Why does Sidamo coffee taste so complex?

Sidamo coffee comes from southern Ethiopia and shows clean fruit acidity, a smooth body, and delicate floral and grassy aromas. The first sip is gentle, then bright citric acidity arrives, followed by a full body and a sweet finish that lingers. Ethiopia is the birthplace of the Arabica coffee seed, and wild trees still grow in the forests of Kaffa.

Ethiopian coffee processing methods, along with variety and terroir, explain much of that range. Front Street roasts Huakui beans and brews them three ways: Clever Cup, AeroPress, and V60, each with its own grind, dose, and timing. The goal is a cup that carries berry aroma and an oolong tea finish at home.

Sidamo, as a long-renowned specialty coffee region in southern Ethiopia, has always been favored by coffee lovers for its diverse flavor expressions and long planting tradition. Today, Front Street Coffee will start from the perspectives of regional terroir, variety characteristics, and processing methods to take you through a comprehensive understanding of the unique charm of Sidamo coffee. The article will also specifically analyze the roasting curve and brewing parameters of Front Street Coffee's Huakui coffee beans, covering the practical methods for three devices: the Clever Cup, AeroPress, and V60, helping you consistently recreate at home a cup of good coffee that combines berry aroma and oolong tea finish.

African coffee has always had an excellent reputation. Front Street Coffee believes that in addition to outstanding quality and rich variety, the cost-effectiveness of African beans is also a major highlight, which is also why they have won the favor of many coffee fans. And among all African regions, Sidamo is especially famous.

The Sidamo coffee produced by Front Street has a clean fruit acidity and smooth mouthfeel on the palate, with delicate and elegant floral and grassy aromas. At first sip it is gentle and friendly, then bright citric acidity emerges, bringing a strong taste contrast. The overall body is full and mellow, with a unique and pleasant sweetness in the finish. The aftertaste rises slowly, hinting at a touch of sweetness, and it remains memorable after drinking. Below, Front Street will discuss from several dimensions what exactly makes Sidamo coffee so outstanding.

Coffee is at the core of Ethiopian culture

Ethiopia is the birthplace of Arabica coffee. In the primitive forests of the Kaffa region in Ethiopia, naturally growing wild coffee trees can still be seen today. In Ethiopian language, coffee is called "Bun" or "Buna," and the term "coffee bean" is generally believed to have evolved into an anglicized expression from "Kaffa Bun." The English word "coffee" has its etymology precisely in the Ethiopian place name "Kaffa."

The Kafa Biosphere contains the largest forest area in Ethiopia. This primitive forest is recognized as the origin of coffee and is also today's gene treasury of Arabica coffee. The "Gesha" mentioned in the origin story of Geisha is actually a region in the western part of Kaffa. Here, a large number of ancient coffee trees form an important part of the local ecology. Coffee trees grow under dense, tall shade trees, with no artificially cultivated crops, relying entirely on seeds falling naturally and sprouting to reproduce. The Kafa Forest batch launched by Front Street uses washed processing. After brewing, it presents bright and clean fruit acidity, with an obvious aroma of melon seeds on the palate, as well as citrus-like sweet acidity similar to orange peel, with quite rich layers.

Back to the main topic: Ethiopia is the world's sixth-largest coffee producer. According to reports, in 2018 about 100 million people worldwide were directly or indirectly engaged in the coffee industry, and coffee workers in Ethiopia accounted for 20% of them. In 2017, the country's green coffee bean output was about 470,000 tons, of which about 160,000 tons were exported. This means exports were less than half of total production, with the remainder retained for domestic consumption.

Coffee has been integrated into Ethiopia's social fabric for hundreds of years. It is said that a common phrase in local social settings is "buna tetu," meaning "drink coffee"; and one of Ethiopia's most famous proverbs is "buna dabo naw," meaning "coffee is our bread."

Coffee cultivation in Ethiopia is mainly concentrated in the west and south, with more than half belonging to smallholder farming, also called garden coffee, which is the country's most important mode of production. It is understood that nearly 1.2 million households locally make a living by growing coffee, with each household cultivating no less than 4 hectares. So-called garden coffee means farmers manage coffee trees mixed with other cash crops in their own backyards, usually planted together with banana trees. Every household's front and back yards form a unique green landscape.

