Where Are Coffee Beans Grown and How Did Geisha Spread?

Coffee beans are grown on trees, and the Geisha variety traces a specific route: it began in the forests of Ethiopia, then moved to Kenya, Tanzania, and Costa Rica before reaching Panama, where Hacienda La Esmeralda brought it to prominence. Geisha and Yijifa are the same coffee, differing only in transliteration from Japanese.

On coffee farms, Geisha's reputation rests on strict standards. Hacienda La Esmeralda grades lots as Red, Green, or Blue Label; its auction Geisha comes from lots grown above 1,550 meters, with some exceeding 1,900 meters, all scoring above 90 points in cupping after pickers select only ripe red cherries.

Geisha and Yijifa are actually the same coffee, transliterated from Japanese. This article begins with the red, green, and blue label grading of Panama's Hacienda La Esmeralda, sorts out its rigorous quality control and auction lot standards, and traces Geisha's legendary path from the forests of Ethiopia to Kenya, Tanzania, Costa Rica, and then to Panama, where it rose to fame. At the same time, it takes a deep dive into Gesha Village to explain the varietal differences between Gori Gesha and Gesha 1931, the meanings of the OMA and SURMA plot codes, and the traceability system for natural lots. Finally, it presents complete information on three products launched by Front Street Coffee: Ethiopia Gesha Village Natural, Panama Hacienda La Esmeralda Red Label Washed, and Costa Rica Tarrazu Dota Goddess Estate Geisha.

What is the difference between Yijifa and Geisha? In fact, they refer to the same coffee; only the name "Yijifa" comes from the Japanese pronunciation.

What variety does Geisha actually belong to? Panama's Hacienda La Esmeralda usually divides its Geisha into three grade lots—Red Label, Green Label, and Blue Label. Among them, part of the Red Label lots are used for the estate auction, while another part is sold directly by Hacienda La Esmeralda. Processing methods such as natural and washed may all appear in auction lots.

At Hacienda La Esmeralda, quality control is first reflected in detailed guidance for pickers. The estate pays pickers extra and requires them to pick only fully ripe, bright red, plump coffee cherries.

Once they enter the preparation stage, these fresh cherries must also be inspected one by one to remove rotten fruit and unripe green beans. The estate invests a great deal of time in handling details and repeatedly studies how to achieve a good feel. It is precisely these practices that make Hacienda La Esmeralda stand out and make it easy to distinguish it from other coffee producers around the world.

Our newly launched Geisha belongs to Hacienda La Esmeralda's Esmeralda Special, also known as auction Geisha, namely the Special-Geisha auction lot. It represents Hacienda La Esmeralda's selected lots, all grown at elevations above 1,550 meters, with some even exceeding 1,900 meters, and all scoring above 90 points in cupping.

Hacienda La Esmeralda is highly experimental in spirit. They have compared 400 coffee varieties and conduct sample processing and cupping every year, from which they select varieties with excellent cupping performance—this was exactly how Geisha was discovered that year. Lots using such innovative experimental processing methods cannot even be found at auctions.

Esmeralda Red Label has three major characteristics:

1. Strong traceability: each lot can be traced to information such as the picking date, specific plot, and tree age in the plot;

2. Elevation: all lots are at elevations above 1,600 meters, with some exceeding 1,900 meters;

3. Cupping score: measured by SCAA standards, the cupping score must reach above 90 points to be called Red Label.

In 1931, a group of botanists went to southern Ethiopia for an expedition and discovered the Geisha bean variety near Gesha Village. This coffee tree is quite tall, and its seeds are also larger than those of general Ethiopian bean varieties. They brought these seeds to Kenya and planted them in a nursery. Five years later, when the seedlings had grown, they selected the healthiest samples from them, collected the fruit, and then took them to Uganda and Tanzania. In 1953, the Costa Rican research institute CATIE obtained some seeds from Tanzania for research.

