Introduction to Brazilian Coffee Bean Varieties, Flavor Profiles, and Taste Characteristics | Brazilian Coffee Growing Regions, Historical Stories, and World Production Ranking

When it comes to major coffee-producing countries, Brazil in South America undoubtedly stands at the forefront. Brazil is the world's largest coffee country in terms of cultivation and production. In recent years, domestic coffee consumption in Brazil has also been gradually increasing, making it the world's second-largest consumer country after the United States. Brazil offers a wide variety of coffees, with the vast majority being unwashed and sun-dried. They are classified according to their state of origin and shipping ports.

As the world's leading coffee producer, Brazil supplies nearly 45% of the world's green coffee beans. The length of the country's dry season can even affect global coffee prices.

Brazil has 26 states, 17 of which produce coffee. Among Brazil's coffee-producing regions, seven states account for the largest production, collectively representing 98% of the country's total output.

São Paulo (Mogiana, Centro-Oeste)

Paraná (Norte Pioneiro do Paraná)

Bahia (Planalto da Bahia, Cerrado da Bahia, Atlântico Baiano)

Espírito Santo (Montanhas do Espírito Santo, Conilon Capixaba)

Minas Gerais (Sul de Minas, Cerrado Mineiro, Chapada de Minas, Matas de Minas)

Rondônia (Rondônia)

Rio de Janeiro (Rio de Janeiro)

Legend Episode

The history of Brazil's coffee cultivation is quite legendary. Three hundred years ago, Brazil had no coffee trees at all, but an illicit romance led to Brazil's dominant position in coffee. In 1727, the handsome army officer Francisco de Mello Palheta was sent to French Guiana to mediate a territorial dispute between France and the Netherlands. The governor's wife of French Guiana fell in love with Palheta and gave him a bag of Bourbon coffee seeds (there are also accounts of receiving coffee seedlings). After returning to Brazil, Palheta resigned from his official position and went to the Para province near the equator in the northwest to grow coffee, which unexpectedly sparked a coffee cultivation boom in Brazil.

Over the past two hundred years, coffee plantations gradually moved to the more populous southeastern states of São Paulo and Espírito Santo (translated as "Holy Spirit"), as well as the southern state of Paraná. These areas are located between 20 and 30 degrees south latitude, with slightly higher latitudes where winter frosts cause cold damage, leaving farmers unable to bear the losses. After 1970-1980, Brazilian coffee farmers tried to develop the warmer northern regions of São Paulo in Minas Gerais and Bahia, located between 10 and 20 degrees south latitude, where winters are warmer and free from frost damage. Today, Minas Gerais (hereinafter referred to as Minas) has become the new hope for Brazilian specialty coffee.

Cultivated Varieties

Brazil cultivates a wide variety of coffee varieties, with Red Bourbon, Yellow Bourbon, Mundo Novo, and Catuai currently being the main varieties. Caturra, Acaiá, Obatã, Aramosa, and Laurina are also cultivated and researched. The Agronomic Institute of Campinas in São Paulo is Brazil's renowned arsenal for coffee variety improvement, and Catimor, the most widely grown globally, is the masterpiece of Portuguese and Brazilian scientists.

Mundo Novo

Mundo Novo is a hybrid of Bourbon and Typica, first appeared in the 1940s and remains popular among Latin American coffee-producing countries today. Its disease resistance and yield are superior to Bourbon and Typica, but at the cost of less flavor complexity.

Catuai

Brazil developed Catuai in the 1950s, which is a hybrid of Caturra and Mundo Novo, with strong disease resistance and high yield. Similar to Caturra, Catuai's mature fruits are naturally divided into red and yellow varieties (I personally prefer the former). Catuai is known for its rich acidity and is a common variety in most Central American countries.

Caturra

In the 1930s, people discovered a genetic mutation of Bourbon near the city of Caturra in Brazil, thus naming it Caturra. Caturra has very high yields, and its compact plant form facilitates harvesting, but if planted in lower altitude environments, this characteristic becomes its own worst enemy—coffee becomes quite light here, so the weight of the fruit itself can kill the plant. If planted in high-altitude environments (above 1200 meters), both the quality and yield of Caturra coffee can be better guaranteed. Caturra is a common variety in the Central American coffee belt.

