Why is the acidity of Brazilian specialty coffee relatively low?

Brazil is not only the world's largest coffee producer, but also the most complex. It turns out that everything from mass-produced coffee to the cheapest coffee in the world to elegant coffee, which is regarded as the best espresso brewing in the world. In Brazil, it is not uncommon to use four different processing methods to remove fruit from beans, and all four methods are used on the same farm during the same harvest.

Brazilian coffee is not a highly cultivated thing. Brazil ranges from 2000 to 4000 feet above sea level, well below the more than 5000 elevations common for boutique coffee produced in Central America, Colombia and East Africa. The lower growth altitude means that Brazilian coffee has relatively low acidity. At best, they tend to be round, sweet and nuanced, rather than large and bright.

A few years ago, the Brazilian government deregulated the coffee industry, allowing large farms to sell coffee directly to consuming ​​ countries, regardless of the grading structure set by the government. As a result, coffee like Santos or Bourbon Santos also enters the American market directly from large farms called fazendas.

Quality coffee shipped from these farms to consumer countries is usually dry-processed or "natural" coffee. However, Brazilian estates may also be wet-processed, which will make them brighter in the cup, or they may be what Brazilians call pulpy natural or semi-washed coffee, which is dried without a skin. but the sticky fruit pulp still sticks to the beans. Usually, these fleshy natural coffees absorb sweetness from the pulp and are as full and sweet in the cup as dry coffee.

In any case, bitterness is a risk taken by Brazilian farmers when they try to get the round, sweet and fruity taste of the best dry coffee. Fazenda Vista Alegre, a Brazilian farm, is famous in the United States for allowing its dry-processed coffee to dry directly on trees rather than after picking. Unfortunately, these interesting coffees often reflect the disadvantages of dry processing rather than the advantages. The Vista Alegre coffee I often drink shows a slight edge of dryness damage.

The growing area of Brazil. The three main growing areas provide most of the high-end Brazilian coffee. The oldest Mogiana, located on the border between S ã o Paulo and Minas Gerais, north of S ã o Paulo, is famous for its deep, fertile red soil and sweet, full, round coffee. Located in South Minas in the southern state of Minas Gerais northeast of S ã o Paulo.

(Sul Minas) the rugged hills are the heart of Brazil's coffee country and are home to two of the largest and best-known Fazendas Ipanema and Monte Alegre. Serrado, a semi-arid plateau around Patrosinio, located between Sao Paulo and Brasilia, is a relatively new growing area. It has the worst scenery of the three areas with new towns and plateaus, but it can be said to be the most promising area for coffee quality.