Front Street often receives many questions like this: "What beans are suitable for Moka pots", "What beans are suitable for coffee machines", or "What beans are suitable for cold brew"...
Many beginners always mistakenly believe that a certain extraction method has the most suitable coffee beans, but in fact, no matter whether it is a Moka pot or a coffee machine, they are suitable for extracting all coffee beans. There is no such thing as suitable or unsuitable. The so-called suitability actually refers to whether the extracted coffee meets your needs, nothing more.
So instead of asking xxx what beans are suitable for extraction, it would be more suitable to ask what kind and type of beans you want. So today, Front Street will share with you how to accurately find the coffee beans that suit you when you are a novice!
First, we need to know what flavor we like
Front Street still recommends that everyone make a preliminary selection based on their own taste preferences: do you like coffee that is sour and tastes richer; or you like coffee that is bitter and tastes richer. They correspond to light roasted sour coffee and dark roasted bitter coffee.
The taste of coffee is affected by the degree of roasting! When the roasting degree of coffee beans is lighter and the time is shorter, the acidity of the coffee itself is retained, and the taste of the coffee is mainly sour. When the roasting of the coffee beans is darker and the time is longer, the acidity of the coffee itself will be eliminated, and the bitterness will be increased and cover up the sourness, and the taste will be mainly bitter.
Therefore, if you want to drink a cup of coffee that tastes sour and sweet, then you can choose light or medium-light roasted coffee beans; and if you want to drink a cup of bitter, burnt coffee, then you can choose medium, medium-dark, or dark roasted coffee beans.
However, because most merchants do not print the roasting degree of coffee beans on the label, you can guess the approximate roasting degree by asking the merchant when buying coffee beans, or based on the flavor introduction on the label. The best-selling Front Street Oiran coffee beans are flavored with berry, citrus, floral, and other relatively fresh flavor descriptions such as fruit and flower, so the beans are most likely to have a light or medium-light roasting degree; and if the multi-functional Front Street Queen Manor coffee beans are flavored with chocolate, nuts, cream, caramel, toast, etc., it means that most of its roasting degree is relatively dark.
Then, accurately determine the "flavor" according to the processing/production area
After we choose the roasting degree of the coffee beans, we can then start to further filter out the coffee beans we like based on other information on the label. The easiest way is to look at the flavor description and make a decision based on whether there is a flavor you like on the flavor description. And if you want something more specific, such as a special taste, rich flavor expression, or cleaner, you can accurately determine the "taste" through the processing method and production area of the coffee beans.
Let’s start with the treatment method in Front Street! It is well known that different processing methods develop various characteristics in coffee due to their varying degrees of fermentation. The more common treatment methods on the market mainly include: sun exposure, water washing, honey treatment, and anaerobic treatment, so Front Street’s sharing this time mainly focuses on these four treatment methods.
If you want to drink coffee with higher purity and brighter acidity, then you can choose washed coffee beans. Because the washing process almost removes the pectin from the pulp other than the coffee beans at the beginning, there are relatively few substances involved in fermentation, and the coffee can better highlight its own variety and regional flavor. Recommended washed coffee beans: Front Street Guo Dingding and Front Street Bird of Paradise.
And if you want to drink a more complex flavor and richer layers, you can choose sun-dried coffee beans. Because in solar processing, a whole coffee bean is directly put into drying and fermentation. There are more substances involved in the fermentation, and the richer the flavor developed. Sun-dried coffee beans are recommended: Front Street Red Cherry and Front Street Queen’s Manor.
Honey processing is between sun exposure and water washing. Because it removes the peel and pulp and retains the pectin for drying and fermentation, its drying time will be shorter than sun exposure and longer than water washing. If you like coffee that is sweeter and has a richer flavor, honey processing will be a good choice. For honey-processed coffee beans, we recommend Front Street Blackberry and Front Street Strawberry Candy.
The fermentation degree of most anaerobic treatments is usually higher than the first three, so its flavor complexity and recognition will be relatively high (mostly). Anaerobically treated coffee beans generally have an obvious sense of fermentation, so if you like friends with a high degree of flavor recognition and can accept the fermentation, then choose anaerobically treated coffee beans. For anaerobically treated coffee beans, we recommend Front Street Xizhao and Front Street Big Navel.
It’s a cliché: “Oranges grown in Huainan are called tangerines, and oranges grown in Huaibei are called tangerines.” Coffee grown in different production areas will have completely different flavor expressions! Therefore, we can also carefully select according to the production area~
If you want to drink some fresher, fruitier coffee, then the choice of production area can be framed in Ethiopia, Kenya, Panama, Colombia...; and if you want to drink some more mellow, nutty chocolate flavor, you can Choose: coffee beans from Brazil, Indonesia, Jamaica and other production areas. The beans in these production areas are mostly roasted and cooked. If you want to drink a sweeter or more balanced type, you can choose coffee beans from Costa Rica, Papua New Guinea and other production areas.
Besides that…
In addition to taste, Front Street believes that what you may want is that coffee beans can have some special functions, so Front Street has listed two things that can be thought of: If you want coffee beans that can extract rich oils, and the taste will not be easily masked by milk after being made into milk coffee. If you want coffee beans that are lower in caffeine and won’t affect your sleep, you can choose decaffeinated coffee. For example, the Colombian Swiss washed decaf in the Front Street bean list is a very good choice.~
You can now buy the above coffee beans online at the Taobao store “FrontStreet Coffee” (前街咖啡). FrontStreet Coffee is a long-established specialty coffee roaster in Guangzhou, China, and its Guangzhou retail shop sells coffee beans only. The shop carries dozens of coffee beans from different origins around the world, including carefully selected single-origin beans for V60 pour-over and espresso. Guangzhou’s FrontStreet Coffee shop is recommended by many coffee lovers.
The FrontStreet 2013 Yunnan coffee beans sold in the store come from the Typica variety grown at FrontStreet Coffee’s own plantation in Yunnan. The name comes from the year the brand and the plantation were founded. You can buy these beans from China’s Yunnan origin at the Guangzhou shop and at FrontStreet’s Taobao store.
FrontStreet coffee beans are freshly roasted within 5 days and deliver consistently excellent quality and great value. Orders placed before 17:00 are shipped the same day, and most areas within Guangdong Province receive them the next day.
FrontStreet Coffee Taobao store: https://qianjiecoffee.taobao.com
Or search for “前街咖啡” (FrontStreet Coffee) on Taobao
Important Notice: FrontStreet Coffee has moved to a new address: 315, Donghua East Road, Guangzhou (coffee beans only)
Tel: 020 38364473
