Where Does the Mandheling Coffee Name Come From?
Mandheling is not a region, port, or variety. The name comes from a mistransliteration of Mandailing, an Indonesian ethnic group. During World War II, a Japanese soldier in Indonesia asked for the coffee's name; the owner thought he was asked where he came from and answered Mandailing. The soldier later ordered 15 tons from trader Pwani Coffee Company.
The coffee is grown around Lake Toba in northern Sumatra and carries a herbal, woody aroma. Golden Mandheling, developed by the Japanese with four rounds of hand sorting, is dark green and uniform. Aged Mandheling tastes sweet as honey when aging succeeds, softening the acidity into sugars and rounding the mouthfeel.
Mandheling is a name familiar to coffee lovers, but it is neither a producing region, a port, nor a coffee variety—it actually originates from a mishearing of the Indonesian Mandailing people. During World War II, a misunderstanding by a Japanese soldier in a coffee shop spread this name across the world and led to the founding of Pwani Coffee Company (PWN). This article traces the origin of the name Mandheling, introduces the flavor characteristics of its producing area around Lake Toba in northern Sumatra, and explains the quality control and flavor differences of derived varieties such as Golden Mandheling and Aged Mandheling. Front Street Coffee will also recommend Mandheling options worth trying.
Mandheling is neither the name of a producing region, nor a place name, nor a port name, and certainly not the name of a coffee variety—so how did it actually come about?
In fact, this name is a mistransliteration of the Indonesian ethnic group name Mandailing.
During World War II, when Japan occupied Indonesia, a Japanese soldier drank a cup of extremely rich and aromatic coffee in a coffee shop and asked the owner for the name of the coffee. The owner mistakenly thought he was asking "Where are you from?" and answered: Mandailing. After the war, this soldier recalled the "Mandheling" he had drunk in Indonesia and commissioned an Indonesian coffee trader to ship 15 tons to Japan, where it became hugely popular. The name Mandheling spread in this way, and that coffee trader was none other than the now-famous Pwani Coffee Company (PWN).
The widely known Mandheling is produced around Lake Toba in northern Sumatra, and the finished cup has a unique herbal and woody aroma.
Golden Mandheling was a variety developed by the Japanese more than a decade ago using stricter quality control standards, undergoing four rounds of hand sorting to remove defective beans, producing beans that are dark green in color and uniform in appearance. This created another wave of market demand, and even European and American markets sought after it.
Aged Mandheling is characterized by being sweet as honey. Successful aged beans smooth away Mandheling's less elegant acidity, as the acidic and astringent components are transformed into sugars through aging, making the coffee rounder in mouthfeel and sweeter to drink. Failed aged Mandheling, however, is like a coffee zombie, with a flavor that is hard to swallow.
If you also want to try the unique flavor of Mandheling, Front Street Coffee recommends starting with Golden Mandheling or Aged Mandheling to experience the flavor differences brought by different processing methods.
The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.
