Among the rich and fragrant coffees, many people will be impressed by Indonesian Mandheling coffee. Indeed, the name Mandheling coffee is also well-known. It is a typical representative of Asian coffee and is loved by many people. Along with its great reputation, there are also many people who taste it because of its reputation and stop at its taste.
Why? In fact, as we know from Front Street Coffee, coffee like Mandheling is darkly roasted. Deeply roasted coffee like this can easily produce a bitter taste. If the brewing parameters and techniques are not mastered well, the brewed Mandheling will be fragrant but not mellow, bitter but not smooth. So, how do you brew this type of beans to make them taste good? To make a good cup of Mandheling, it is important to understand the details from beans to cup. Here is the experience sharing of Front Street Coffee.
The key to making a good cup of coffee is knowing yourself and your enemy
Understanding coffee information is crucial to brewing. Mandheling does not specifically refer to a bean variety, nor is it the name of the place of origin. It is a mistranslation of the Mandheling tribe that grows coffee. Mandheling coffee now generally refers to Arabica coffee beans from North Sumatra, Indonesia.
There are four types of Mandheling coffee on Front Street’s coffee list: Lintong Mandheling, Golden Mandheling, Tiger Mandheling, and Aged Mandheling. Below, Front Street will briefly introduce the differences between these four Mandheling coffees:
Lindong Mandheling: Mandheling coffee beans produced in the Lindong production area are graded G1 (the highest grade of coffee in Indonesia) and can express the basic flavor of the Indonesian Mandheling coffee production area.
Golden Mandheling: It is a product of the Indonesian PWN Coffee Company (the Golden Mandheling trademark is owned by PWN Company). The introduction of green Golden Mandheling coffee beans will be accompanied by a certificate from PWN Company for authentication (identification of authenticity). Golden Mandheling coffee beans are produced from Aceh Gayoo Mountain, grade G1, and adopt 3 hand selection processes to ensure large and full particles (19 mesh) with few defects. High-quality Mandheling coffee with a very clean, mellow taste and high sweetness.
Tiger Mandheling: Produced in the Tawa Lake area of Aqi Province, Tiger Mandheling's requirements are that the taste will have the aroma of Chinese medicine, and the defect rate of 17 or more meshes is less than 4%. All are also high quality Mandheling coffee beans.
Aged Mandheling: Aging treatment is adopted. The normally processed Mandheling coffee is then placed in a constant temperature warehouse for aging treatment for 2-3 years. After aging, the acidity of aged Mandheling becomes very soft, the sweetness of caramel becomes obvious, and the taste becomes more rounded and easy to drink, just like a cooked Puerpe.
Wet planing adds texture
The wet planing method is a unique coffee processing method in Indonesia, and it can also be regarded as a processing method adapted to local conditions in rainy and humid Indonesia. The wet planing method involves washing the coffee beans in the early stage, then drying the coffee beans with sheepskin to a semi-dry state, then planing off the sheepskin, and then drying. The advantage is that the drying time is greatly shortened, which greatly reduces the sourness of the coffee beans, significantly increases the mellowness, and has a clear caramel aroma and a slightly herbal fresh aroma.
So how should Mandheling coffee be brewed?
Front Street’s understanding of the brewing of Mandheling coffee is that it hopes to have a mellow and clean taste, highlighting the flavors of caramel, chocolate and its signature herbal aroma, and does not want Mandheling coffee to have an unpleasant bitter taste. Front Street will explain the selection of utensils and various important brewing parameters, using Golden Mandheling for demonstration.
When it came to choosing a filter cup, Front Street chose the famous Kono filter cup. The biggest feature of the Kono filter cup is that the ribs extend from the bottom to the middle, and the upper part is a smooth filter cup wall. This way, when the filter paper fits the filter cup, water cannot "sneak" around the coffee powder and escape, improving the richness of the taste.
The amount of coffee powder used by Front Street is still 15g. The amount of coffee powder is not better, nor is it less. It depends on the specifications of the filter cup. Front Street uses a filter cup for 1-2 people. A reasonable amount of coffee powder is 15-20g. It will be difficult to brew powder amounts outside this range.
In terms of brewing powder-to-water ratio, Front Street recommends using 1:15. Although some people recommend using a powder-to-water ratio of 1:13 or smaller, Front Street’s previous article stated that there is no necessary connection between concentration and body. And too much concentration can cause discomfort. Therefore, using a powder to water ratio of 1:15 can also well express the mellow taste of Mandheling.
In terms of coffee grinding, Front Street uses a No. 20 sieve with a pass rate of 70%. The grinding degree for brewing Golden Mandheling coffee is slightly coarser than that of light-roasted coffee beans. This is because the dark roast used by Golden Mandheling has a looser structure and is easier to absorb water and release coffee substances. If it is ground to the thickness of light-roasted beans, it is easy to produce a burnt and bitter taste; if it is ground coarser, the coffee will become thin and tasteless, and the taste will be as thin as water.
When it comes to the choice of water temperature, Front Street recommends using a water temperature of 87-88°C for brewing. In the same way as the grinding degree, water temperature that is too high is likely to produce a burnt and bitter taste, while water temperature that is too low will cause the coffee to appear flat and have an unpleasant sour taste.
The brewing method uses a three-stage water injection method. The three-stage water injection can better express the mellow taste of golden Mandheling coffee and the sweetness of caramel. The specific water injection amount is distributed as the first section of steaming water injection30ml, this stage of water injection fully wets the coffee powder and exhausts it. In order to better extract the flavor substances of the coffee in the future, the second stage of injection100ml, the last paragraph injects95ml, improve the sweetness of coffee, showing a thick and mellow taste as a whole, the sweetness of caramel and the flavor of chocolate and nuts.
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
