Grade Classification Standards and Characteristics of Jamaica's Premium Blue Mountain Coffee - Types of Blue Mountain Coffee Beans

FrontStreet Coffee believes that everyone is certainly familiar with Blue Mountain Coffee. Without question, Blue Mountain coffee beans are truly one of the world's renowned and expensive coffee beans, which makes everyone very eager to experience the flavor of Blue Mountain Coffee.

In fact, Blue Mountain Coffee is merely one classification of Jamaican coffee, while what we often refer to as Blue Mountain Coffee actually means Blue Mountain No. 1 coffee beans.

Jamaica's coffee production is uniformly managed by the Jamaica Industrial Board (CIB), which classifies coffee into three grades based on cultivation altitude. The Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee grade must meet the requirement of being cultivated at an altitude above 1000 meters; the Jamaica High Mountain Coffee grade must meet the requirement of being cultivated at an altitude between 500 to 1000 meters; while the Jamaica Prime Coffee grade coffee beans are generally cultivated at altitudes below 500 meters.

Among these, the Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee grade is further divided into four grades: No. 1, No. 2, No. 3, and Peaberry. This means that Jamaica Blue Mountain No. 1 coffee beans are the highest grade among Jamaican coffee beans, with Jamaica Blue Mountain No. 1 green coffee beans having a particle size of 17/18 screen, and a defect rate not exceeding 2%. Therefore, genuine Jamaica Blue Mountain No. 1 coffee beans are rare in production and high in price.

Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee Regulations and Standards

Jamaican law stipulates that only coffee beans produced in the Blue Mountain region can be called Blue Mountain Coffee.

High-grade Blue Mountain Coffee is divided into three grades: No. 1 (above 17-18 screen), No. 2 (16 screen), and No. 3 (15 screen), where 17 screen corresponds to a size of 17/64 inches.

They all have the same flavor profile (which must be confirmed through cupping by specially approved personnel of the Jamaican government), differing only in size.

The green beans of these three grades must be packed in wooden barrels for export abroad, available in three specifications: 70kg/barrel, 30kg/barrel, and 15kg/barrel.

The barrels are printed with the name of the producing farm, the English abbreviation of the importer's name, the batch number of each shipment, and the name of the arrival port.

For example, the Blue Mountain Coffee barrels imported by the Japanese company ATAKA Trading Co., Ltd. bear the abbreviation ATC in their diamond-shaped logo.

While the Blue Mountain Coffee barrels imported by the Japanese UCC Coffee Company bear the abbreviation UCC in their diamond-shaped logo.

Therefore, when you see a Blue Mountain Coffee barrel, you can know which farm in Jamaica's Blue Mountains this coffee comes from.

Who its importer is, and which port it arrived at.

At the same time, Jamaican exporters also provide a green-colored certificate of origin to the importer.

This Jamaican government-recognized certificate of origin is only issued to importers who purchase in whole-barrel units (70kg/barrel, 30kg/barrel, 15kg/barrel).

It records the name of the exporting estate, the name of the importer, that year's goods, quantity, grade number, batch number, arrival port name, etc.

(Among green coffee beans produced outside Jamaica's Blue Mountain region, only High Mountain coffee beans are packed in wooden barrels.)

Quality Classification and Export Standards

Next, there are those damaged beans, beans of varying sizes that don't look good on the surface but have acceptable flavor in green bean form.

The Jamaican government stipulates that these green beans can only be packed in gunny sacks for export abroad.

Worse than these are coffees with flavor defects.

The Jamaican government has strict regulations that such coffee cannot be exported abroad in green bean form.

It can only be exported abroad after being roasted locally in Jamaica and must be dark roasted.

Because only dark roasting can mask or eliminate flavor defects.

However, the advantages of Blue Mountain Coffee are perfectly displayed only when lightly roasted.

So if you purchase small-packaged, dark-roasted Blue Mountain Coffee directly imported from Jamaica in domestic stores.

This is the lowest grade of Blue Mountain Coffee, but it is at least genuine Blue Mountain Coffee.

Important Notice :

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