What Sets Typica Coffee Apart From Other Arabica Varieties?
Typica coffee is one of the oldest known Arabica varieties, and it is the ancestor of many familiar beans, including Blue Mountain, Mandheling, and Yunnan Peaberry. Its beans carry a faint sweetness, but flavor varies by origin and growing conditions. Typica yields are low and the plants are prone to coffee leaf rust, so most regions do not grow it alone on a large scale.
The variety spread from Ethiopia's gene pool through Dutch plantings on Java, then French introduction to the Caribbean and onward to Central and South America. As a classic C arabica line, Typica has been improved into many modern cultivars, and the Bourbon family is one of its closest relatives. That shared ancestry explains why Typica, Bourbon, and Blue Mountain can taste similar yet distinct.
Typica is one of the oldest varieties of Arabica coffee, and many well-known coffee beans today, such as Blue Mountain, Mandheling, and Yunnan Peaberry, share inextricable blood ties with it. From the perspective of Front Street Coffee, this article systematically sorts out Typica's flavor characteristics and cultivation history, extends to the variety evolution of the Bourbon family, and compares the differences between Blue Mountain coffee and Yunnan coffee in variety selection and taste performance. Whether you are a coffee enthusiast who has just started or a connoisseur who enjoys exploring the stories behind varieties, you can gain a complete understanding of Typica and its derived varieties.
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Ethiopia is widely recognized as the birthplace of coffee, and coffee has long been deeply embedded in local daily life. During traditional festivals, people offer a cup of rich local coffee to their most honored guests. In the eyes of the outside world, Ethiopia is like a huge treasure trove of coffee genes, nurturing varieties of different forms, which locals collectively call Ethiopian heirloom varieties. Front Street believes that coffee culture has already merged with the cultural bloodline of Ethiopians and has become one of their proudest traditions.
The coffee everyone drinks daily at present basically belongs to Arabica, one of the three major varieties. Robusta appears more often in the commercial coffee field, such as in the production of instant coffee. As for Liberica, it is already extremely rare on the market.
Among the many coffee varieties launched by Front Street, quite a few can actually be traced back to mutated descendants of Typica. Typica has a fairly wide cultivation range globally. The Dutch once planted Typica coffee on the island of Java in Indonesia, after which the French introduced it to the Caribbean, and it further spread to Central and South America. Because Typica has always had low yields and is also prone to coffee leaf rust, most producing regions do not plant Typica alone on a large scale.
According to Front Street's understanding, Typica coffee belongs to the oldest known coffee varieties. It initially grew in areas such as Martinique. Typica coffee beans carry a faint sweetness. However, not all Typica coffee presents the same flavor performance.
Typica coffee is the most classic Arabica variety, and many varieties today have been improved from Typica. For example, coffee beans such as Blue Mountain, Mandheling, and Yunnan Peaberry launched by Front Street all belong to Typica variants. Front Street also grows two coffee trees in its coffee shop, and they are precisely the Typica variety. Everyone is welcome to come to Front Street's shop when free to observe them. Typica's top leaves are bronze-colored, the leaves are long oval, the leaf surface is smooth, and the tree is tall. The branches at the ends of the coffee tree are very long, with fewer branches, the flowers are white, and the ripe fruit is bright red. The coffee bean body is oval or slender-pointed. If you carefully observe Typica's branches and trunk, you will find that neither the trunk nor the branches are very thick, and the leaves, fruit, and green beans are usually relatively small. Because Typica's top leaves are red-copper colored, it is also called red-top coffee.
Now that Typica has been mentioned, one cannot fail to mention Bourbon, which is also one of the oldest varieties in the world. There is a blood relationship between Bourbon and Typica, because Bourbon originated from Typica. Its yield is higher than Typica's, but it needs shade trees. Because the young leaves at the top are green, it is called green-top coffee. The name Bourbon comes from the original Bourbon Island, which is now Réunion Island. The French exported this coffee overseas. Bourbon's coffee fruit is short and small, and the pulp density is higher than that of ordinary Typica fruit, so the sweetness is also higher and the acidity is bright.