Bourbon

When it comes to Bourbon varieties, many people have heard about the color distinctions, such as Red Bourbon, Yellow Bourbon, and Pink Bourbon. Bourbon is a subspecies mutated from Typica and belongs to the oldest existing coffee varieties along with Typica. When green fruits mature, they present bright red color. Bourbon planted at high altitudes usually has better aroma and bright acidity. Red Bourbon is the most common type because, under normal circumstances, coffee fruits gradually mature from green to slight yellow, then to orange, presenting red color at the optimal picking time, and finally to overripe dark purple.

Red Bourbon is named because its fruits appear red. The same applies to Yellow Bourbon and Pink Bourbon. Yellow Bourbon is generally considered a hybrid of Red Bourbon and other varieties. When mature, Yellow Bourbon fruits present yellow color. Initially discovered in Brazil, Brazil is also the main country planting Yellow Bourbon. Besides its yellow fruits, Yellow Bourbon has relatively low yields and is not resistant to wind and rain, so it is not widely cultivated. Pink Bourbon is even rarer. Pink Bourbon is obtained by hybridizing Red Bourbon and Yellow Bourbon. The reason for its rarity is that the pink shape of the fruit is determined by recessive genes, which are very susceptible to interference, making it difficult to maintain the pink appearance of the fruit.

Brazil's coffee planting areas are mainly dominated by two types of terrain: the Brazilian plateau above 500 meters altitude and the Brazilian plains below 200 meters. The main cultivated and well-known varieties are Bourbon (including Yellow Bourbon, Red Bourbon, and flat bean Santos). The flavor profile of Brazilian coffee is mainly characterized by low acidity, nutty flavors, balance, and moderate body. In the world of specialty coffee, Brazilian coffee is not outstanding, but in espresso coffee, Brazilian coffee beans are often used as blending varieties. Because of its high balance, it is often used by merchants as Blue Mountain flavor beans.

Coffee Bean Characteristics

Brazilian coffee beans refer to all coffee beans grown in Brazil, except for Santos. Most Brazilian beans belong to "good value for money" coffee. They can be used for mass-produced blended coffee beans, mostly heavily roasted. FrontStreet Coffee's two blend beans also selected Brazilian coffee beans: FrontStreet Coffee's basic blend and FrontStreet Coffee's specialty blend. The main raw material for instant coffee is also Brazilian coffee beans.

Brazilian coffee beans are large and fragrant, with moderate bitterness and high-quality acidity. The overall taste is soft with low acidity, and careful tasting reveals endless aftertaste. Brazilian coffee's flavor profile contains lower acidity, combined with the sweet and bitter taste of coffee, making it extremely smooth to drink, and also carrying a faint grassy aroma. It's fragrant with a slight bitterness, sweet and smooth to drink, with an aftertaste that makes people feel refreshed and pleasant. Therefore, without good Brazilian coffee, there's no good espresso.

FrontStreet Coffee's Brazilian Pour-Over Coffee

FrontStreet Coffee's coffee bean list includes two Brazilian coffee beans: Red Bourbon from the Cerrado region and Yellow Bourbon from Queen's Farm. Now let's brew the Brazilian Cerrado coffee beans and learn Brazilian coffee brewing methods. Cerrado belongs to Minas state and is a high-quality coffee-producing region in Brazil. This area is the essence of the Cerrado savanna, with high altitude and fertile soil, making it possible to grow specialty coffee beans with sweet clean flavors, high body, and high cleanliness. FrontStreet Coffee has tasted coffees from all major Brazilian producing regions, and Cerrado, as a large producing region, has the most stable and characteristic flavor. This bean is used by FrontStreet Coffee as a formula in espresso blends and as a daily drink single-origin bean representing the flavor of the Brazilian region.

Brewing Parameters: Using Kono Filter

Water Temperature: 88°C

Dose: 15 grams

Coffee-to-Water Ratio: 1:15

Grind Size: Medium-fine grind (Chinese standard #20 sieve pass rate 70-75%)

FrontStreet Coffee uses segmented extraction, also called three-stage brewing: Bloom with 30g of water for 30 seconds, then pour water in a circular motion with small flow to 125g for segmentation. When the water level drops and is about to expose the coffee bed, continue pouring to 225g and stop pouring. When the water level drops and is about to expose the coffee bed, remove the filter cup. (Timing starts from the beginning of blooming) Extraction time is 2'05"-2'15".

Brazilian Red Bourbon Brewing Flavor

Upon entry, there's an obvious sweetness, accompanied by a faint caramel aroma, containing rich nutty flavors, with a distinct dark chocolate taste in the later stages, giving an overall rounded feeling.

Important Notice :

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