What Makes the Best Mandheling Coffee Beans? The Flavor Profile of Indonesia's PWN Golden Mandheling

Golden Mandheling is a select coffee from the Indonesian green bean company Pawani. It is said that due to strict screening standards—one machine density and color sorting and four manual hand selections—the coffee beans ultimately present a uniform color and consistent shape. When processing the green beans, the Mandheling beans emit a golden luster under sunlight, thus earning them the name "Golden Mandheling Coffee."

Authentic Golden Mandheling comes from the Indonesian PWN green bean company! If you're familiar with the origin of the Mandheling coffee name, you've probably heard this popular story: During World War II when Japan occupied Indonesia, a Japanese soldier tasted an exceptionally aromatic coffee at a café. When he asked the owner about it, the owner misunderstood, thinking he was asking where he was from, and replied: "Mandailing." After the war, the soldier recalled the "Mandheling" coffee he had in Indonesia and arranged to have 15 tons shipped to Japan, which became surprisingly popular, and the name Mandheling was thus spread.

The first to export Mandheling coffee beans to Japan was the café owner from this story, who recognized the enormous business potential of Mandheling coffee and founded the PWN Perkumpulan Wanita Niaga coffee company in 1957. PWN mainly purchases high-quality batches of Mandheling green beans locally, specializing in producing premium Mandheling, with Golden Mandheling being their signature product.

At that time, the Japanese recognized the quality of Sumatran coffee and purchased it long-term, gradually discovering that the local bean quality was often inconsistent. They became more dedicated to Mandheling production and began establishing strict standards and methods for screening defects, including bean density, size, and color values. The produced Mandheling requires 1 machine selection + 4 manual hand selections to remove defects, ensuring the resulting Mandheling beans are complete, uniform, large, and translucent, while also reducing the earthy and grassy flavors of Mandheling. Legend has it that because the beans gleam golden under the sun, they were named "Golden Mandheling."

FrontStreet Coffee: PWN Golden Mandheling Coffee Beans

Origin: Sumatra, Indonesia
Grade: G1, triple hand-selected
Altitude: 1100m-1600m
Variety: Ateng
Processing Method: Wet-hulled
Flavor: Nuts, spices, chocolate, herbs, caramel

As the premium Mandheling coffee market grew, PWN also recognized the importance of trademarks, registering "Golden Mandheling" as an exclusive English trademark before the Japanese. Therefore, only Golden Mandheling produced by PWN can be considered true "Golden Mandheling," while what the Japanese produce had to be renamed "Top Mandheling." The Golden Mandheling that FrontStreet Coffee obtained is, of course, authentic from PWN. You can identify genuine Golden Mandheling by the green bean sack with the PWN logo and a certificate of origin signed by PWN, which FrontStreet Coffee displays in its Dongshankou store.

The Unavoidable Indonesian Wet-Hulled Processing Method

Sumatra is situated on the equator and has a typical tropical rainforest climate with year-round rain, humidity, and frequent typhoons, coupled with scarce freshwater resources. Local people cannot use traditional washed processing for large quantities of coffee beans, nor can they dry them through prolonged sun exposure. Therefore, to adapt to these extreme environmental conditions, local coffee farmers developed a shorter processing method—the wet-hulled method. The so-called wet-hulling involves "forcefully" removing the parchment layer while it's not yet completely dry, meaning the green beans complete their final drying in a "naked" state.

The wet-hulled method begins to differ from traditional washed processing from the fermentation stage. Wet-hulled processing uses less water for fermentation and has a shorter fermentation time. After this brief fermentation, a small amount of mucilage remains on the bean husk. When the green beans' first drying reaches 35-40% moisture content, coffee farmers sell the beans to buyers. The buyers directly hull the semi-dry parchment beans, removing mucilage and husk to obtain green beans.

Although the time for each step is significantly shortened, the "naked beans" still absorb moisture from the hot and humid air, resulting in Mandheling coffee with additional woody, herbal, and spicy mellow aromas. All Mandheling coffee beans on FrontStreet Coffee's menu use the wet-hulled method. After medium-dark roasting, they present rich chocolate, brown sugar, and nut flavors, with a herbal plant-like aftertaste. FrontStreet Coffee believes that wet-hulled Lintong Mandheling has a typical "Mandheling flavor," which is why they include it in their daily coffee series.

How FrontStreet Coffee Brews to Extract Mandheling Flavors

Medium to dark roasted Mandheling coffee has higher body, but the coffee beans' texture becomes more porous and more absorbent, making extraction easier during brewing. Therefore, FrontStreet Coffee uses lower water temperature and coarser grind size to avoid over-extraction that would produce negative bitterness.

Filter: KONO filter
Water Temperature: 87°C
Dose: 15 grams
Ratio: 1:15
Grind Size: Medium-coarse (70% pass-through rate on China standard #20 sieve)

Wet the KONO filter to ensure the filter paper fits snugly against the coffee dripper. Pour out the water from the sharing pot and add 15g of ground coffee. After blooming with 30g of water for 30s, begin pouring in small circular motions from the center until reaching 125g, then pause. When the coffee bed drops to half the filter's height, begin the second pour using the same technique until reaching 225g. Once all dripping is complete, remove the filter.

The ground Golden Mandheling coffee has a nutty and toasted bread aroma, and during brewing, you can smell the sweet fragrance of caramel. The brewed Mandheling coffee enters with spices and dark chocolate, with a rich yet clean mouthfeel, noticeable sweet aftertaste, and a persistent finish.

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FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473