Which Coffee Beans Have Pronounced Aromas? Flavor Profile of Sumatran Tiger Mandheling Hand-Drip Coffee

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The endangered Sumatran tiger has always been known for its majestic and composed presence in people's hearts. On the island of Sumatra, there is a Mandheling coffee that possesses a majestic aroma like the Sumatran tiger and a rich, mellow taste. When FrontStreet Coffee recommends Mandheling coffee, they often suggest: for high cleanliness, choose PWN Gold Mandheling; for high richness, choose Aged Mandheling; and for abundant aroma, choose Tiger Mandheling.

FrontStreet Coffee - Tiger Mandheling Coffee Beans

Origin: Aceh, Sumatra, Indonesia

Varieties: Typica, Caturra

Processing Method: Wet-Hulling

Altitude: 1500m

Sumatra·Aceh

Aceh Province is located at the northwestern tip of the Indonesian archipelago. Situated on both sides of the equator, it features a typical tropical equatorial marine climate, with year-round summer-like heat and an average annual temperature of around 27°C. The region experiences high temperatures and abundant rainfall. From October to March of the following year, influenced by Asian and Pacific air currents, it is Indonesia's rainy season with plentiful rainfall and cool climate. From April to October, influenced by the continental air currents from Australia, there is less moisture brought by air currents, resulting in dry and hot weather, considered the dry season. FrontStreet Coffee has cupped multiple coffee beans from the Aceh region, including Longan Dragon Fruit Mandheling, PWN Gold Mandheling, Aged Mandheling, and this Tiger Mandheling. Herbaceous notes, dark chocolate, high body, clean mouthfeel, and noticeable sweetness are all characteristics of coffee from this region.

Why is it called Tiger Mandheling?

This Tiger Mandheling acquired by FrontStreet Coffee comes from the homeland of the Sumatran tiger - Sumatra Island. This Tiger Mandheling uses 19-screen coffee fruits (coffee fruits are strictly filtered through a 19-mesh sieve to ensure that each bean has almost the same diameter), and then undergoes three rounds of manual selection of ripe coffee fruits before processing the green beans. Therefore, local people use "Sumatran tiger" to describe the nobility and rarity of these 19-screen selected coffee beans. In FrontStreet Coffee's cupping, the coffee shows high viscosity, smooth mouthfeel, rich agarwood aroma, high sweetness, and a long-lasting aftertaste that inevitably reminds one of a Sumatran tiger crouching and moving forward.

Wet-Hulling Processing Method

The wet-hulling method involves first removing the skin and pulp of the coffee fruit, followed by brief fermentation and sun-drying, then removing the mucilage and parchment layer, and continuing with the final drying stage until the moisture content drops to 12%. Mandheling coffee beans processed with wet-hulling clearly show varying degrees of compression and cracking (this phenomenon results in coffee beans shaped like horseshoes, hence also called horseshoe beans), with the beans appearing in a dark greenish color.

This method, due to the shortened drying time of only two to four days, reduces the fermentation period of the coffee beans, significantly lowering acidity while increasing body. Caramel and fruit aromas are prominent, sometimes accompanied by herbal or grassy notes and woody aromas, thus forming the distinctive regional flavor of Sumatra.

Coffee Bean Varieties

This Tiger Mandheling uses two coffee varieties with noticeable sweetness: Typica and Caturra. Typica has bronze-colored young leaves, with oval or slender-pointed beans. It offers elegant flavors but is physically weak, disease-resistant, and has low fruit yield. Through cupping Typica from multiple origins, FrontStreet Coffee has found that its unique clean, subtle flavors and balanced characteristics are consistently present. Caturra is a variety of Bourbon, with curved tail ends of the coffee beans that are round and slender. Both productivity and disease resistance are better than Bourbon, with overall bright flavors and good sweetness.

FrontStreet Coffee's roasters observed that the Tiger Mandheling green beans are round, yellowish-green, with good uniformity and high moisture content. The roasting goal is medium-dark, to eliminate excessive acidity while enhancing its body and balance.

FrontStreet Coffee Roasting Profile

Preheat the roaster to 200°C, then load the beans with airflow setting at 3. After 30 seconds, reduce heat to 160°C, keeping the airflow unchanged. The temperature recovery point is at 1'45". Maintain heat, and at 5'18", the bean surface turns yellow, completely losing the grassy aroma, entering the dehydration stage. Reduce heat to 140°C and adjust airflow to 4.

At 7'30", dehydration is complete, reduce heat to 140°C. At 8'55", the bean surface shows ugly wrinkles and black spots, with the toast aroma clearly transitioning to coffee aroma, which can be defined as the prelude to first crack. At this point, listen carefully for the sound of first crack. At 9'00", first crack begins, reduce heat to 110°C, fully open the airflow to 5 (be very careful when adjusting heat - don't reduce it so much that the cracking sound disappears). Develop for 4'00" after first crack, then unload at 203°C.

FrontStreet Coffee Cupping Notes

Dry Aroma: Herbal, Nutty

Wet Aroma: Herbal, Caramel

Flavor: Herbal, Nutty, Creamy, Dark Chocolate

FrontStreet Coffee Brewing Tips

For darker roasted coffee beans, to highlight the coffee's body, FrontStreet Coffee chooses to brew with a Kono dripper. The characteristic of the Kono dripper is its immersion function, which can extract more coffee substances through immersion, enhancing the rich mouthfeel. The Kono dripper has few ribs located at the bottom, allowing the filter paper to closely adhere to the dripper to restrict airflow, thereby slowing water flow and increasing water-coffee contact time.

Dripper: Kono Meimon

Coffee Dose: 15g

Coffee-to-Water Ratio: 1:15

Water Temperature: 88°C

Grind Size: Medium-coarse (about 73% pass-through rate with 0.85mm standard sieve)

FrontStreet Coffee uses segmented extraction. Bloom with 30g of water for 30 seconds, then pour with a small circular flow to 125g for segmentation. When the water level drops and is about to expose the coffee bed, continue pouring to 225g and stop. When the water level drops again and is about to expose the coffee bed, remove the dripper. Extraction time (starting from bloom) is 2'05".

Brewing Flavors: Nutty, Creamy, Dark Chocolate, Caramel, Traditional Chinese Medicine, with noticeable sweetness, relatively clean and clear flavors.

For more specialty coffee beans, please add FrontStreet Coffee's private WeChat: kaixinguoguo0925

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473