What coffee should I buy in Taiwan? Taiwan Travel Letter Taiwan Alishan Coffee Brand Recommendation

Taiwan surprised the world with coffee.

Yang Yishan, the world champion of siphon coffee in 2017 and director of UCC Group's flagship coffee shop "Coffee Lover's Planet", observed that more and more foreign coffee players came to Taiwan. The most popular coffee in the shop is the manor coffee beans from Alishan. Many tourists even bought Taiwanese coffee beans as gifts.

Chen Zhihuang, the founder of Fika Cafe, the winner of the Nordic Cup Coffee Roasting Competition in 2013, pointed out that foreign coffee fans like to taste Taiwanese coffee very much. As long as they see Taiwanese coffee, they will definitely want to try it. In recent years, the quality of coffee beans produced in Taiwan has improved rapidly, which has also helped promote Taiwan's fine coffee culture. Chao Wenqing of Taiwan Coffee Laboratory

Coffee made in Taiwan has become a favorite among coffee lovers internationally. (Photo source: World Information)

Taiwan leads Asia in coffee production and marketing

This Taiwan coffee fever can be traced back to around 2000, when the world set off a wave of tracing back to the source of the new wave of fine coffee, Taiwan coffee players began to study the essence of coffee, not only pay attention to the production area, even green bean processing, brewing methods and other factors on the coffee flavor influence, all have ink.

From the consumer market, Taiwan's coffee culture has developed all the way upstream to the origin of the development.

Taiwan's coffee culture has also promoted the development of local fine coffee. (Photo source: World Information

According to the Agriculture and Food Administration of the Council of Agriculture, the area of coffee cultivation in Taiwan has exceeded 1104 hectares from 387 hectares in 2006 to 2016. In ten years, it has grown twice as much.

"Taiwan is ahead of Asia," says Yang Yi-shan."It has a one-stop coffee production and marketing chain." In terms of quality, Taiwan lies on the Tropic of Cancer, and has a climate that is ideal for growing coffee.

Nantou County is an important producer of local fine coffee. (Photo source: World Information)

The coffee season in Taiwan runs from December to May. Yang Yishan says that because coffee plantations in Taiwan are often mixed with fruit trees, coffee beans have a special fruity flavor. In fact, during the Japanese occupation, Taiwan was the largest producer of coffee beans in East Asia, and after a century of baptism, it flourished again.

Today's Taiwanese coffee is already a shining star on the world coffee map. Taiwan coffee expert world shine

Chien Chia-cheng, a former national champion in coffee competitions and head of Peace & Love Cafe, believes that the advantage of Taiwanese beans lies in reducing carbon emissions during coffee delivery and relatively improving freshness. As coffee farmers pay more attention to varieties and treatments, flavor is improved a lot.

From beans to coffee, promising Taiwanese industries

"Coffee loving Taiwan has become one of the few coffee producers and consumers in the world!" Yang Yishan says that five years ago, Taiwan's knowledge and technology of coffee cultivation were incomplete. However, in the past two or three years, with the increase of coffee beans and champion baristas representing Taiwan,"farmers who know how to grow and professionals who know how to taste" have joined forces to continuously improve the "process from a bean to a cup of coffee", making coffee a "promising industry."

2017 siphon coffee world champion Yang Yishan observed that more and more foreign coffee players, smell incense came to Taiwan.

However, Taiwan's coffee production and sales are not yet comparable to other major producing areas in the world. Chien Chia-cheng says that the main reason is that Taiwan's hinterland is small and labor costs are relatively high. Taiwan coffee beans "can only emphasize Taiwan, delicacy and texture, but they can't be produced in quantity." (Extended reading: 12 specialty cafes in Taiwan)

According to Chien Chia-cheng's analysis, Taiwan coffee has grown by about 10%-15% in the past two years. He chose Baisheng Village Coffee Farm in Kuo-hsiang Township, Nantou County, which has won the first prize in Taiwan's domestic fine coffee competition many times. He said that the coffee beans are "very clean in the sun treatment, special flavor, with tropical fruit and wine fragrance."

"the current situation of taiwan coffee is that it is low in quantity and high in price," points out chen chih-huang. taiwan beans are supplied in small quantities and are expensive. Fika Fika started selling Taiwanese coffee from time to time four years ago. He usually chooses "Baisheng Village Coffee Manor" and "Xiangyang Taiwan Manor Coffee" in Nantou County, and occasionally coffee beans from Alishan "Tropical Dance Manor" will appear.

Taiwan manor coffee beans have occupied a place in the world. (Photo by Wu Yujie)

Yang is optimistic about the potential of Taiwan's coffee market, and hopes to let the world see Taiwan's own international coffee. Coffee Lover's Planet, in addition to selling Alishan coffee beans, also launched the Coffee Lover's Planet Taiwan Coffee Carnival to share the wonderful flavor of Taiwanese coffee. Eight local coffee shops were selected throughout Taiwan, including Songyue Coffee Farm in Kukeng, Yunlin, Shengu Mountain Coffee Farm in Heping, Taichung, and Stone Coffee Farm in Santimen, Pingtung. (Responsible Editor: Hong Jianing)