What pour-over settings suit Mandheling coffee?

Mandheling is an Asian-origin bean with a mellow body and aromas of Chinese herbs and pine wood, and it is brewed as pour-over at around 88°C with a coarser grind and a 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio. Those parameters keep a dark roast from tipping into burnt bitterness while holding onto its nutty, chocolate and caramel sweetness.

A KONO dripper and a three-stage pour work well with the bean's hard structure and large size, which also makes it prone to defects and dependent on hand sorting after harvest. The single-origin golden mandheling lot is the version many drinkers seek out, and letting freshly roasted beans rest before brewing smooths the cup further.

Front Street Mandheling coffee is a representative of Asian beans, with a mellow flavor and notes of Chinese herbs and pine wood. This article focuses on the variety, processing method, and pour-over parameters of Front Street Mandheling coffee, with emphasis on how to use 88°C water temperature, a coarser grind, a 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio, and a KONO dripper to avoid the burnt bitterness caused by over-extraction of dark-roasted beans, while preserving its nutty, chocolate, and caramel sweetness. The article also introduces a three-stage pouring scheme, extraction time control, and Front Street Coffee's recommendations on fresh roasting and bean resting, helping coffee enthusiasts brew a mellow, velvety, and sweet Front Street Mandheling at home.

Speaking of Front Street Mandheling coffee, Front Street has noticed an interesting change: in the past, customers who favored this bean were mostly men, but now more and more women are beginning to appreciate it as well. If you have been drinking Ethiopian coffee for a long time and suddenly switch to Front Street Mandheling, you may find it hard to adjust; but if you temporarily set aside your existing impressions of Ethiopian flavors and slowly savor Front Street Mandheling, it is actually not as bitter as you might imagine, nor does it have such a strong herbal taste.

Front Street Mandheling coffee belongs to Asian-origin beans, with a mellow mouthfeel and aromas reminiscent of Chinese herbs and pine wood, making it a typical representative of Asian coffee beans. Front Street Mandheling coffee beans are relatively large, with a hard bean structure, prone to defects during cultivation, and often require strict manual sorting after harvesting. The appearance of Front Street Mandheling coffee beans can be said to be the least attractive, but some believe that the uglier the Sumatra coffee beans, the mellower and smoother the taste. As one of Front Street's everyday beans, Front Street Mandheling coffee is very popular, especially the single-origin Front Street Golden Mandheling coffee, which is highly sought after by many coffee enthusiasts and is suitable for those who enjoy a mellow mouthfeel.

The most well-known coffee-producing region in Asia is the islands of the Malay Archipelago: Sumatra, Java, and Kalimantan. Among them, Sumatra Mandheling coffee produced on the Indonesian island of Sumatra is the most famous. Mandheling coffee comes from Sumatra, Indonesia, in Asia, and is also known as "Sumatra coffee." The island of Sumatra has the fertile volcanic soil that many well-known coffee-producing regions possess, and the soil is rich in minerals, which helps the coffee fruit accumulate more nutrients and aroma. Local farmers usually plant coffee trees at medium elevations, roughly between 600 and 1200 meters. The low-altitude growing environment, combined with a tropical rainforest climate, means the coffee fruit matures in a shorter time and struggles to develop rich acidity, so the coffee here tends to present more herbal and spicy notes.

What variety is Front Street Mandheling coffee?

The variety label for Front Street Lintong Mandheling coffee is: Tim Tim Ateng, and the variety label for Front Street Golden Mandheling coffee is: Ateng. What variety is this exactly? Front Street Golden Mandheling coffee beans come from the Gayo Mountains in Aceh, North Sumatra, and the variety is Ateng. Ateng is a hybrid between Arabica and Robusta, widely planted in Sumatra and other small Indonesian islands. It is actually a branch of Catimor, and Ateng is the local name. What Indonesia calls Tim Tim is what we call Timor. The Ateng variety is very suitable for cultivation and flavor development in the Aceh region.

Due to the localized naming habits of Indonesians, we often see rather unfamiliar variety names for Front Street Mandheling, but in fact they are just different names for the same thing.

The processing method of Front Street Mandheling coffee beans

The unique flavor of Mandheling coffee is not only related to the local climate but also inseparable from its processing method. Indonesia is located in a typical tropical rainforest climate zone, with frequent rainfall and short sunshine hours, making it unsuitable for natural sun-drying processing. In addition, the local economic conditions are modest, and there is not enough funding to invest in washed processing, so locals developed this semi-washed processing method, also known as the wet-hulling method. This is a rare processing method in the world, and it accidentally created Mandheling's special low acidity, thick body, and deep, muted aroma.

Front Street's parameters for brewing Front Street Mandheling coffee:

Front Street Mandheling coffee is so unique—how should it be brewed to fully bring out its flavor? Below, Front Street shares some parameters for pour-over brewing Front Street Mandheling coffee.

