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Honduras Coffee – Cultivation History and Best Beans to Buy

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Honduras

$ 1

  • How to serve: Cappuccino, Macchiato, Latte, Affogato
  • flavor: High acidity with a nutty almost savory flavor
Varieties Arabica, Bourbon, Pacas, Catuai, Caturra, Typica
How to Serve Due to its high acidity, Honduras coffee is served with something added, e.g. milk, foam, cream, cocoa, or anything else to cut the acidity a bit
Flavor High acidity with a nutty almost savory flavor which goes great with something sweet.
Recommended Machine Espresso Machine, Percolator, Moka Pot
Good As Cappuccino, Macchiato, Latte, Affogato
Price Range $0.6 – $16 per ounce
Caffeine Level 2.7% on average

Coffee history is quite fascinating in Honduras. It was indeed an outsider in the coffee business and a lot greater coffee could be produced by neighboring nations like Costa Rica as well as Guatemala. However, Honduras has fortunately been able to strengthen the development of large Honduras coffee beans plantations in the past years.

Coffee could be considered as the salvific grace for the local people’s lifestyles considering the situation in Honduras, meaning conflict and despair. The plant has gone a long way in this country. In fact, local farmers have managed to tame 6 different varieties of coffee, such as:

Arabica Bourbon Pacas
Catuai Caturra Typica

Honduran coffee, with its mild smells and creamy taste, has become one of the globe’s most precious coffees. With its lovely vanilla as well as hazelnut fragrance organic Honduras coffee has a rich taste of cocoa with some nutty undertones. It brings quite a kick in terms of caffeine as well, sitting at 2.7% on average, while most beans are at around 1%.

Top Coffee Producing Regions in Honduras

Each of the nation’s top coffee-producing areas contributes a distinct flavor, putting Honduran coffee among the greatest in the world. Here is the list of top coffee-producing areas in this country.

Montecillo’s – Sweet & Fruity Beans

Producers in Montecillo, located on the southern edge of the Honduran border, grow a distinct cup of coffee having delicate, fruity tastes of citrus and peach, coupled with a powerful sharpness that offers a velvet texture.

The greatest coffee-producing area in Honduras, with an elevation range from 4000 to 5300 feet, the beans from Montecillos show the drink’s excellent result and flavor on the global market.

Café Marcala, a Montecillos-based brand, was the very first recognized coffee shop chain in Honduras as well as Central America, establishing it as a known and renowned aroma. So if you want to taste coffee from the world’s top places, Montecillo’s sweet and fruity Honduras coffee beans are something I can wholeheartedly recommend.

Copan – Best Honduran Coffee Beans (Allegedly)

Another special place that should also definitely be mentioned here is Copan. Copán provides a rich, powerful taste with a touch of chocolate at elevations of 3300-4900 feet along the Guatemalan border.

The government and coffee growers collaborated to develop the Ruta del Café, which traverses the length of the nation and allows tourists to sample the many tastes of Honduras coffee, typically starting in Copán. On the other hand, there are some other locations in the country, where they yield far more fruitful cups such as the Honduran honey coffee.

Agalta – Chocolatey Flavors

Coffee from the Agalta area is grown upstream in a much more tropical environment at altitudes of 3600-4600 feet. The coffee here is exclusively picked from December to March for better taste. Agalta coffee has a wide range of citrus tastes, as well as caramelized and chocolate aromas, making it the ideal after-dinner beverage.

Honduran coffee has an excellent work culture known as “Manos Honduras,” which helps the nation to be a market leader owing to the efforts of hundreds of Honduras coffee farmers working tirelessly each day to create premium quality coffee.

Opalaca

The Opalaca area is located in the eastern part of Copán and has a somewhat greater altitude, ranging from 3600 to 5300 feet. Coffee from this area has a rather intense flavor, a robust fragrance, and subtle tastes of citrus fruits. The Opalaca district is honored in connection with the “Taza de Excelencia” prize, in which a local farmer nominated Honduras for the “Cup of Excellence Award,” which seeks the greatest cup of coffee in the whole world according to the taste and cost ratios.

Opalaca is a high-altitude area noted for generating coffees with powerful mango flavors, high acidity, and vibrant smells. Therefore, it is not surprising why this region of the country is considered to be one of the best Honduras coffee areas in the world.

Top 5 Honduran Coffee Brands on Amazon

Honduran coffee is best to purchase from a Honduran seller. On the other hand, Amazon provides exactly as good, and much simpler to get products if you have Amazon Prime. Let’s talk about the Top 5 Best Honduras Coffee Brands on Amazon and how we rate them.


How We Rated Them

We pay attention to the following:

For more detailed information on how exactly we rate the coffee products we suggest in our guides, click here.

Individual Overviews of Our Top Choices

Let’s now take a look at the individual products and why we think they’re worth a shot.

BLK & Bold La Guadalupe

Price: $13.99 (subject to change)

Size: 12 oz

Type: Arabica

Roast: Light

Producer: BLK & Bold

Beans: Whole

Sweet hints of caramel and honey can immediately be felt once you make a brew of these beans. But, there is one downside, at least for yours truly. It’s a bit too acidic due to the light roast. However, if you’re a fan of acidity, then it might be the perfect option for you.BLK & Bold never disappoints with its product. This black-owned company always delivers the highest quality and their La Guadalupe Honduras coffee is no exception.

The pricing is pretty spot-on as well. $14 for 12 ounces is pretty much the market standard. A cup of coffee comes at around $1-$2 depending on how strong you like it.

