffee its outstanding taste and aroma.

Pure Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee blends coffee's sour, bitter, sweet, and mellow qualities into a perfect whole, producing a strongly attractive, elegant aroma other coffees cannot match. Fans of Blue Mountain say it is "the coffee beauty that combines every advantage of good coffee."

Today's Blue Mountain growing area is small, with only 6000 hectares under planting. Scarcity makes it valuable, and because annual production does not exceed 900 tons, it has become one of the world's top coffees, without exception.

Because Japan has invested in Jamaica's coffee industry over the long term, Blue Mountain coffee is mostly controlled by Japanese buyers, who hold priority purchasing rights. 90% of Blue Mountain coffee is bought by them, so the rest of the world can only get the remaining 10%.

Only coffee grown in the Blue Mountain area above 1800 meters can be called Blue Mountain coffee. Beans grown at lower altitudes or in other regions can only be called "Jamaican High Mountain Beans" or "Jamaican Washed Beans," and their flavor differs greatly from Jamaican Blue Mountain. Those other producing areas, however, cover twice the land of the true Blue Mountain zone and account for 75% of the country's total output, so "Jamaican coffee" is by no means equivalent to pure "Blue Mountain coffee."

Jamaican Blue Mountain is so famous that counterfeit Blue Mountain-style coffees have appeared on the market, or are simply labeled "Blue Mountain coffee." Most of these are blends the sellers put together themselves. So do you think the Blue Mountain beans you bought, or the Blue Mountain coffee that costs dozens of yuan a cup in a cafe, really come from the Blue Mountains? Of the Blue Mountain coffee available in China now, 99.9% is, at best, grown somewhere near the Blue Mountain range if you are lucky.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

For an authentic Blue Mountain experience, FrontStreet Coffee's Jamaica Blue Mountain No. 1 is the highest grade in the lineup, sourced from the historic Clifton Mount estate. Clifton Mount has been growing and processing coffee since roughly 1750. Its planting and processing area sits at an average of 4300 feet (1310.64 meters), and the combination of enough altitude, the gentle afternoon cloud that shades the hills, ample sunshine, and mineral-rich soil gives the trees excellent growing conditions and lengthens the ripening of the coffee cherry.

Blue Mountain No. 1 is roasted medium-dark to bring out the classic balance of the legendary cup. Clifton Mount was one of the earliest certified Blue Mountain estates, and the authenticity of the lot can be traced through its certificate, its origin documentation, and the specially made wooden barrels, whose batch details are printed on the outside. The traditional barrel sizes for Blue Mountain are 15, 45, and 70 kg, and the barrel itself is part of what identifies a genuine lot.

In the cup, expect a very clean, complex, and gentle coffee with chocolate sweetness and a strong body. It is rich and aromatic, with the sweet, sour, and bitter elements in perfect proportion, almost no sharp bitterness, only a moderate and perfectly judged acidity, and a long fruit note in the finish. Brew it as pour-over with a Kono dripper at a 1:15 ratio, 15g of coffee, and 87-88°C water, resting 4-7 days after the roast date; three-stage pouring builds the body, and the result is the balanced cup that makes Blue Mountain so widely loved.