In fact, the first person to bring Geisha from Costa Rica to Panama was Pachi Serracin, the former owner of Hacienda Don Pachi, and that was in 1963. But Geisha was initially not well regarded in Panama. Its yield was low and its economic benefit was poor, so it could only be sold mixed with other bean varieties. Some Geisha trees could be found on various estates, and some were even used as windbreaks for coffee farms. It was not until after 2000 that Daniel Peterson of Hacienda La Esmeralda discovered that Geisha's flavor was extremely charming, but the flavor was so distinctive that they were not sure whether consumers could accept it.

At the 2003 Best of Panama competition, Hacienda La Esmeralda took first place that year with Geisha, and its intense and complex flavor amazed all the judges. Over the following decade, Geisha was unbeatable in various green bean competitions, and coffee farmers across Central and South America rushed to plant it as well, with countries such as Costa Rica, Bolivia, and Colombia following suit. Although their flavors still lagged behind Panama's, Geisha had already become the gold among coffee beans, and no one wanted to miss out.

Some people also hoped to trace Geisha's origins and organized several expeditions deep into the primeval forests of southwestern Ethiopia, but in the end everyone generally agreed that Panama still seemed to be the world's best place for producing Geisha. Different processing methods also bring different flavors to Geisha, from the earliest washed method to later natural and honey processing, becoming increasingly detailed and complex.

What exactly is the difference between Gesha Village and ordinary Ethiopian estates? What do OMA and SURMA in lot numbers refer to? What do the series of numbers 51, 72, and 59 mean? What is the difference between Gesha1931 and Gori Gesha?

Estate Background

Adam Overton and Samuel Rachel began planting Ethiopian Geisha in the nearly 500-hectare Gesha Village in 2011, and their only goal was to produce the world's best coffee. Starting in 2008, after three years of searching, they finally found an environmental system suitable for coffee cultivation at an elevation of 1,900-2,100 meters, with tropical rainforest, a suitable climate, fertile forest soil, and long-standing woodland.

Gesha Village Coffee Estate covers a total area of 471 hectares. By 2015, 300 hectares of coffee had been planted, and in 2016 another 50 hectares were added. The Geisha seeds were selected from the native coffee forest 20 kilometers from the estate (Gori Gesha), which is also the source of Panama's Geisha variety. With the guidance and help of Mr. Willem Boot, the godfather of Geisha, Gesha Village's coffee has repeatedly achieved excellent results in world competitions.

Extremely Strong Traceability and High Quality Control

Unlike the vast majority of Ethiopian coffees, which must be exported through the ECX (Ethiopia Commodity Exchange) or cooperatives, Gesha Village Coffee Estate, with an area of nearly 500 hectares, can be independently processed and exported as a single estate, and therefore has traceability unmatched by other Ethiopian green beans.

Each lot of green beans can be traced to every stage, including the specific plot, variety, tree age, picking date, and length of natural (washed) processing, effectively ensuring transparency and quality control at each stage.

What is the difference between Gori Gesha and Gesha1931?

Gori Gesha and Gesha 1931 both refer to the names of planted varieties. Gesha Village grows three varieties in total, namely Gori Gesha, Gesha 1931, and Illubabor Forest. The first two are both Geisha, while Illubabor Forest is a disease-resistant variety provided by the Ethiopian research institute.

Among them, Gori Gesha comes from the Geisha variety in the wild coffee forest Gori Gesha near the estate and encompasses the genetic diversity of Geisha, so it is named after the forest.

Gesha 1931 was selected from multiple Geisha varieties in the Gori Gesha forest and is the variety closest to Panama Geisha. Variety selection depends on the morphology of the coffee plant, the appearance of the coffee beans, and cupping results. It is named Gesha 1931 precisely because 1931 was the year people discovered the Geisha variety from Ethiopia.

What do OMA, SURMA, and others represent?

The estate divides the nearly 500-hectare property into plots according to different varieties and microclimates (as shown in the figure below):

Therefore, the variety distribution is as follows:

Planting Gori Gesha: Shewa-Jibabu; Shaya, Bangi;

Planting Gesha 1931: Surma; Oma; Narsha;

Planting Illubabor Forest: Dimma; Gaylee

What do the numbers in lot names mean?

At this point, we need to specifically discuss Gesha Village's traceability.