Because the coffee yield from smallholders is limited, there are farmer cooperatives or processing stations of various sizes locally responsible for green bean processing in the area. Each harvest season, farmers pack their own coffee cherries and send them to nearby processing stations (cooperatives) close to water sources for unified processing, then sell them under the name of the processing station. For example, the Gedeb cooperative coffee beans on Front Street's bean list are made by collecting coffee cherries grown in Yirgacheffe town. Farmers send them to the town for unified washed processing, and finally they are produced under the cooperative's name and sold globally.

Sidamo Producing Region

Ethiopia has significant changes in terrain and altitude, along with various mutations and not-yet-classified native varieties, so differences between producing regions are very large. The cup flavor profile of coffee from each producing region, micro-region, or even individual farm is different. This also leads coffee buyers, when purchasing, to prefer judging based on producing region, altitude, and cupping score rather than distinguishing Ethiopian coffee by variety.

The Sidamo coffee producing region is at an altitude of 1,400-2,200 meters and is a famous specialty coffee area in southern Ethiopia, bordering Kenya. Washed Sidamo coffee beans are light green, not large in size, elongated oval, full in fruit, with good average quality, aromatic and mellow smell, and a long finish on the palate, carrying a kind of wild beauty. The characteristic of Sidamo coffee beans lies in their very diverse flavors. Different soil types, microclimates, and countless native coffee varieties make the coffee produced in each town clearly different and distinctive.

Coffee beans produced in the Sidamo region received high scores of 92 to 94 from the authoritative American coffee evaluation website CR in 2010 to 2012. This shows the extraordinary strength of green beans from this region. Within its borders are towering mountains, highlands, plateaus, valleys, and plains, with rich and diverse terrain. The geology of this area belongs to fertile, well-drained volcanic soil, with a soil depth of nearly two meters, and the surface soil is dark brown or brown. The region's greatest advantage is that soil fertility is maintained through the cycling of organic matter, using fallen leaves from surrounding trees or plant residues as fertilizer.

Coffee Cultivation in Ethiopia

Ethiopian coffee is usually grown in an environmentally sustainable way, mostly in the form of "garden coffee," with coffee trees planted directly beside farmers' houses and together with other crops. Local "semi-forest coffee" is also very common. In this method, weeds and shrubs in natural forests are trimmed and adjusted to regulate shade trees, and after that coffee seedlings are introduced and planted. It is estimated that only 5% of Ethiopia's coffee production comes from farms specifically dedicated to growing coffee.

The types of farmers growing coffee in Ethiopia are divided into contract farmers, plantations, and smallholders. Ethiopia's smallholder groups are organized according to cooperative principles, with voluntary participation and openness to all farmers.

Any smallholder willing to join a cooperative and able to bear the mutual responsibilities of members may join without discrimination based on gender, social status, ethnicity, disability, religion, etc. Cooperatives are jointly run by their members and are democratic organizations, with members actively participating and jointly formulating policies and decisions; each member has equal voting rights.

Coffee cooperatives support and encourage smallholders to adopt good agricultural practices, such as harvesting ripe coffee cherries and using sun-dried or washed processing. If they have export sales capability, the dividends from exported coffee can be distributed to cooperative members. Two or more primary cooperatives can form a union. In Ethiopia's coffee supply chain, the union supports the harvest and processing of each primary cooperative, and carries out secondary processing including hulling, grading, packaging, and exporting coffee, while allocating returns to their respective cooperatives.

This is an effective grading system focused on complete and consistent monitoring while complying with strict international quality standards, which is very important for specialty coffee buyers.

Ethiopian Coffee Processing Methods

Both washed and sun-dried processed coffee are common in Ethiopia. In sun-dried processing, farmers place coffee cherries on flat surfaces and dry them in the sun. This process usually takes two to six weeks, during which the cherries are turned and rotated so they dry evenly. After the seeds dry, they are removed from the fruit.

