Costa Rican Coffee Growing Regions Costa Rican Coffee Beans Flavor Characteristics of Costa Rican Coffee

As one of the earlier countries in Central America to cultivate coffee, Costa Rica's coffee industry not only started early but also implemented strict laws and regulations to maintain the country's excellent coffee quality, prohibiting Robusta as a coffee variety for cultivation.

The Coffee Cultivation History of Costa Rica

FrontStreet Coffee reviewed historical records and found that the first coffee plant was brought to Costa Rica from Cuba in 1779, quickly initiating the coffee cultivation chapter here. By 1808, coffee had begun commercial production in Costa Rica, with approximately 17,000 coffee trees planted in plantations. In 1821, Costa Rica officially gained independence from Spain, and the coffee industry gradually became an important component of national economic income, continuing to this day.

Initially, the Costa Rican government recognized the benefits that coffee cultivation would bring to the country and its citizens, so it began implementing a series of policies to encourage cultivation, including free distribution of coffee seedlings and allowing any farmer who planted coffee on excess land for more than 5 days to apply for land ownership. In this way, with strong government support, Costa Rica launched a very popular "nationwide coffee planting" campaign.

However, during World War II, Costa Rica's coffee industry declined from prosperity. Unstable factors such as war turmoil caused Britain to stop purchasing coffee, which directly led to the end of Costa Rica's golden era of coffee exports. In 1900, Brazil began stirring waves in the coffee industry, to some extent reducing Costa Rica's coffee prices. Subsequently, producing regions like Honduras and Guatemala also emerged as leaders driving the development of the world coffee industry at that time. Clearly, compared to the thriving coffee industries of other countries, Costa Rica's coffee cultivation situation faced more difficulties and obstacles.

By 1989, the Costa Rican government officially passed a law: prohibiting the cultivation of inferior coffee beans and encouraging Costa Rican farmers to pursue truly excellent quality coffee beans. This is why only Arabica has been cultivated locally in Costa Rica. It's worth mentioning that this law was jointly decided and implemented by government departments and two well-known Costa Rican research institutions: CATIE (Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center, composed of multiple countries) and ICAFE (Costa Rican Coffee Institute). CATIE was established in 1942, while ICAFE was created as early as 1933. They have not only contributed to Costa Rican coffee cultivation but have also made outstanding contributions to coffee throughout the Central and South American producing regions.

Introduction to Costa Rican Coffee Producing Regions

Costa Rica is located in Central and South America, connected to Panama where Geisha became famous, and simultaneously influenced by Pacific and Atlantic ocean currents and monsoons, creating excellent microclimates. Combined with various topographical features, it has become a perfect producing region for coffee to thrive. Although Costa Rica's ranking in coffee production is not high, multiple volcanic crops in the country bring very fertile mineral soil, plus excellent drainage, allowing the crops cultivated here to receive abundant rainfall and nutrients, naturally producing higher quality fruits.

From the map, it can be observed that Costa Rica's territory is long and narrow, with coffee cultivation areas also distributed in a narrow strip in the central region. Thanks to the unique climate and volcanic geographical environment, Costa Rica has a total of 8 high-quality coffee producing regions: five main producing regions - Central Valley, TRES RÍOS, WEST VALLEY, TARRAZÚ, and BRUNCA, as well as three small producing regions: Turrialba, Orosi, and Guanacaste.

Among them, the Tarrazú producing region is the largest and most well-known specialty producing region locally, accounting for 35% of total production. In addition to rich volcanic soil and cool climate, Tarrazú also has high-altitude cultivation environments, producing coffee with bright acidity and rich, full body, typically with fruit, vanilla, and chocolate flavors. With the development of specialty coffee, continuous innovation and progress in processing techniques have made FrontStreet Coffee's Costa Rica Tarrazú coffee accumulate a good reputation in the coffee community.

FrontStreet Coffee's Costa Rican daily bean on FrontStreet Coffee's bean list comes from here, with the variety selected as the common local Caturra and Catuaí varieties. The washed post-processing method makes this FrontStreet Coffee Tarrazú coffee present clean taste and flavor characteristics like sweet orange, toffee, and nuts.