Picking date data for some Gesha Village lots from 2016-2017 (Image: Gesha Village auction materials)

Take the OMA plot natural lot used by Japanese champion Takayuki Ishitani in competition as an example (see the figure above). The variety planted in this plot is Gesha 1931, and the plot is further divided into 5 natural lots: 51, 72, 77, 86, and 90. The closer the areas are, the closer their maturation and picking periods are. In addition, OMA#27 is the only washed lot in this plot (due to limited space, it is not shown in the figure above). Takayuki Ishitani's competition beans were the OMA#51 auction lot, and one of the lots ordered by Grand Cru Coffee was the same lot as OMA#72.

After multiple cuppings and screenings, Grand Cru Coffee selected three natural lots with distinctive characteristics and purchased them in batches. Among them, the first batch, Surma#85 and Shewa-Jibabu#59, has sold out; the second batch restocks the same lot as Shewa-Jibabu#59 and offers the same lot as Oma#72 in stock.

The specific cupping flavors are as follows:

1 Same lot as Shewa-Jibabu#59 (Gori Gesha)

This lot has outstanding sweetness, with obvious flavors of strawberry, peach, and papaya, delicate floral aromas, and a creamy, rich mouthfeel;

2 Same lot as Oma#72 (Gesha 1931)

This lot is candied fruit; intense floral aroma, high complexity;

The above two Geisha lots both use the natural processing method. First, floating matter and impurities are removed, then the cherries are dried on African-style raised beds covered with film and plastic sheeting, with a total drying time of 18-30 days.

Front Street Ethiopia Gesha Village Natural Geisha

(Gesha Village Coffee Estate Gesha Natural)

Variety: Geisha (Gori Gesha)

Processing method: Natural

Harvest season: 2017 new harvest season

Flavor description: strawberry, peach, papaya, floral, creamy, rich

Front Street Panama Hacienda La Esmeralda New Harvest Season Red Label Geisha Auction Yijifa Washed Processing

Panama Geisha Hacienda La Esmeralda

Country: Panama ⟧51⟧Grade: Red Label

Grade: Red Label

Region: Boquete

Roast level: Light roast

Processing method: Washed

Variety: Geisha

Estate: Hacienda La Esmeralda

Flavor: lychee, peach, sweet potato

Front Street Costa Rica Goddess Geisha

In Costa Rica's most famous Tarrazu region, the Dota area is especially known for producing micro-lot Geisha varieties. As early as 1865, the Dota area already enjoyed the reputation of good Costa Rican coffee. At that time, when road construction extending from the capital reached the Dota Valley, it had to pass through the Tarrazu area, so later when the Costa Rican coffee bureau marked production regions, it was customary to label it Dota tarrazu. This area has a typical highland terrain, and both its soil and temperature and humidity are excellent choices for coffee cultivation.

Goddess Estate was established in the 1960s and cultivates coffee using organic methods, using local native trees and fruit trees to shade the coffee. The fertilizer used is made by mixing coffee cherry pulp with molasses, adding fertile soil with high mineral content from nearby mountain areas, and combining it with microbial fermentation to create an organic fertilizer that can enhance the disease resistance of coffee plants. The estate also habitually uses California earthworms to cultivate the soil and directly uses them as the main nutrient source for coffee trees during the fertilization period, while interplanting multiple coffee varieties. It always purchases and selectively picks fully ripe red-purple berries, and strictly controls the soaking and fermentation process, developing a very unique constant-temperature processing method. A fermentation degree that is neither too much nor too little gives the coffee an excellent balance of clarity and complexity, making its flavor expression more stable and revealing Geisha's special flavors strand by strand, which is truly intoxicating.

Dota E1 Diosa Geisha

Origin: Costa Rica

Region: Tarrazu

Variety: Geisha

Elevation: 1,800 meters

Soil: Volcanic soil

Grade: SHB

Processing method: Washed

Harvesting: Manual harvesting

Flavor:

[Dry aroma] tea aroma, orange, plum, cranberry, floral, vanilla, almond

[Wet aroma] floral, chocolate, vanilla, bright malic acidity, cranberry

Flavor characteristics: lemon and citrus aromas, soft grapefruit acidity and the sweet fragrance of fruit candy, medium body, clean and smooth mouthfeel

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