What we usually call Bourbon generally refers to Red Bourbon. Among the beans launched by Front Street, one Brazilian Red Fruit coffee belongs to the Red Bourbon variety. This Brazilian Red Fruit has rich nutty and chocolate flavors when drunk, and smells of peanut and creamy sweet aroma.
Many coffee tree varieties in Brazil are Bourbon. A Yellow Bourbon variety was also discovered before, and it is currently mainly grown in Brazil. Front Street has learned that this Yellow Bourbon is of quite good quality and can grow in high-altitude environments. After sun-drying, Yellow Bourbon carries Bourbon's own nutty flavor, with balanced acidity and a slight bitterness. For example, the Brazilian Queen's Farm Yellow Bourbon coffee launched by Front Street perfectly interprets the flavor of Yellow Bourbon coffee.
Perhaps by chance, Red Bourbon and Yellow Bourbon combined and were cross-bred to cultivate a new variety. Because its coffee fruit is romantic pink, everyone calls it Pink Bourbon. This rare Pink Bourbon variety was first planted in the Huila region, initially mixed with other Bourbon and Caturra, and only later picked and processed separately. Among the many coffee types launched by Front Street, the one whose coffee variety is Pink Bourbon is Isabel coffee from the Huila region of Colombia. On the palate there are fruity aromas of berries and cherry tomatoes, and after cooling there is a honey-like sweetness, with a smooth and clean mouthfeel.
These coffee varieties are like a big family, all carrying a bit of blood relationship. Just like Front Street's Sumatra Mandheling, Front Street 2013 Typica, Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee, Hawaiian Kona coffee, and so on, these coffee beans all belong to variants of Typica coffee . In addition to the sweetness inherent in its genes and a relatively clean body, Typica coffee 's flavor is also affected by region and climate. Just like Mandheling grown in Indonesia, its taste leans toward a very rich medicinal herbal flavor, with a thick mouthfeel of herbs and caramel.
Just like Yunnan coffee, which has attracted very high attention this year, Yunnan coffee was initially planted with Typica coffee. Because Typica's yield is extremely low and the economic benefits it brings are relatively low, coffee farmers are not very willing to plant Typica, but are more willing to plant the higher-yielding Catimor coffee. Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) also has its own coffee estate in Baoshan, Yunnan. Through continuous attempts and exploration, Front Street finally decided to plant the oldest Typica variety.
The reason Front Street chose to plant the Typica variety is, on the one hand, because of the good flavor of Typica coffee trees, and on the other hand, because as early as a hundred years ago, Yunnan already had a history of planting Typica. The variety now commonly planted in Yunnan is Catimor, and Catimor is a cross between Timor and Caturra. Although its yield is large, its flavor cannot compare with Typica coffee, lacking aroma and taste. One Front Street 2013 Typica coffee launched by Front Street is the Typica variety, using washed processing to highlight the coffee's clean mouthfeel, with melon and fruit aromas, sugarcane sweetness, and a bit of soft fruity acidity. This mouthfeel carries the traditional Typica coffee flavor, with relatively high purity and body, as well as citrus-like fruity acidity, and a sweeter aftertaste. Compared with Central and South America, the low-yield Typica varieties there have gradually been replaced by the high-yield Caturra and Catuai.
But in Jamaica, the variety of authentic Blue Mountain coffee produced is 100% Typica. This Typica coffee is grown at an altitude of 1,000-1,700 meters, which is very conducive to the formation of the coffee beans' taste. Because Typica has a low yield, and because CIB has very strict requirements for exported Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee, Jamaica's Blue Mountain coffee production is extremely low. In addition, Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee has a very balanced taste, with sourness, sweetness, and bitterness perfectly integrated in this Blue Mountain coffee, so there is also a reason why Jamaican coffee prices rank at the top of the world.
If one were to talk about coffee varieties, even three days and three nights would not be enough. If you want to learn more about coffee knowledge, everyone is welcome to follow Front Street's public account. Front Street will share coffee-related knowledge in the public account.
The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.
