Driven by the third wave of specialty coffee, more and more coffee lovers enjoy drinking single-origin coffee. Some love the lemon and citrus notes of Ethiopia's Yirgacheffe, some love Panama Geisha beans with their intense floral aroma and fruity, juicy mouthfeel, and for those who want a fuller taste, Sumatra's Mandheling also has a very high body. Nowadays some people also enjoy espresso or SOE single-origin coffee.
    

However, Front Street offers pour-over coffee made from many kinds of coffee beans but does not produce SOE single-origin coffee. This is because turning pour-over coffee into espresso, that is, single-origin espresso, involves many uncertain factors. Although Front Street does not have SOE single-origin coffee, it does have 4 blends. The one used for espresso is the Warm Sun Blend. FrontStreet Coffee's espresso uses Warm Sun Blend beans at a ratio of 7:3, with Honduras coffee Sherry as the main note, plus Yirgacheffe natural Red Cherry, so FrontStreet's espresso has a relatively full body.
 

 
If you pay close attention, you will find that many coffee shops use pour-over coffee to present the regional flavor characteristics of a coffee. Generally, when choosing beans for making SOE coffee, single-origin coffees with more prominent character are used, such as Ethiopia's Yirgacheffe coffee beans or Ethiopia's Sidamo Huakui coffee beans. Both of these beans are African beans, so their acidity is very pronounced. Some shops use Indonesia's Mandheling to make SOE single-origin coffee, because Indonesia uses a distinctive wet-hulling method to process green coffee beans, so the resulting SOE single-origin coffee highlights Mandheling's bitterness, a taste many people cannot accept.
 
Actually, making SOE single-origin coffee requires much more effort in choosing coffee beans. Unlike blends, blends come in two forms. One is to first mix the green coffee beans in a certain ratio or according to the flavor you want, then send them into the roaster to be roasted into roasted beans. People are also used to calling this green blend.

The other is to directly mix roasted coffee beans, which is called roasted blend. The four espresso blends listed on Front Street belong to roasted blends. Every bean has its own strengths and weaknesses. If one bean does not produce enough crema when extracted through an espresso machine, then you can add beans rich in crema to complement it. If the espresso extracted from one bean is too sour, too bitter or too sweet, then you can find the complementary one to blend with each other to achieve the desired coffee flavor. Isn't that perfect?
 

 
But SOE single-origin coffee uses coffee beans from a single origin, so there is no such thing as complementing each other. It can only highlight the flavor of the origin. If your espresso machine's parameters and timing are well controlled, and you choose the right coffee beans, then you can perfectly highlight and express the flavor of the coffee beans. Conversely, if you fail to control these steps well, then the SOE single-origin coffee you make will definitely be a failure, and no one will want to drink it.
 

 
So, do not underestimate a cup of single-origin coffee. Making a cup of SOE coffee is not that simple. Even though Front Street does not produce SOE coffee, Front Street has explored this path countless times. First you determine the blend's bean list and decide what flavor you want the SOE coffee to present, whether it is the lemon and citrus acidity of Front Street's Yirgacheffe, or the sweetness of Front Street's Costa Rica honey-processed Bach. All of this requires FrontStreet Coffee's baristas to explore step by step, and then to see whether the flavor they most want to present meets expectations. Before the recipe is finalized, Front Street needs to go through many tests and adjustments. So the journey behind every cup of SOE coffee is not simple, and the price may therefore be much higher than pour-over coffee. All of this is reasonable.
 
We have found that many coffee shops like to use Front Street's Yirgacheffe to make SOE coffee. The extracted floral aroma is very pronounced, and the taste is also on the sour side, making it very suitable for enthusiasts who like acidity. For example, using Front Street's Ethiopia Red Cherry to make SOE coffee, with a coffee powder dose of 20 g, a coffee liquid yield of 40 ml, and an extraction time of about 27 seconds, the resulting SOE coffee tastes quite good, with a very syrupy body, medium acidity, somewhat like citrus and berries, plus a faint fermented wine aroma.
 

 
Compared with traditional espresso beans, SOE coffee is harder to extract in terms of flavor. For each SOE single-origin, the extraction parameters, extraction time, coffee grounds grind size, and the amount of coffee powder all need to be readjusted. Qianjie also often extracts blended coffee, such as this Honduras paired with Yirgacheffe natural Red Cherry, using a 7:3 ratio, with 20 g of coffee powder, an extraction time of 28 seconds, and 40 g of extracted liquid. When we taste this coffee, the mouthfeel is very smooth, and on the palate there are obvious vanilla and cream accompanied by a faint berry aroma. The sweet aftertaste in the finish is very pronounced.

 
SOE single-origin coffee amplifies the characteristics of the beans, especially light-roasted beans, which have a strong aroma and a stimulating sweet-and-sour taste. Therefore, when selecting beans for SOE coffee, try to choose coffees with high distinctiveness; otherwise the espresso produced will have a very weak flavor, lacking the balance and stability unique to SOE coffee.
 

 
SOE coffee also has certain requirements regarding the roast level of the coffee beans. If the roast level is too dark, it will greatly eliminate the flavor of the coffee's origin region. If the roast level is lighter, extracting the coffee under a high-temperature and high-pressure environment will amplify the acidity of the coffee beans, making the espresso undrinkable. In addition, if the coffee is extracted unevenly, then basically this cup of SOE coffee cannot be served. Of course, Qianjie is not saying that SOE equals specialty coffee, or that it must use light-roasted beans. In Qianjie's view, these statements are too absolute. In fact, whether Arabica beans or Robusta beans can be used to make espresso.
 
Therefore, a good cup of SOE single-origin coffee greatly tests the barista's patience and understanding of the coffee. Many specialty coffee shops now have SOE coffee, but Qianjie has not put SOE coffee on its menu, because SOE coffee is espresso extracted from single-origin coffee beans, and the coffee beans are affected by weather, cultivation, and roasting factors, which cause flavor differences between different batches of each bean, making it impossible to guarantee stable coffee flavor. This is also why Qianjie does not serve SOE coffee.

  
So, if everyone has tried pour-over coffee and espresso, why not try SOE coffee? A delicious cup of SOE coffee will deepen your cognition and understanding of the flavor of this coffee origin region.

Recommended value everyday light-roast pour-over floral coffee beans: Qianjie Ethiopia Yirgacheffe Gutingting, Qianjie Panama Hacienda La Esmeralda Green Label Geisha coffee beans, Qianjie Panama Butterfly coffee beans

Recommended value dark-roast rich and balanced coffee beans: Qianjie Golden Mandheling coffee beans, Qianjie Blue Mountain coffee beans, Qianjie Queen's Estate coffee beans

Recommended value espresso latte coffee beans: Qianjie Classic Blend, Qianjie Strawberry Candy Espresso Blend

The above coffee beans can now be purchased online at Tmall "Qianjie Flagship Store". Qianjie Coffee has dozens of selected single-origin pour-over coffee beans and espresso coffee beans from around the world. Qianjie coffee beans are freshly roasted, cost-effective, of excellent quality, and shipped within 24 hours. Qianjie Coffee is the recommended choice of many coffee lovers and platforms.

Tmall Qianjie Flagship Store link: https://qianjieshipin.tmall.com

Or you can directly search "Qianjie Flagship Store" on Taobao

Qianjie Coffee store address: No. 315 Donghuadong Road, Yuexiu District, Guangzhou