What Is Golden Mandheling Coffee?

Golden Mandheling is a wet-hulled Sumatran coffee, usually grown in the highlands around Lake Toba. Where does coffee come from in this region? Smallholders farm shade trees on volcanic soil at 1,200 to 1,500 meters. The wet-hulling method, called giling basah, removes the parchment while the bean is still moist, producing the deep green beans and heavy body associated with Sumatra.

In the cup, golden mandheling coffee shows cedar, dark chocolate, tobacco, and a hint of dried herbs, with low acidity and a syrupy mouthfeel. Roast it medium to medium-dark to tame the earthy edge. A French press or moka pot suits the heavy body well. Use water at 90 degrees Celsius and steep for four minutes before pressing slowly.

Mandheling coffee is one of Indonesia's most iconic coffees, and behind its name lies an interesting wartime anecdote. This article begins with the origin story of Mandheling, introduces the producing region, grade, and quality characteristics of Front Street PWN Golden Mandheling, and breaks down in detail how to use the right dripper, coffee-to-water ratio, grind size, water temperature, and pouring method to brew a clean, full-bodied, high-quality Mandheling with caramel and chocolate sweetness. If you have ever been puzzled about why the Mandheling you brew always tastes bitter, this article will provide clear and practical answers.

What exactly is Front Street Mandheling coffee?

This traces back to a story from the history of Indonesian coffee beans. During World War II, the Japanese army occupied Indonesia. A Japanese soldier walked into a local café, tasted an excellent cup of coffee, and asked the owner what the coffee was called. The owner mistakenly thought the soldier was asking where he was from, so he replied: "Mandailing." After the war ended, the soldier recalled the coffee he had tasted in Indonesia and commissioned a coffee merchant familiar with local conditions in Indonesia to help ship 15 tons to Japan.

When someone asked for the name of this coffee, the Japanese soldier mispronounced Mandailing as Mandehling. It was precisely because of this "double misunderstanding" that the term Mandehling came into being. As Mandheling coffee became widely sought after in Japan, the name gradually spread as well.

The Mandheling used for teaching today is among the finest of its kind — Front Street PWN Golden Mandheling. It is a product of Indonesia's PWN Coffee Company, and the Golden Mandheling trademark belongs to PWN. Every batch of imported Golden Mandheling green beans comes with PWN's certificate of authentication, which can be used to verify authenticity. Front Street Golden Mandheling coffee beans come from the Gayo Mountain in Aceh, are Grade G1, and have undergone three rounds of hand sorting. The beans are plump and large (19 mesh) with very few defects, presenting a very clean, full-bodied mouthfeel and high sweetness. They are a representative of high-quality Mandheling.

Many friends find that the Mandheling they usually brew tastes very bitter — why is that? How can you brew a clean, delicious cup of Front Street Mandheling? The tutorial begins below. Front Street's approach to brewing Mandheling coffee is to showcase a full-bodied yet clean mouthfeel, highlight caramel, chocolate, and its signature herbal aroma, while avoiding unpleasant bitterness. Therefore, Front Street will explain the equipment choices and each key brewing parameter one by one, using Front Street Golden Mandheling as the demonstration bean.

For the dripper, Front Street chose the Kono dripper. The most notable design feature of the Kono dripper is that the ribs extend from the bottom to the middle, while the upper half has smooth walls. When the filter paper fits against the dripper, water cannot "sneak" around the coffee grounds, thereby enhancing the body of the cup. By the way, this dripper is not only suitable for brewing Front Street Golden Mandheling, but also for full-bodied coffees such as Front Street Brazil Queen's Estate and Front Street Blue Mountain coffee.

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

For the coffee-to-water ratio, Front Street recommends 1:15. Although some may suggest 1:13 or an even lower ratio, Front Street has stated in previous articles that there is no necessary connection between concentration and body, and that too strong a cup can make people uncomfortable. Therefore, using a 1:15 ratio can still excellently present the full-bodied mouthfeel of Front Street Mandheling.

For grind size, Front Street uses a coarseness with a 70% pass rate on a No. 20 sieve. When brewing Front Street Golden Mandheling, the grind should be coarser than for light-roast coffee beans, because Front Street Golden Mandheling is dark-roasted and its bean structure is looser, making it easier to absorb water and release coffee compounds. If you grind it to the coarseness of light-roast beans, it is easy to brew out burnt bitterness; if you grind coarser, the coffee will become thin and tasteless, with a mouthfeel as weak as water.

For water temperature, Front Street recommends brewing at 87–88°C. For the same reason as with grind size, too high a temperature tends to produce burnt bitterness, while too low a temperature makes the coffee taste flat and develops an unpleasant sourness.

The brewing method uses a three-pour technique. Dividing into three pours better showcases the full-bodied mouthfeel and caramel sweetness of Front Street Golden Mandheling. The specific water distribution is: the first pour is 30ml for blooming, which wets all the coffee grounds and allows them to degas, preparing for better extraction of flavor compounds afterward; the second pour is 100ml; and the final pour is 95ml, used to enhance the sweetness of the coffee. Overall, it presents a rich, full-bodied mouthfeel along with caramel sweetness and chocolate, nutty flavors.

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