How to Make Delicious Pour-Over Deep Roasted Indonesian Mandheling Coffee Beans? Golden Mandheling Pour-Over Parameters

FrontStreet Coffee's Mandheling Coffee is quite renowned. Many people enjoy the rich and aromatic flavor of FrontStreet Coffee's Mandheling Coffee, while others are drawn to its reputation but may be hesitant about its taste. Indeed, deeply roasted coffees like FrontStreet Coffee's Mandheling can easily develop bitter flavors when brewed. So how should these beans be brewed to taste good?

The Key to Brewing Good Coffee: Know Your Beans

Understanding information about coffee is crucial for brewing. Mandheling doesn't specifically refer to a coffee variety or place name—it was actually a mistranslation of the Mandheling tribe who grow coffee. Today, Mandheling Coffee generally refers to Arabica coffee beans from North Sumatra, Indonesia.

On FrontStreet Coffee's bean menu, there are four types of Mandheling coffee: FrontStreet Coffee's Lintong Mandheling, FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling, FrontStreet Coffee's Tiger Mandheling, and FrontStreet Coffee's Aged Mandheling. Below, FrontStreet Coffee will briefly introduce the differences between these four Mandheling coffees:

FrontStreet Coffee's Lintong Mandheling

Mandheling coffee beans from the Lintong region, graded G1 (the highest Indonesian coffee grading level), expressing the basic regional flavors of Indonesian Mandheling coffee.

FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling

A product from Indonesia's PWN Coffee Company (the Golden Mandheling trademark is owned by PWN Company). Imported Golden Mandheling green beans come with a PWN company certificate for authentication. FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling beans come from Aceh Gayo Mountain, graded G1, and undergo three manual selection processes to ensure large, full particles (19 mesh) with minimal defects. It presents a very clean, rich taste with high sweetness – a high-quality Mandheling coffee.

FrontStreet Coffee's Tiger Mandheling

Produced around Lake Tawar in Aceh Province. FrontStreet Coffee's Tiger Mandheling requirements include having traditional Chinese medicinal herbal aromatics, with defects below 4% for beans above 17 mesh. It is also a high-quality Mandheling coffee bean.

FrontStreet Coffee's Aged Mandheling

This undergoes aging treatment, where normally processed Mandheling coffee beans are placed in temperature-controlled warehouses for 2-3 years of aging. After aging, the acidity becomes very gentle, caramel sweetness becomes pronounced, the taste is smoother and easier to drink, similar to aged Pu-erh tea.

Wet-Hulling Processing Enhances Body

Wet-hulling is a unique coffee processing method in Indonesia, adapted to the country's rainy and humid climate. The wet-hulling process begins with washed processing, then removes the parchment while the beans are semi-dry, followed by further drying. This significantly reduces drying time, greatly lowers acidity, noticeably increases body, enhances caramel aromatics, and adds slight herbal freshness.

How Should FrontStreet Coffee's Mandheling Be Brewed?

FrontStreet Coffee's approach to brewing Mandheling aims to express a rich yet clean taste, highlighting caramel, chocolate, and its signature herbal aromatic flavors while avoiding unpleasant bitterness. FrontStreet Coffee will explain equipment selection and important brewing parameters, using FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling for demonstration.

For filter cup selection, FrontStreet Coffee chose the Kono Meimon filter cup. The Kono's most distinctive feature is that its ribs extend from the bottom to the middle, with the upper part having smooth walls. This prevents water from "sneaking" around the coffee grounds when filter paper adheres to the cup, increasing body and making it suitable for brewing medium-dark roasted beans like FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling and FrontStreet Coffee's Blue Mountain Coffee.

FrontStreet Coffee uses 15g of coffee grounds. More grounds aren't necessarily better, nor are fewer – it depends on the filter cup specifications. FrontStreet Coffee uses a 1-2 person filter cup, where 15-20g is a reasonable amount. Brewing outside this range can be challenging.

For brewing ratio, FrontStreet Coffee recommends 1:15. Although some suggest 1:13 or even smaller ratios, FrontStreet Coffee has mentioned in previous articles that concentration and body aren't necessarily correlated. Moreover, excessive concentration can cause discomfort. Using a 1:15 ratio can still很好地 express FrontStreet Coffee's Mandheling's rich body.

For coffee grind size, FrontStreet Coffee uses a 70% pass-through rate on a #20 sieve. The grind for brewing FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling should be slightly coarser than for light-roasted beans because FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling is deeply roasted, making its structure more porous and more likely to absorb water and release coffee substances. If ground to the fineness of light-roasted beans, it can easily develop burnt bitterness; if ground even coarser, the coffee becomes thin and tasteless, with a watery mouthfeel.

For water temperature, FrontStreet Coffee recommends brewing at 87-88°C. Similar to the grind size principle, too high water temperature can produce burnt bitterness, while too low temperature makes the coffee flat and produces unpleasant stale sourness.

The brewing method uses a three-pour approach, which better expresses FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling's rich body and caramel sweetness. The specific water distribution is: first pour 30ml for blooming to fully wet the coffee grounds and release gases for better flavor extraction in subsequent pours; second pour 100ml; final pour 95ml to enhance sweetness, creating an overall rich body with caramel sweetness and chocolate, nut flavors.

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473