How to Brew Light Roast Coffee Beans: Yirgacheffe Pour-Over Technique Tutorial and Brewing Guide

FrontStreet Coffee - Yirgacheffe Kochere Natural G1 Brewing Tutorial

Yirgacheffe Kochere Natural G1

Variety: Local heirloom varieties

Grade: G1

Altitude: 1,800-2,100 m

Processing: Natural

Flavor: Citrus, tea-like, berries

With medium-light roast coffee, the grounds tend to float on the water surface longer during the brew, creating more resistance as water flows through the filter. To keep extraction time under control, FrontStreet Coffee recommends a dripper designed for faster flow.

Extraction parameters used:

Coffee grounds: 20 g

Grind size: Medium

Water temperature: starting at 91°C, 350 g total, finishing at 88°C

Extraction time: 3 minutes 5 seconds

Extracted liquid: 323.4 g, concentration 1.18%

Extraction yield: 19.1%

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation: Yirgacheffe Beans and How to Brew Them

If you are new to Ethiopian coffee, start with FrontStreet Coffee's everyday washed Yirgacheffe. Known for white jasmine florals, bright citrus and lemon acidity, and a tea-like finish, and priced affordably, it is the first bean many people reach for when getting into specialty coffee. Yirgacheffe is a small town in the Sidamo province of southern Ethiopia at roughly 1,700-2,100 m, with coffee trees planted above 1,800 m - among the highest coffee-growing areas in the world. The town's name means "let us settle in this wetland" in the old language, and its unmistakable white florals and lemon-citrus acidity have become shorthand for Ethiopian specialty coffee. The region's fame grew so great that in 2010 the Ethiopian Commodity Exchange split it off from Sidamo as its own designation, giving us the household name Yirgacheffe is today.

Yirgacheffe town actually encompasses many smaller districts, even single villages, and several of them host experienced, technically mature cooperatives whose coffees rise to another level. The best example is FrontStreet Coffee's washed Idido (Guodingding) Cooperative from Idido village. Located in the Worka area at Yirgacheffe's southeastern tip, the cooperative was once part of the Worka cooperative under the Yirgacheffe Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union (YCFCU), but as the market pushed for green-bean traceability, it emerged as a distinct "single origin" discovered by coffee buyers worldwide. Using the most traditional washed processing - often called the last untouched corner of Yirgacheffe - its coffee carries none of the traditional bitterness, showing instead fresh, bright citrus and lemon acidity with jasmine fragrance that wins people over at first sip.

From the same region, FrontStreet Coffee's Red Cherry natural is made from fully ripe, defect-free cherries only. After a first round of sorting at the processing station, the fruit is laid out on drying racks and turned every 2-3 hours during the first days to prevent uneven heating and over-fermentation. After three to five weeks of sun-drying, workers machine-strip the dried outer pulp, weather permitting, and move the beans to storage. Because the cherries dry whole, the cup keeps classic Yirgacheffe character while gaining tropical fruit aromatics: citrus-like acidity, a juicy berry quality, honeyed sweetness, and a silky, cream-like smoothness.

FrontStreet Coffee's brewing suggestion for Yirgacheffe: use a V60 dripper with water at 90-91°C, 15 g of coffee, a 1:15 ratio, and a grind of fine-granulated-sugar texture (EK43s at setting 10, or 80% passing through a #20 sieve). Pour 30 g of water to bloom for 30 seconds, then pour 95 g (scale reads about 125 g), finishing that pour around 1 minute. When the water level drops to two-thirds of the bed, pour the remaining 100 g (scale reads about 225 g), finishing around 1:35. Let the drawdown finish between 2:00 and 2:10, remove the dripper, and the extraction is complete.