Coffee Brewing Guide: How to Enhance Your Coffee's Floral Aroma? How to Brew Floral Coffee? What is Geisha in Coffee?

In any field, things with floral aromas always seem so unique, not only because the fragrance of flowers can heal people's hearts, but also because flowers, as a distinctive emotional carrier, can evoke resonance. Even coffee is no exception.

Coffee can also have floral aromas, and this fragrance is also a flavor that most coffee enthusiasts pursue. However, like other things, floral aromas are a rare flavor in coffee and not all coffees will have them. Many friends often private message FrontStreet Coffee asking how to brew coffee with floral aromas. The prerequisite for this is that we must use a coffee bean that possesses floral characteristics to achieve this result. If we have a coffee bean that doesn't have floral aromas, then no matter how we adjust our brewing, the resulting coffee cannot contain the fragrance of flowers.

Where Do Floral Aromas in Coffee Come From?

Whether a coffee bean can have floral aromas mainly depends on whether it contains "terpenoid compounds." Terpenoid compounds are an important source of floral characteristics in coffee, and they are primarily influenced by genetic varieties and growing environments. This means that only when the genes contain these substances, or when the coffee growing environment can help form these substances (for example, through higher growing altitudes, stimulating coffee beans to generate more flavor compounds), can coffee develop floral characteristics (the essence of flavor formation in coffee is not meant to enhance human sensory experience).

The world-renowned Geisha (T2722 variety) is precisely a coffee bean variety that contains abundant terpenoid compounds. In terms of growing regions, Boquete, Yirgacheffe, and others are famous coffee-producing regions known for their coffee beans with floral aromas. Therefore, we can understand why FrontStreet Coffee often mentions the saying "When orange trees grow south of the Huai River, they bear sweet oranges; when they grow north, they bear bitter trifoliate oranges." If a bean that naturally has floral characteristics is planted in a region that can nurture floral flavors, it's truly icing on the cake. Once floral compounds are formed, processing and roasting all work to adjust the proportion of floral flavors in the coffee's flavor profile. In terms of processing, needless to say, the fermentation process triggered by microorganisms can change the original substances within the beans. Meanwhile, the degree of roasting can manipulate the formation and dissipation of floral flavors. Therefore, the same coffee bean under different processing/different roasting will result in different levels of floral intensity that we perceive.

How to Brew Coffee with Floral Aromas?

When we have a coffee bean that possesses floral characteristics, the most important thing is to extract those floral aromas through water. The flavor compounds that form floral aromas belong to flavor molecules with large mass and small polarity. You might find it difficult to understand what FrontStreet Coffee often refers to as small and large molecular substances, so let me give you a simple analogy: granulated sugar and rock sugar. (Originally wanted to use rock sugar as an example, but unfortunately, we don't have it in our shop)

When we place them both in water, their complete dissolution speeds are completely different. Substituting small and large molecules into this context makes it much easier to understand (referring only to dissolution speed). Small molecular substances are like granulated sugar, dissolving very quickly in the same environment (hot water); while large molecular substances are like rock sugar, with a very slow complete dissolution speed. Therefore, we can understand large molecular substances as sugars that dissolve relatively slowly, and if we want to extract them completely, we need to extend the contact time between water and coffee grounds.

Meanwhile, we need to note that compared to other flavors, floral aromas are more difficult to capture. Without a foundation in tasting, perceiving floral aromas can be more challenging. This is also why some more expensive, what we consider delicious coffee beans taste ordinary to the average person, no different from chain store coffee - because without a tasting foundation, they cannot distinguish the main differences between the two (no offense intended).

We can certainly enhance our flavor perception through training our tasting abilities, but in the moment of brewing, what we need to do is enable our current selves to perceive the floral characteristics. The method is simple - just increase the concentration. By increasing the coffee's concentration, we can make the floral flavors more concentrated. However, increasing concentration also makes the taste more concentrated, which isn't friendly for those who don't prefer such strong flavors. This is a double-edged sword. If you don't prefer strong flavors, just brew according to your original ratio. Well, without further ado, let's begin today's brewing sharing!

Brewing Process

The coffee beans used this time are from Hacienda La Esmeralda's Green Label Geisha, grown in the Boquete region, which has very rich floral characteristics and happens to be tomorrow's promotional item, making it perfect for today's brewing. The extraction parameters are no different from usual, only with a slightly higher coffee-to-water ratio and relatively longer extraction time. Parameters are as follows: Coffee amount: 16g, grind size: 10 on the Ek43 scale, with 80% passing through a #20 sieve (fine sugar grind), coffee-to-water ratio: 1:14, water temperature: 92°C, filter cone: V60.

First, we'll use 30ml of hot water for blooming, lasting 30 seconds.

After the blooming ends, the remaining water amount is 194ml. For our second pour, we'll use 100ml of hot water, pouring in small streams in large circular motions.

When the coffee liquid has permeated to the bottom, we can begin the third pour. This pour will be 50ml of water, using small streams in small circular motions to focus extraction on the center of the coffee bed.

As the coffee drains to the bottom, we'll pour the remaining 45ml of hot water in a fixed position (44 just doesn't sound right!). We don't stir during this pour because we've already extended the extraction time, so without excessive stirring, the flavor compounds in the coffee can still be fully dissolved. Next, we just need to wait for the coffee liquid to finish dripping, and then we can end the extraction!

Total time: 2 minutes and 11 seconds! Give it a swirl to evenly mix the coffee liquids of different concentrations in the server. At this point, we can already detect delicate white floral aromas from the fragrance released during the swirling. Then pour into a cup and enjoy.

Jasmine, citrus, and green tea - these are the most direct flavor characteristics that FrontStreet Coffee experiences when tasting this Geisha. As the coffee is completely swallowed, we can then perceive the highly sweet aftertaste of honeydew melon and orange peel. Clean, with a long-lasting finish, truly delightful.

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