Where Does the Name Golden Mandheling Coffee Come From?

Golden Mandheling coffee gets its name from a misunderstanding. During World War II, a Japanese soldier in Indonesia asked a café owner for the coffee's name, and the owner replied "Mandheling," referring to the Mandailing ethnic group. After the war the soldier had 15 tons shipped to Japan, and the name spread.

Golden Mandheling is tied to Pwani Coffee Company (PWN), which contracts premium Mandheling-growing regions and enforces strict hand-sorting. The wet-hulled process behind this Indonesian coffee gives it a full body, and a three-stage pour-over brings out its rich, aromatic character.

The name Mandheling does not come from a region or bean variety, but rather a mispronunciation of the Indonesian Mandailing ethnic group's name. After World War II, a Japanese soldier brought this rich and aromatic coffee back to Japan, and from then on, Mandheling became famous. Golden Mandheling, on the other hand, is closely associated with PWN, a company that contracts premium Mandheling-producing regions in Indonesia and enforces strict hand-sorting standards. The Golden Mandheling on Front Street Coffee's bean list comes from PWN, and the store also displays raw bean burlap sacks and certification certificates. This article will cover the origin of the name Golden Mandheling, the characteristics of the Ateng variety, details of the wet-hulled processing method, and include Front Street Coffee's pour-over parameters and three-stage pouring method, giving you a comprehensive understanding of this full-bodied coffee.

Mandheling is neither a producing region, a place name, nor the name of a port or coffee variety. Its origin actually stems from a mispronunciation of the Indonesian Mandailing ethnic group's name. During World War II, when Japan occupied Indonesia, a Japanese soldier drank an extremely rich and aromatic cup of coffee in a café and asked the shop owner for the name of the coffee. The owner mistakenly thought the soldier was asking where he was from, so he answered "Mandheling." After the war, the soldier recalled the coffee he had drunk in Indonesia and commissioned an Indonesian coffee merchant to ship 15 tons to Japan, where it became hugely popular. The name Mandheling spread in this way.

What exactly is the "Golden Mandheling" that everyone often talks about?

Mandheling's rise to fame is inseparable from Pwani Coffee Company (PWN), which successfully introduced it to the Japanese market. PWN's owner was precisely the café owner mentioned at the beginning of Front Street's article. Unlike many raw bean traders in Indonesia, PWN is the exclusive supplier of high-grade Golden Mandheling, having contracted Indonesia's best Mandheling-producing regions, and all the Mandheling beans it produces are of premium quality. The Golden Mandheling that has long occupied the top-right corner of Front Street's bean list comes from PWN, and the Dongshankou store also displays raw bean packaging burlap sacks and certification certificates.

The wet-hulled method saves a great deal of time and labor costs in raw bean processing, but rapid processing also brings a higher defect rate. Therefore, only through strict hand-sorting can defective beans that machines cannot screen out be removed. PWN subjects the Mandheling raw beans it purchases to one mechanical sorting plus three rounds of hand-picking, with quality far exceeding Indonesia's highest local G1 grade, meeting Front Street's PWN Golden Mandheling production standards, which specifically require the following:

1. Raw bean screen size: above 18-19 mesh after one hand-sorting

2. Fewer than 3 defective beans in a 300-gram raw bean sample

3. Raw coffee bean grade is G1

4. Dark green in color, uniform in size, neat in shape

Before launching a coffee bean, Front Street always evaluates it through cupping. Cupping is an assessment of coffee bean quality and flavor; a unified standard allows for a more objective identification of the strengths, weaknesses, and characteristics of the beans' flavor. Through cupping, Front Street's Lintong Mandheling everyday drinking beans present a rich nutty character, with a hint of melon aroma in the finish; as the temperature drops, herbal notes emerge, with a full body and abundant aroma. Front Street's PWN Golden Mandheling has not only the aromas of dark chocolate, nuts, and caramel, but also the flavors of herbal spices and pine wood, with a sweet dark chocolate aftertaste, a lingering finish, high cleanliness, and a gentle fruit acidity as the temperature drops.

What variety is Golden Mandheling?

Indonesia cultivates a wide variety of varieties. The first coffee variety planted in Indonesia was Typica, widely recognized for its excellent flavor, introduced by the Dutch in the late 17th century. In 1877, almost all coffee trees in Indonesia were severely affected by leaf rust disease, and large areas of Typica trees withered. To address this predicament, the Indonesian government introduced more disease-resistant Robusta varieties from Africa and elsewhere, and to this day Robusta remains Indonesia's main variety.

To increase coffee production, Indonesia continuously introduced various disease-resistant varieties from other countries. Among them, the Robusta-Arabica hybrid Tim Tim, Bor Bor, and the Catimor series Ateng, due to their excellent disease resistance and adaptation to Sumatra's terroir, present a unique cedar aroma. Currently, Ateng and Tim Tim account for 70% of Sumatra coffee. Front Street's Indonesian Lintong Mandheling everyday drinking beans are a blend of Tim Tim and Ateng, while Golden Mandheling is selected from Ateng, which is what we call Catimor.

Sumatra-style semi-washed method — wet-hulled processing

Indonesia's year-round humidity is 70%–90%. If washed processing were used for coffee, the raw beans would mold and spoil in the humid air before fully drying, so they developed a semi-washed method that greatly shortens processing time. The wet-hulled method first uses a pulping machine to remove the coffee cherry's outer skin, then the beans are directly poured into a pool for a brief fermentation of a few hours, during which a small amount of mucilage remains on the parchment; the mucilage is removed by scrubbing. Next, the parchment beans are sun-dried; when the raw beans first reach a moisture content of 30–40% during drying, the coffee farmers sell the raw beans to collectors. The collectors directly hull the semi-dried parchment beans they purchase, accelerating drying, removing mucilage and parchment to obtain raw beans.

Obviously, wet-hulling shortens the coffee bean fermentation period, reducing acidity and increasing body, while adding grassy and herbal notes. The "naked beans" still absorb moisture from the hot and humid air, forming the earthy, herbal, and cedar wood "muted aroma" unique to the Sumatra region. After roasting, they carry even richer roasted aromas of dark chocolate, caramel, and nuts. Front Street Coffee's baristas taste its aroma in pour-over form.

Front Street pour-over recommendations

Brewing water temperature: 87–88°C

Coffee powder: 15 grams

Coffee-to-water ratio: 1:15

Dripper: KONO dripper

Grind size: medium-coarse grind (70% passing through China standard No. 20 sieve)

The brewing method uses three-stage pouring. Dividing into three stages of pouring better expresses Golden Mandheling coffee's full-bodied mouthfeel and caramel sweetness.

First stage: bloom with 30ml of water. This pour completely wets the coffee grounds and allows them to degas, for better extraction of the coffee's flavor compounds afterward.

Second stage: pour 100ml. This stage mainly flushes out Mandheling's golden foam and raises the coffee bed.

Final stage: gently pour 95ml in the center. This enhances the coffee's sweetness.

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