FrontStreet Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee): Costa Rica Tarrazú Coffee Beans

Region: Costa Rica Tarrazú

Altitude: 1500 meters

Variety: Caturra, Catuaí

Processing: Washed processing

Flavor: Sweet orange, honey, toffee, nuts

Coffee Characteristics of Costa Rican Processing Methods

Around the mid-1990s, to reduce the drying time for processing large quantities of green coffee beans, Brazilian merchants invented the Pulped Natural method, locally called "Cereja Descascada." This is a method of sun-drying after removing the fruit skin, which is very suitable for the dry climate of Brazil. It can not only shorten the drying days but also solve the problem of undesirable fermentation flavors caused by Brazilian natural beans drying on plazas, greatly improving the flavor and quality of coffee beans.

With the birth of this new coffee post-processing technology, some estate owners in Central and South American countries also began to imitate and try it, adapting Brazil's pulped natural process to local climate conditions. By removing different amounts of mucilage, they created different sugar content in the dried green coffee beans, thus subdividing processing schemes such as white honey, yellow honey, red honey, and black honey.

When producers use honey processing to handle green beans, they first pour fresh coffee cherries into water tanks for flotation, removing unripe fruits and impurities, then use a depulping machine to remove the outermost layer of the fruit. At this time, large amounts of clean water are not used to wash away the mucilage; instead, the mucilage is retained for sun-drying. Because there is sugar in the mucilage and it has a sticky consistency, it easily reminds people of honey, hence the name honey processing. Compared to the washed method, honey processing does not require large amounts of fresh water and related equipment, and also reduces the defect负面 flavors caused by prolonged exposure to sunlight. Moreover, honey-processed coffee generally presents rich tropical fruit flavors and fermented sweetness, which is very popular among consumers in the market.

The reason why FrontStreet Coffee's FrontStreet Coffee Costa Rican daily bean did not choose the honey processing method is because FrontStreet Coffee believes that daily beans are a series for everyone to get started. By tasting its own aroma, one can understand a coffee bean and the characteristics of this coffee's producing region. Although honey processing wins rich aroma for coffee beans, FrontStreet Coffee feels that washed processed FrontStreet Coffee Tarrazú coffee can better present the characteristics of Costa Rican coffee beans themselves, allowing Costa Rican coffee to retain more classic coffee tonality.

Pour-over Suggestions and Flavor Characteristics of Costa Rican Coffee

Dripper: V60

Water Temperature: 91°C

Dose: 15 grams

Coffee-to-Water Ratio: 1:15

Grind Size: 80% pass-through rate on #20 standard sieve

After roasting is completed, coffee beans have a 4-7 day degassing period before entering the optimal flavor stage. As storage time increases, the coffee's aroma will accelerate volatilization, and flavor characteristics will be greatly diminished. FrontStreet Coffee ensures that the coffee everyone drinks is in its best period by guaranteeing only beans baked within 5 days are shipped. Fresh coffee beans are more beneficial for us to extract the high-quality flavors of Yirgacheffe.

In brewing, FrontStreet Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) baristas习惯采用三段式的注水手法:

The first stage injects 30 grams of water for 30 seconds of blooming, then injects 95 grams (electronic scale shows around 125 grams), taking about 1 minute to complete. When the water level drops to 2/3 of the powder layer, inject the remaining 100 grams (electronic scale shows around 225 grams), taking about 1 minute and 35 seconds to complete. Extraction completes at 2'10", remove the dripper, and finish extraction.

FrontStreet Coffee's washed Tarrazú daily bean, after grinding, reveals nutty and chocolate aromas. The entry taste is clear and clean berry, sweet orange, and melon sweet and sour, with a slight sweet aftertaste.

For professional coffee knowledge exchange and more coffee bean information, please follow Coffee Workshop (WeChat public account: cafe_style).

For more specialty coffee beans, please add the private WeChat of FrontStreet Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee), WeChat ID: qjcoffeex

Important Notice :

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