Washed Ethiopian coffee gives off an elegant character, with floral notes, citrus, and a delicate finish, and a smooth mouthfeel. However, flavor characteristics vary greatly by region.

Sun-dried coffee usually has a rich, rounded fruit flavor and is more profound. Compared with washed coffee of the same kind, high-quality sun-dried coffee has clean citrus aroma and the refreshing feel of floral notes, while adding sweetness and body. When you can find one of these characteristics, the other flavor characteristics will not be too bad either. Now there is also more and more honey-processed coffee in Ethiopia. I think this is because farmers can sell directly to the market, and sales are also good.

In the Sidamo producing region, the most famous coffee bean is none other than the sun-dried Huakui coffee bean from the Buku Abel processing station in the Guji Hambela sub-region! In this article, Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) uses Huakui coffee beans as an example to conduct roasting and brewing and share with everyone, so we can all experience the charm of coffee from the Sidamo producing region together!

Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) - Sidamo Huakui Coffee Beans

Country: Ethiopia

Region: Sidama (Sidamo)

Processing Station: Buku Abel

Altitude: 1,750-2,350 meters

Processing Method: Natural Process

Variety: Ethiopian Heirloom

In 2017, Ethiopia's DW green bean company sent their coffee beans to the TOH (the Taste Of Harvest) green bean competition hosted by the African Coffee Association. A sun-dried batch from the "Buku Abel" processing station won the TOH Ethiopia championship with its strong strawberry and creamy aroma. That year, this batch of green beans was imported by a green bean trader in Beijing. Because of its champion status, it was given the name "Huakui."

Subsequently, DW added processing stations in Dimtu, the core production area of Hambella, namely "Buku Abel," "Buku Saysay," "Haro Soresa," and "Tirtiro Goye," with an annual coffee output of about 1,100 tons. In terms of growing regions and processing stations, among all these estates and processing stations, only the processing area from the "Buku Abel" processing station covered the small production area that originally produced the sun-dried coffee bean "Huakui."

As Huakui coffee beans become more and more well-known, many Huakui coffee beans at different prices have begun to appear on the market. When buying, everyone must confirm the four key pieces of information: "Sidamo producing region," "Buku Abel processing station," "sun-dried processing," and "Ethiopian heirloom variety" - none can be missing! Authentic Huakui coffee beans can be purchased at the Front Street flagship store / Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) shops~

Through observation, Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) noticed that the green beans of sun-dried Huakui coffee appear green with yellow, and the overall beans also show variation in size, which is also a characteristic of Ethiopian heirloom varieties. As the birthplace of coffee varieties, Ethiopia has far too many coffee varieties. It is like a natural gene bank of Arabica. On the one hand, there are so many varieties that identification and classification are difficult; on the other hand, the Ethiopian government, out of consideration for protection, is unwilling to disclose information about these varieties, so they are collectively called Ethiopian heirloom. Precisely because the varieties are numerous and mixed, they are planted mixed and harvested mixed, so Ethiopian heirloom beans vary in size.

Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) Roasting Suggestions

Roasting machine: Yangjia 800N.

Charge when the drum temperature reaches 200°C, set the damper to 3, and the power to 160. Keep the damper unchanged. The turning point is at 1'32". When the drum temperature is 140, adjust the damper to 4; at this time the bean surface turns yellow, the grassy smell completely disappears, and it enters the dehydration stage. When the drum temperature reaches 168°C, adjust the power to 140 and keep the damper unchanged;

At 8'56", ugly wrinkles and dark spots appear on the bean surface, and the toast smell clearly turns into coffee aroma, which can be defined as the prelude to first crack. At this time, listen clearly for the sound of the first crack point. First crack begins at 9'14", lower the power to 110, adjust the damper to 5, develop for 1'45" after first crack, and drop at 196°C.

Front Street Huakui coffee beans are suitable for extraction with the Clever Cup, AeroPress, and V60 pour-over, but if you want the coffee to taste good, you need to pay attention to the parameters and technique.

Clever Cup:

The Clever Cup combines the advantages of the French press and the pour-over brewer. It is simple, convenient, and easy to use. It extracts by immersion, so it actually does not require much skill. If it is difficult for you to master a stable stream of water skillfully for the time being, and you cannot accept the fine particles of a French press, then the Clever Cup is a choice that is easy to operate and can also balance flavor.

