Sidamo and Yirgacheffe both belong to Ethiopia, yet Sidamo is renowned for its natural processing method, and Guji is an even newer rising star that broke away from it. This article covers geography, grading, historical entanglements, the origins of Hambela and Huakui, and explains the natural processing method and pour-over recommendations in detail. Front Street Coffee's daily beans selection and brewing parameters are also included, making it suitable for enthusiasts who want to gain a deeper understanding of Ethiopian natural coffee.

When Ethiopian coffee is mentioned, many people immediately think of Yirgacheffe with its bright citric acidity and floral aroma, and even treat it as the calling card for the entire country's coffee. Ethiopian coffee is usually named after its production region: coffee from the Yirgacheffe region is called Yirgacheffe coffee, while coffee from the Sidamo region is called Sidamo coffee. Front Street Coffee's Ethiopian entry-level daily beans are precisely Yirgacheffe.

However, although these two regions both belong to Ethiopia, their processing methods are completely different: Yirgacheffe is mainly washed, while Sidamo mostly uses natural processing. When it comes to the representative natural coffee of Sidamo, one cannot avoid Huakui. Whether in terms of market popularity or flavor performance, Huakui can be considered among the best of Ethiopian natural beans.

Geographically, Sidamo is located on the southern highlands of Ethiopia, adjacent to Lake Awasa in the East African Rift Valley and bordering Kenya. High altitude, suitable rainfall, fertile soil, and abundant native tree species create ideal conditions for coffee cultivation. Coffee trees here mostly grow between 1,550 and 2,200 meters. The high altitude causes the fruit to mature more slowly, resulting in a more complex and intense aroma structure, and the harvest season is also slightly later than in other parts of Ethiopia.

The overlapping administrative divisions left over from history make Sidamo one of the most complex and difficult-to-understand origins in the world. Its coverage is both large and broad. The Ethiopia Commodity Exchange (ECX) divides it by geographical indication into five regions: A, B, C, D, and E, and each region governs multiple sub-regions, covering more than 50 cooperatives and over 200 washing stations in total. Differences in altitude, humidity, soil, and microclimate also create subtle differences in coffee flavor between different villages.

In the last century, Yirgacheffe originally belonged to the Sidamo production region and was labeled as "large sidamo" when exported. Because of its outstanding flavor, it attracted attention early, broke away from the Sidamo classification first, and with the promotion of the Ethiopian government, successfully registered the "Yirgacheffe®" flavor trademark globally in 2007.

Similarly, when the Ethiopia Commodity Exchange ECX was established in 2008, Guji coffee was still classified under "Sidama A" in auction categories. Later, as more and more smaller origins emerged with excellent flavors in international green bean competitions such as COE, Guji's reputation rose accordingly, and ECX finally listed it as a new separate category in 2015.

Guji Production Region

Guji was originally managed by the Sidamo production region. Due to its remote location and lagging development, the rise and fame of its coffee came relatively late, and its early reputation was not as great as that of Yirgacheffe, Harrar, and other production regions. Later, because of the outstanding flavor of its coffee beans, it was independently divided into a new production region. It has fertile black soil, with an average altitude of over 1,800 meters, and its unique geographical conditions form a terroir favorable for coffee tree growth.

Precisely because it is far from traditional production regions, Guji has long suffered from inconvenient transportation and has been surrounded by high mountains and dense forests, almost isolated from the outside world in the past. The local residents initially made a living by herding, and later discovered that there were large mineral deposits underground, after which the mining industry gradually emerged. Only in recent years, as high-quality coffee has been favored by more and more international buyers, has the coffee industry developed rapidly and become an important new pillar of Guji.

Unlike Yirgacheffe, Guji, as a rising star, started its coffee industry late, but it possesses high altitude, mineral-rich soil, and sufficient available land, providing conditions for establishing large-scale washing stations and natural drying yards. In addition, the protection of primary forests here is more complete, providing safeguards for water and soil conservation and the uniqueness of flavor.

From Front Street's Guji coffee distribution map, well-known sub-regions include Ana Sora, Hambela, Shakiso, Uraga, and Rogicha. The Huakui mentioned by Front Street comes from Hambela and uses natural processing.

Hambela

Unlike traditional production regions such as Yirgacheffe, Hambela is actually a coffee farm belonging to the locally renowned METAD Agricultural Development PLC. It is both an independent farm and the main processing station for nearby growing areas, processing surrounding coffee and selling it as separate lots. As a local Ethiopian coffee export company, METAD was founded by Aman Adinew in 2013. Its coffee comes from the Gedeo Zone and Gedeb District in the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples' Region (SNNPR), as well as the Guji Zone and Hambela Estate in the Oromia Region.

