How does arabica arabica coffee quality vary by lot?

Yirgacheffe is treated as an evergreen tree of the specialty coffee world, and Operation Cherry Red stands for high-quality Ethiopian natural beans. The comparison covers Front Street Cherry Red Yirgacheffe and Natural Aricha, two G1-grade beans, looking at green bean appearance, roasting curves, and cupping flavors, with brewing parameters included.

Operation Cherry Red launched in 2007 through Trabocca, a Dutch green bean trader, to improve coffee quality on small farms. Picking requires only fully ripe red cherries, all hand-selected, and the project supports Ethiopian growers in raising income. High-quality washed Arabica handles various roast levels well.

Yirgacheffe is hailed as the evergreen tree of the specialty coffee world, and the Operation Cherry Red is synonymous with high-quality Ethiopian natural beans. This article will take you deep into the origins and operating mechanisms of Operation Cherry Red, analyze the essence of the natural processing method, and compare the similarities and differences between Front Street Coffee Cherry Red Yirgacheffe and Natural Aricha, two G1-grade beans, in terms of green bean appearance, roasting curves, and cupping flavors. It also includes Front Street Coffee's brewing parameters and technique suggestions to help you more comprehensively understand the flavor profiles and tasting points of these two coffees.

When it comes to the coffee quality of Yirgacheffe, Front Street believes that many coffee enthusiasts are familiar with this world-renowned region, which can be called an evergreen tree in the specialty coffee world. Front Street's overall impression of Yirgacheffe is elegant floral notes, a clean mouthfeel, and a floral-fruity tea-like texture. Front Street believes that Yirgacheffe, as one of the most recognizable specialty coffees in the world and the most representative category among African washed beans, is highly praised by both professional cuppers and specialty coffee enthusiasts. High-quality washed Arabica coffee adapts to various roast levels, has high moisture content and hard beans, and by regulating roasting time and development time, it can fully release fresh and bright floral and fruity aromas, with an extremely pure taste.

About Operation Cherry Red OPERATION CHERRY RED

When mentioning "Operation Cherry Red," many friends are no strangers to the name. But if asked to explain specifically what this project entails,恐怕 only a few can explain it clearly. Operation Cherry Red (ORC) is a project aimed at improving the coffee quality of small-scale farms. In 2007, Trabocca, the largest green bean trader in the Netherlands, launched this project to seek high-quality Ethiopian coffee. The project stipulates that when picking coffee cherries, not only must all ripe red cherries be selected, but the entire process must also be hand-picked. However, this is only the most basic entry requirement; the operation of the entire project is far more complex than this.

In order to help Ethiopian coffee growers increase income and improve local living conditions, in 2007 Dutch trader Trabocca and local farmers jointly launched the "OPERATION CHERRY RED PROJECT." The core purpose of this project is to incentivize farmers to improve the quality of coffee beans. Every harvest season, Trabocca formulates picking plans for specific microclimate areas, requiring hand-picking of 100% ripe red coffee cherries, with production of approximately 1,500 to 3,000 kilograms.

Trabocca provides farmers with financial loans, new hardware equipment, and technical guidance in production and processing to help them improve production levels. At the same time, it promises that as long as the actual output quality meets standards in cupping labs in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, and Amsterdam, the Netherlands, it will purchase at a premium price. Trabocca's passing score is set at 88 points.

Natural/Dried-in-the-Fruit method:

After the coffee fruit is picked, it undergoes no treatment and directly enters the sun-drying process. This is the oldest known processing method. The drying process usually lasts about four weeks. The operation must be extremely rigorous to ensure the coffee does not lose any flavor. The natural sun-drying method requires a very dry climate in the producing area. In some regions, people will

Natural Aricha processing plant — not part of Operation Cherry Red

Natural-processed Front Street Ethiopia Yirgacheffe Aricha coffee comes from the Kebel Aricha producing area, and the owner is Surafel Birhanu. In the Gedeo zone, 4 kilometers west of Yirgacheffe town, about 650 to 700 small farms are engaged in the cultivation and production of these coffees. After the coffee cherries are ripe and picked, they are sent to the Kebel Aricha processing plant for sorting and raised-bed drying. In the first few days of natural processing, the coffee cherries need to be turned every 2 to 3 hours to prevent excessive fermentation and mold. Depending on weather conditions, after 4 to 6 weeks, the beans with parchment are transported to Addis Ababa, where processing is completed before export and they are packed into jute bags. This natural-processed Front Street Ethiopia Yirgacheffe Aricha coffee is exported and traded through the ECX exchange (Ethiopia Commodity Exchange) system. The Yirgacheffe region has many high-quality coffee processing plants, and many coffees gain greatly increased value because they come from these processing plants. The Front Street natural Yirgacheffe produced by Kebel Aricha Mill is one of them. FrontStreet Coffee ARICHA beans, after being processed by the Kebel Aricha processing plant through refined natural processing, are classified by ECX as Gr.1 or G1 (the highest grade of Ethiopian coffee), and are known as the "King of Fruits."

FrontStreet Coffee green bean comparison

FrontStreet Coffee believes that Front Street Cherry Red Yirgacheffe and Front Street Natural Aricha both belong to the G1 grade. In terms of green bean appearance, both show a yellow-green color, which is a typical natural coffee color, with uniform and plump particles and few defective beans.

FrontStreet Coffee roasting analysis

[Front Street Cherry Red Yirgacheffe]: dropped at 194°C

[Front Street Natural Aricha]: dropped at 198.6°C

In order to fully showcase the characteristics of these two Yirgacheffe coffee beans, FrontStreet Coffee's roaster adopted a light roast strategy for both. From FrontStreet Coffee's roasting curves, the curve of Front Street Cherry Red Yirgacheffe is relatively smooth, while Front Street Aricha's is more jagged. The reason is that the beans of Front Street Aricha are not as evenly mature as those of Front Street Cherry Red Yirgacheffe, so we appropriately extended the dehydration time of Front Street Aricha to make its overall color more uniform and its development more full and complete.

FrontStreet Coffee cupping comparison

Although from the appearance of the green beans, Front Street Cherry Red Yirgacheffe coffee beans and Front Street non-Cherry Red Yirgacheffe coffee beans are not very different, in the roasting and cupping stages, the differences between the two are still quite obvious. The coffee beans of Operation Cherry Red are more evenly mature, which allows it to retain rich floral aromas and fruit acidity during roasting; while the coffee beans not from Operation Cherry Red, due to uneven maturity, are harder to balance roasting uniformity with flavor fullness and cleanliness at the same time.

[FrontStreet Coffee brewing parameters]

Dose: 15 grams Water-to-coffee ratio: 1:15 Filter: V60 Water temperature: 90°C Grind size: fine granulated sugar (EK43s grinder setting 10)

[FrontStreet Coffee brewing technique]

Bloom with 30 grams for 30 seconds. After blooming, pour in a circular motion to 125 grams. After the water level drops by half, continue pouring in a circular motion to 225 grams. Extraction time 2 minutes to 2 minutes 10 seconds.

[FrontStreet Coffee flavor description]

[Front Street Yirgacheffe Cherry Red Coffee] Lemon, licorice, citrus, berries, sweet orange; overall sweetness is relatively high, with caramel and cream notes in the aftertaste, and a black tea aroma in the finish.

[Front Street Yirgacheffe Natural Aricha Coffee] Aroma of ripe fruit, with obvious fermented aroma on the palate, green grapes; as the temperature drops slightly, there is citric acidity and cream, with a grape juice-like character in the finish.

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