The secret is that there is a piston at the bottom of the cup. Normally it is in a lowered state (there are four feet below, letting it stay suspended). After water is poured in, it closes under pressure, and the piston firmly blocks the flow of water. When it is placed on a container, the piston below is pushed up, and the coffee flows out.

Preparation:

1. Fold the filter paper, place it in the Clever Cup, and wet the filter paper with hot water to remove the paper taste;

2. 15g coffee powder, medium-fine grind (80% pass rate on China standard No. 20 sieve), water temperature 90°C, water-to-coffee ratio 1:15;

Move the Clever Cup onto the electronic scale (at this time the valve will close automatically), and pour the ground coffee into the center of the dripper. For the first pour, add 30g of hot water, press the timer, and bloom for 30 seconds; after blooming, pour hot water until 225g, then steep for 1'50". After steeping is complete, move the Clever Cup onto a container to open the valve and filter out the coffee liquid in the dripper. The whole process lasts about 15 seconds, and the total coffee extraction time is 2'05".

AeroPress:

The AeroPress is not only an extremely ingenious creative achievement, but also a practical product. It combines the immersion extraction method of a French press, the paper filtration of pour-over coffee, and the rapid, pressure extraction principle of espresso. Through pressure extraction, it can combine the richness of espresso, the purity of pour-over coffee, and the smoothness of a French press.

Flavor characteristics of AeroPress coffee:

Clean and smooth mouthfeel: Using suitable warm water plus appropriate pressure can brew coffee with low acidity and no bitterness, yet full of flavor.

Rich flavors: Complete immersion brewing can maximize and evenly extract coffee, fully preserving the coffee's flavors.

Medium body: A perfect cup of coffee is made in 2 minutes, with the actual pressing time only 20-30 seconds. However, because of the pressure extraction during pressing, it can highlight the coffee's sweetness and smoothness.

Preparation:

1. Prepare 15g coffee powder, medium grind (75% passing China No. 20 standard sieve), 89°C, water-to-coffee ratio 1:15, preheat the AeroPress;

2. AeroPress standard accessories: AeroPress body (rubber head already installed), funnel, filter paper holder, filter cap, filter paper, measuring spoon, stirrer, electronic scale;

Method: Pour in the coffee powder, add 40g of water, and stir evenly (because the chamber is narrow, coffee powder may remain at the edges, so pour a little more water so that the coffee powder in the corners can fully absorb water). After 30 seconds, add water until 200g, stir again to help the coffee powder continue degassing, and at about 1:30 turn it over and press. Pressure extraction takes about 30 seconds. If you feel the taste is a bit strong, you can add 27g of water.

V60 Dripper Brewing:

The V60 has many ribs and a relatively fast drainage speed. When the flow is stopped, it can extend the extraction time. Using a three-stage brewing method clearly brings out the coffee's front, middle, and back-end flavors.

Preparation: 15g coffee powder, 90°C, water-to-coffee ratio 1:15, medium-fine grind (80% pass rate on China standard No. 20 sieve).

Pour water using a three-stage method: start the timer, pour water for the first time until 30g, and bloom for 30s; then begin the second stage, pouring in a circular motion with a small amount of water until 125g. Wait until the water level in the coffee bed drops to half before pouring again, then continue pouring in a circular motion with a small amount of water until 225g. After all dripping is complete, the total extraction time is about 2 minutes 00 seconds to 2 minutes 10 seconds.

There are so many brewing methods, but not every one is suitable for extracting Huakui coffee beans. Different devices paired with different grind sizes are intended to express a certain unique flavor and mouthfeel. Everyone can try them.

Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) advocates a conservative brewing method: accurate grinding, accurate temperature, accurate weight, and full extraction at the accurate time. On this basis, ensure the presentation of coffee flavor. Huakui coffee that can be fully extracted within an appropriate time will show: berry/tropical fruit aroma, sweet-and-sour juicy feel, and a finish with the sweet aftertaste of oolong tea. The flavor is very pleasant and acidic~

The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.