What should you look for in SOE coffee beans?

Choosing beans for SOE coffee comes down to three things: origin, roast level, and processing method. Single-origin beans face high heat, fine grinding, and pressure in an espresso machine, so their flavors are magnified. A wrong pick turns sour and bitter fast. A basic 1:2 brew ratio is the starting point before fine-tuning.

Ethiopian medium-light roasts and fruity fermented lots usually need a coarser grind and a shorter ratio, while medium-dark beans tolerate a tighter one. The goal is a balanced SOE americano or latte at home. Cafes now list many single-origin lots, so matching the bean to the shot matters more than ever.

In recent years, the specialty coffee trend has flourished, and more and more enthusiasts are trying to make SOE espresso with single-origin beans. But single-origin beans have to withstand the high temperature and pressure and fine grinding of an espresso machine, and their flavors are magnified exponentially, so choosing the wrong beans can easily make the shot both sour and bitter. Starting from the three dimensions of origin, roast level, and processing method, this article helps you quickly identify the type of SOE that suits you, and shares the basic formula of a 1:2 brew ratio, as well as fine-tuning tips for Ethiopian medium-light roasts, fruity fermented types, and medium-dark roasted beans, so you can make a balanced and delicious SOE americano or latte at home.

The specialty coffee atmosphere in China is getting stronger and stronger, and high-quality single-origin beans from all over the world keep appearing on cafe menus. Each bean not only comes with detailed traceability information, but many single-origin lots are also memorable for their unique aromas. Take the Front Street store as an example: the bean list is a large blackboard, densely filled with nearly 50 products, from fruity acidity to sweet bitterness, from refreshing to intense, and you can always find one that suits your taste.

In the past, when making espresso, almost the only options were a few blends, and most were dark roasted, producing a heavy mouthfeel and relatively simple flavors. Now there are more and more beans to choose from, and many friends have gotten the idea of using single-origin beans to make SOE, hoping to extract a cup of espresso with a distinctive style.

What exactly is SOE?

To review once more, SOE is the abbreviation of Single Origin Espresso, which in Chinese means "espresso made with coffee beans from a single origin," and the core keyword is "single origin."

To put it plainly, if you use 25 yuan Front Street Yirgacheffe everyday beans to extract a shot of espresso, it is called "Yirgacheffe SOE"; if you use the 158 yuan Front Street Blue Mountain No. 1 to make an americano, then it is a "Blue Mountain SOE americano"; and if your wallet is strong enough, choose the most expensive bag of Front Street Emerald Red Label Geisha to make a latte, and this milk coffee can be called a "Red Label Geisha SOE latte."

What beans should you choose for SOE?

You should know that whether it is a blend or a single origin, in the end it must go through the high temperature, high pressure, and fine grinding of an espresso machine, letting hot water pass through the puck in a few dozen seconds and turn into espresso, and the coffee beans' own flavors are magnified exponentially throughout the entire extraction process.

The most common problem is this: using single-origin beans that are roasted too light to make espresso makes the acidity spike sharply while the aroma remains flat; extracting with beans roasted too dark leaves the espresso with only bitterness and burnt notes, with no personality at all. So if you want to make a delicious SOE, choosing the right beans is the first step. Based on Front Street's experience, it is better to start from the three angles of origin, roast level, and processing method, which can help you lock in the type of SOE that suits you more quickly.

Friends who prefer a fresh, sweet-and-sour profile can give priority to naturally processed single origins from African origins, such as Ethiopia's Sidamo, Yirgacheffe, and Guji, all of which are currently very representative single-origin regions, and usually have higher sweetness and rich fruit and floral notes after brewing. However, these beans are mostly used for pour-over, cold brew, and smart drippers, and the roast level is usually light or medium-light. Using them directly to make espresso can easily lead to under-extraction, splashing coffee liquid, and thin crema.

For this reason, for customers who like Ethiopian origins and also want to try SOE, Front Street specially selected three naturally processed single origins and separately adjusted an espresso roasting profile, launching Huakui SOE coffee beans, Chaka SOE coffee beans, and Red Cherry SOE coffee beans.

If you prefer espresso with rich fruit aromas and rounded sweetness, then high-altitude beans from Central and South America may be just what you want. Coffee from Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Peru, and other countries mostly uses medium roasting in order to show the sweet aromatic profile and caramel notes of the origin or variety, so it is compatible with a variety of extraction methods.

In addition, if you want to maximize the fruit aromas of SOE, you can start with single-origin beans using processing methods such as natural, honey, or anaerobic natural. For example, Front Street Colombia Pink Bourbon uses double anaerobic natural processing, and the resulting SOE americano has obvious flavors of blueberry juice, passion fruit, and ripe grapes; another one also from Colombia but using anaerobic natural, Ombligon, makes an SOE latte that presents aromas of orange, nuts, and milk candy.

If none of the above single origins are your thing, or if you do not really like acidic coffee, then you might look among single origins from Asia and South America, preferably beans with a roast level in the medium to dark range. For example, espresso made with Front Street Brazil Cerrado and Colombia Queen's Estate shows a profile that is low in acidity, not bitter, and balanced in mouthfeel.

How do you make a delicious SOE?

Actually, making a delicious SOE is not hard; it is similar to dialing in espresso as usual. The first step is still to apply the basic formula of a 1:2 brew ratio, keeping the time within 25 to 35 seconds, and the grind size depends on whether the flow rate can fall within this time range.

For example, Front Street uses 20g Huakui SOE coffee powder to extract 40g of coffee liquid (18g powder corresponds to 36g liquid). If the time is far less than 25 seconds, it means the grind is too coarse and needs to be made finer; if the coffee liquid finishes flowing in about 30 seconds, it means the grind size is roughly fine and the setting does not need to be changed.

Since SOE ultimately has to be made into flavored coffee drinks such as americano, latte, and flat white, after the espresso is set, we also need to make some slight adjustments in advance to the extraction plan based on SOE's own flavor profile.

If you are using medium or medium-light roasted Ethiopian beans, and the origin flavors are fresh notes such as floral, bright fruit acidity, and berries, the resulting espresso can easily have thin or even no crema. At this point, you can compensate for the aromatic substances by increasing the dose by 0.3 to 0.5g. For example, Front Street will use 20.5g Huakui SOE coffee powder and extract 40g of coffee liquid in 31 seconds as the base, making an americano that is refreshing with sweet acidity, and the coffee strength of the latte will also increase, allowing you to better perceive the aroma of the espresso combined with milk.

When we use fruity single-origin beans that also carry a certain fermented flavor to make SOE, the espresso itself already has a rich sweet-and-sour taste. If you want the SOE americano to also be rich in aroma, you might increase the espresso extraction amount by 3 to 5g, which can make the sweetness higher and the finish longer; if you are making an SOE latte and want to highlight the aroma of the single-origin coffee, you only need to reduce the amount of milk. Suppose you originally used 200g of fresh milk, then you can lower it to 160 to 180g.

The last common situation is that when using medium-dark roasted single-origin beans, the SOE shows pungent flavors such as tire, dry hay, smoke, and charcoal, which means the espresso has most likely been over-extracted, making the americano or latte hard to drink. The remedy is simple: reduce the espresso extraction amount by 3 to 5g, which can effectively remove the defective finish.

But if your coffee has a light aroma, a short finish, and obvious acidity, that means the SOE may be under-extracted, and you need to slightly make the grind finer and extend the extraction time by 2 to 3 seconds, thereby ensuring a moderate coffee strength.

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