Aman comes from a coffee family. His grandmother opened coffee farms in Ethiopia's Harrar and Sidamo regions in the last century, and Aman himself also served as Chief Operating Officer (COO) of the Ethiopia Commodity Exchange (ECX). After leaving the government agency, in order to help modernize the local coffee industry, he founded METAD and cooperates with thousands of smallholder farmers in Yirgacheffe and Guji.

Hambela Farm covers 200 hectares and is about 75 kilometers from Yirgacheffe. It is located in Ethiopia's best coffee heartland, and its processing station is quite professional and well-equipped in terms of equipment, management, and scale. In addition, fertile volcanic soil, natural organic farming, and relatively mature post-processing methods are all key reasons why the coffee here has become a hit in recent years.

Buku Abel

In fact, before this bean was called "Huakui," it had only one English name, "Hambella," translated as "Hambela." In other words, what we call Huakui coffee is a traditional natural G1 coffee bean from the Hambela production region, and the "Buku Abel" processing station is its more detailed traceability information, located in Dimtu town.

After Huakui became famous, in order to meet surging market demand, DW Company added up to 5 independent green bean drying processing stations in Hambella Wamena Wereda, all located in the core production area of Dimtu town. In addition to the original Buku Abel, four other small villages, Buku Saysay, Haro Soresa, Tirtiro Goye, and Seke Bokosa, also joined the production of natural coffee beans. It is reported that the annual production of Huakui under DW Company has already reached tens of millions of tons.

Since the 2018 production season, the taste of Huakui (natural G1 coffee beans) from the same origin and the same processing station has changed. Through cupping, Front Street found that although the Huakui of 2018 and 2019 was similar in flavor to that of 2017, it was inferior to the "first-generation Huakui" in mouthfeel such as body and finish.

Therefore, in order to continue selling this Hambela natural coffee while distinguishing it from the original version, domestic green bean trading companies created an X.0 suffix for each subsequent year's lot based on the years after 2017. For example, the 2018 lot was called "Huakui 2.0," the 2019 production was called "Huakui 3.0 and 3.1"... Last year's release was "Huakui 7.0," and so on. In this way, we can identify which year's lot the Huakui we buy belongs to through the suffix.

Natural Processing ---- Green Bean Processing Method

Although the washed coffee beans from the Yirgacheffe production region are very famous, Ethiopia actually mainly uses the natural processing method. Even now, natural processing still accounts for about 70% of the country's production. Natural processing is one of the oldest and most classic processing methods, and its steps are relatively simple: dry the coffee cherries in the sun for several weeks until the moisture content drops to about 11%, then use a machine to remove the peel and pulp, and afterward store them in warehouses awaiting export.

Sidamo mostly processes coffee cherries naturally. Front Street Coffee believes that natural processing can better express the clear fruit acidity and smooth mouthfeel of Sidamo coffee. The natural processing method is also called the "dry method." It places coffee beans directly under the sun to dry for as long as 27 to 30 days, reducing moisture from 60% to only about 12%. Front Street Coffee finds that it has the sweet-and-sour sensation of tropical fruit, retains the coffee beans' natural richness, has layered flavors, and sometimes carries a slight fermented aroma of wine.

Pour-over Recommendations for Huakui Coffee Beans

Lightly roasted coffee beans are harder in texture, so Front Street uses hot water at 92°C to 93°C to bring out the floral and fruity notes in the coffee. For grind size, Front Street recommends medium-fine grinding (78% passing rate on the Chinese standard No. 20 sieve). If it is too coarse, the rich substances cannot be extracted, and the brew will taste thin; if it is too fine, it is easy to over-extract at high water temperature, and the brew will easily become bitter.

For the brewing ratio, Front Street believes 1:15 to 1:16 is fine. If you want a richer mouthfeel, use 1:15; if you want to feel the floral sweetness more clearly, use 1:16 to let the flavors spread out more.

Dripper: V60 Water temperature: 92-93°C Dose: 15g Coffee-to-water ratio: 1:15 Grind size: fine granulated sugar size (78% passing rate on No. 20 standard sieve)

Pouring technique: three-stage

Three-stage pouring: wet the coffee bed with twice the amount of water as the coffee grounds to form a dome and bloom for 30s, then pour in a small stream in circles from the inside out until 125g, pause, wait for the coffee bed to drop to half the height of the dripper, continue pouring the third stage with the same thin stream until 225g, and once all the coffee liquid has filtered through, remove the dripper. The total time is about 2 minutes.

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