What Is the Relationship Between Panama Geisha and Huakui?

Most common coffee varieties on the market descend from two ancestral Arabica types: Typica and Bourbon. Typica was the first coffee variety to leave Ethiopia and spread via Yemen, and it represents what many picture as the classic Arabica image. Bourbon, a natural mutation of Typica, is shorter and rounder, and its Red Bourbon name distinguishes it from Yellow Bourbon.

Other widely grown varieties include SL28, SL34, Caturra, and Catuai, while Geisha rose to fame in Panama. The article sorts out the origins, spread paths, and naming histories of these varieties, and addresses the often confused question of how Panama Geisha relates to Ethiopia Huakui.

There are many coffee varieties, and many common ones on the market actually originate from the two great ancestors under Arabica—Typica and Bourbon. Starting with appearance identification, this article introduces Typica, Bourbon (Red Bourbon), SL28 and SL34, Caturra, Catuai, and Geisha, which rose to fame in Panama. It also answers a commonly confused question: what exactly is the relationship between Panama Geisha and Ethiopia Huakui? By sorting out the origins, spread paths, and naming histories of each variety, it helps coffee enthusiasts more clearly understand the kinship and differences among these varieties.

Front Street Coffee previously released an article on identifying the appearance of common coffee varieties, with the aim of letting everyone see the differences in shape among varieties in an intuitive way. Of course, in real life this method is not very practical. After all, there are hundreds of coffee varieties, and lookalikes are everywhere. We cannot determine which variety a bean belongs to solely by its appearance (in the vast majority of cases). Still, it is necessary to get to know them. Today, Front Street Coffee will talk about some common coffee varieties on the market to help everyone deepen their understanding of them.

Typica

So far, many of the varieties we know have evolved from two varieties under the Arabica category. Typica is one of these two ancestral varieties. It was the first coffee variety to leave Ethiopia and spread around the world (spreading to other places via Yemen), and it is also the representative of Arabica. The common "Arabica image" we see online is almost always the long-bodied, rounded Typica. The famous Blue Mountain coffee uses the Typica variety.

Bourbon/Red Bourbon

Bourbon is another ancestral variety. It spread around the world a little later than Typica. It should be understood that Bourbon is a natural mutation of Typica. Because Typica has a longer body, it appears oval overall; Bourbon, however, is short at both ends, overall squat and rounder. When the two are compared side by side, they are still quite easy to distinguish.

It is worth mentioning that with the later appearance of Yellow Bourbon (a hybrid of Bourbon and Yellow Botucatu), Bourbon gained the alias "Red Bourbon" to distinguish it from Yellow Bourbon.

Whether Bourbon or Typica, although they perform excellently in flavor, they have almost no disease resistance. Therefore, they are easily wiped out in large numbers when hit by disease. In addition, because they are difficult to cultivate and low-yielding, many production areas that originally grew these varieties switched to other varieties with stronger disease resistance and higher yields after experiencing leaf rust.

SL28, SL34

In 1930, the British established the Scott Agricultural Laboratories in Kenya with the aim of breeding new varieties with stronger disease resistance to replace old ones, and then carried out more than a decade of research and selection. Eventually, the SL series of bean varieties with high disease resistance was born, among which the most outstanding were SL28 and SL34. "SL" is the abbreviation of Scott Laboratories, and 28 and 34 are variety numbers.

At first, people always thought they were both mutations of Bourbon, because most of the laboratory's seed sources came from Bourbon Island, the place where Bourbon "made its name." But according to recent testing by WCR, SL34 is not like that; it is actually a mutation of Typica. In this way, the obvious appearance difference between SL28 and SL34—one with a rounder body and the other with a long body—makes complete sense.

Caturra, Catuai

Caturra is a natural mutation of Bourbon. In the early 20th century, on a Bourbon plantation in Minas Gerais, Brazil, people discovered a short Bourbon plant. Testing revealed that this was caused by a genetic mutation. So this Bourbon mutation was named "Caturra," meaning "small size." Caturra has higher productivity than Bourbon and also has relatively strong adaptability, so it does not have overly strict requirements for the growing environment (it is not easy to die).

Catuai is a hybrid of Caturra and Mundo Novo, and Mundo Novo itself is a natural hybrid of Bourbon and Typica, originally named "H-2077." Catuai has higher productivity, stronger disease resistance, and very suitable flavor, while also inheriting Caturra's petite appearance and its "tough life" trait. From this it can be seen that this variety is quite excellent, and later its name was changed from "H-2077" to "Catuai," meaning "very good."

Geisha

Everyone must be more than familiar with Geisha. Although there are many different versions of Geisha on the market (such as Gori Geisha and Geisha 1931), the one that left the deepest impression on us is none other than the "T2722" contender that rose to fame from Panama.

Geisha was discovered in 1931 in the Kafa Forest of Ethiopia, but in the era when heavy-roast coffee prevailed, Geisha had no stage on which to shine. Only after it drifted for more than 70 years did it finally welcome the era of specialty coffee that emphasizes flavor, and Geisha became famous in Panama with its extremely prominent floral and fruity notes. Interestingly, when Geisha was collected back then, an error occurred when its name was recorded. What should have been recorded was Gesha, but an extra i was added, turning it into Geisha. And Geisha happens to be the English word for "geisha" (a Japanese occupational title), so Taiwan referred to Geisha by the literal translation "geisha." For this reason, a highly popular Ethiopian heirloom variety in 2017 was named "Huakui" when introduced domestically, implying that it is a bean variety capable of surpassing Geisha, because Huakui is the highest-ranking existence among geisha.

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