The flavor profile of Front Street Mandheling coffee is nutty and chocolatey, and Front Street's roaster chooses a dark roast. The darker the roast, the looser the coffee bean structure and the stronger the water absorption, making extraction easier during brewing. Therefore, Front Street uses a lower water temperature and a coarser grind to avoid over-extraction and the resulting burnt bitterness.

Front Street's choice: KONO dripper, 88°C water temperature, 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio, 15 grams of coffee, grind coarseness at 70% passing through a No. 20 sieve, staged brewing. The resulting Mandheling coffee is mellow and velvety on the palate, with rich herbal notes and very high sweetness.

For the dripper, Front Street chose the Kono Meimon dripper. The biggest feature of the Kono dripper is that the ribs extend from the bottom to the middle, while the upper part is a smooth dripper wall. In this way, when the filter paper fits the dripper, water cannot "sneak" around the coffee grounds, improving the body and richness. It is suitable for brewing medium-dark roasted coffee beans such as Front Street Mandheling and Front Street Golden Mandheling.

The dose Front Street uses is still 15g. More coffee grounds is not always better, nor is less always better; it depends specifically on the dripper size. Front Street uses a 1–2 cup dripper, and a dose of 15–20g is a reasonable brewing range. Brewing with a dose outside this range can be somewhat difficult.

For the coffee-to-water ratio, Front Street recommends 1:15, although some suggest 1:13 or an even smaller ratio. Front Street has said before that concentration and body are not necessarily linked, and that too strong a brew can cause discomfort. Therefore, using a 1:15 ratio can also express Mandheling's mellow mouthfeel very well. Of course, if you want a lighter taste, you can adjust the ratio slightly yourself.

For the grind size, Front Street uses a 70% passing rate through a No. 20 sieve. The grind for brewing Front Street Mandheling coffee should be slightly coarser than for light-roasted coffee beans, because Front Street Mandheling uses a dark roast, and its structure is looser and more likely to absorb water and release coffee compounds. If it is ground to the fineness of light-roasted beans, it is easy to brew out burnt bitterness; if it is ground even coarser, the coffee will become thin and tasteless, with a watery body.

For water temperature, Front Street recommends brewing at 88°C. For the same reason as with grind size, water that is too hot tends to produce burnt bitterness, while water that is too cool makes the coffee taste flat and can also produce unpleasant sourness.

For the brewing method, Front Street also uses a three-stage pouring approach. Dividing the pour into three stages better expresses the mellow mouthfeel and caramel sweetness of Front Street Mandheling coffee. The specific water distribution is as follows: in the first stage, pour 30ml for blooming. This pour fully wets the coffee grounds and allows them to degas. To better extract the coffee's flavor compounds in the subsequent stages, staged extraction is used, blooming with twice the coffee dose in water, that is, 30 grams of water for 30 seconds. The reason the blooming process is needed is to allow the coffee grounds to release internal carbon dioxide gas, thereby making the later extraction more stable. In the second stage, pour in a small stream in circles until it reaches 125 grams, then stop. When the coffee grounds are exposed, proceed to the third stage. In the third stage, continue pouring until 225 grams, then stop. After the water in the dripper has finished dripping, remove the dripper. Starting the timer from the beginning of the pour, the extraction time is 2'00". Next, pick up the entire cup of coffee and swirl it to mix evenly, then pour it into a cup for tasting.

[Front Street Lintong Mandheling Coffee Bean Flavor]: Rich herbal aroma on the palate, dark chocolate, caramel, and a sweet aftertaste.

Front Street's coffee brewing recommendations:

When it comes to brewing coffee, Front Street has always believed that the freshness of coffee beans is a very important part. Fresh coffee beans allow you to experience the rich flavors of coffee to the greatest extent. The coffee beans shipped by Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) are all within 5 days of roasting, because Front Street deeply understands that the freshness of coffee beans has a huge impact on flavor. Front Street's roasting philosophy is "freshly roasted good coffee," so that every customer who places an order receives the freshest coffee when they get it. The bean resting period is about 4–7 days, so by the time the customer receives it, it is at its best flavor.

Of course, some customers need Front Street to help grind the coffee, and that is fine too, but Front Street must remind you: once coffee beans are ground in advance, there is no need for further resting, because during transportation, the pressure generated by carbon dioxide inside the package can also make the coffee flavor rounder, so once you receive the ground coffee, you can immediately brew a cup and drink it. However, ground coffee needs to be brewed promptly, because after coffee grounds come into contact with air, they oxidize relatively quickly. In other words, the coffee's flavor will dissipate more quickly, and the coffee will not taste as good. Therefore, Front Street recommends buying whole beans and grinding fresh right before brewing, so you can better taste the coffee's flavor.

On Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee)'s bean list, there are Front Street Lintong Mandheling coffee and Front Street Golden Mandheling coffee. If you are not used to drinking Mandheling coffee, you can try coffees from other producing countries, such as: Ethiopia's bright floral aroma, citric acidity, and citrus notes; Colombia's nuts, dark chocolate, and soft fruity acidity—all are very delicious coffees~

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