Check Price on Amazon

Cafe Oro Arabica

Price: $13.86 (subject to change)

Size: 16 oz

Type: Arabica

Roast: Medium

Producer: Cafe Oro

Beans: Ground

Cafe Oro is known to be like a gold-quality coffee manufacturer in Honduras, and deservedly so. The aromas with these beans are much more fragrant due to the darker roast and the acidity is a bit more tolerable as well.

One thing I didn’t quite enjoy was that it came in pre-ground. I like to grind my own beans because it retains freshness and doesn’t lose any fragrance, but Honduras coffee beans are high enough quality that a pre-ground package is still tasty.

I was also pretty surprised how strong this coffee came out. I expected a slightly lighter kick, you know, the type you would drink in the afternoon just for the taste. But no, it’s more of a morning coffee to get you going.

Check Price on Amazon

Volcanica Honduras Natural

Price: $24.99 (subject to change)

Size: 16 oz

Type: Arabica

Roast: Medium

Producer: Volcanica

Beans: Whole

I don’t know how Volcanica managed to get their hands on the Honduran honey coffee, but here it is ready to be ordered on Amazon. Naturally, I immediately placed an order knowing what kind of company Volcanica is and what kind of taste to expect from these beans.

And I have to say, it’s absolutely spectacular. The natural sweetness in the Arabica beans, paired up with the sweet aroma of the honey used to process it is simply mesmerizing. I would have loved to put it at the #1 spot in the list, but there’s no real hierarchy here.

The only reason it is so far down in the list is due to the price. It’s a bit more expensive than what I’d be comfortable with paying, but boy is it worth it. 10/10 would definitely order again.

Check Price on Amazon

Cafe Welches Copan Honduras Gourmet

Price: $9.99 (subject to change)

Size: 12 oz

Type: Arabica

Roast: Medium

Producer: Welchez

Beans: Ground

The Welchez brand is known to source coffee beans from all over Central America, and this Honduras Arabica from Copan may be one of their best products.

They specifically chose beans that have these hints of fruit like strawberries with their sweetness and a mix of acidity and sweetness of the pomegranate/red wine.

Another good thing about this product is how it’s packaged. Welchez coffee roasters immediately grind and package the beans once they’ve cooled down from the roasting process and vacuum seal it. What this means is that when you start brewing with these beans, it’s going to feel like you roasted them yourself 5 minutes ago. It’s as fresh as it can get.

Check Price on Amazon

Cafe 2 Coffee Hondubean

Price: $11.49 (subject to change)

Size: 12 oz

Type: Arabica

Roast: Medium

Producer: Cafe 2 Coffee

Beans: Whole

To be honest with you, the Cafe 2 Coffee Honduras Arabica is not as good as the options I’ve listed above. It does taste much better than any Robusta coffee you may have tasted before (instant coffee), but it still lacks a bit on the flavor side.

This can easily be seen with the price-to-amount ratio as well. It is indeed a 100% Arabica blend, but for me, it tasted a bit more bitter and ashy, which is typical of Robusta coffee.

But, I still included it in the list because for the price, it’s a pretty decent product. It will last you for about a week, so it’s a pretty safe way to just give it a taste and see if it’s something you like. I didn’t necessarily like it, but some of my friends did. So, for the sake of objectiveness, here I am listing it.

Check Price on Amazon

Honduran Coffee Brewing Tips & Tricks

In this section of our Honduras Coffee guide, I’d like to focus on what kinds of coffee you can make and how. I’ve tried them myself as I was reviewing the products above, and I have to say, these options were pretty good. So, without further ado, let’s get to it.

The Sweet Bomb – Reduction

This is pretty much a coffee variation of a hot chocolate bomb. Hot cocoa, a bit of Espresso, and tiny wafers for just a smooth warm beverage. It’s best to drink this coffee cold, as it enhances the flavors much more, but you can go with the hot option as well.

Here are the ingredients:

And here are the steps:

  1. Brew some Espresso with Honduran beans
  2. Pour all the ingredients into a blender
  3. Add lots of ice
  4. Pulse a few times and then blend on max speed
  5. Pour and enjoy!

The Press – Best Way to Brew Honduran Coffee (Subjective)

This method is possible with either a French Press or an AeroPress. Basically, the way they work is that instead of pouring water over a filter with coffee, you’re pressing down a filter with coffee inside through hot water. This helps skim the slag a bit and retain only the perfectly brewed coffee. But, it can sometimes lead to oiliness if the coffee is of lower quality.

With Honduran organic beans, such a side effect is not to be expected, simply because the beans are really good quality on their own. All you will need is around 2 ounces of coffee grinds, 10 fluid ounces of warm water, and a reliable French or AeroPress. Simple as that. But if you’d like a more comprehensive tutorial, check out our French Press guide for a better understanding.

Take a Look At The Top 5 French Presses

The Moka Pot – Condensing the Flavor

The Moka Pot is what I like to call a poor man’s Espresso machine. It yields pretty much the same result but doesn’t cost your 2 months’ salary.

It’s a type of Percolator that moisturizes the coffee grinds inside it and creates pressure, pretty similar to how the Espresso machine works.

With Honduran ground coffee, it creates a pretty good strong taste that concentrates the flavor without diluting due to direct contact with warm water. The disposal of grind remains is pretty simple as well and you get a great-tasting cup of coffee from it.

Top 5 Moka Pots Listed Here

The Alchemist – Strongest Concentration

Another coffee-making technique that should also be mentioned while talking about this topic is the alchemist. It is considered to be one of the strongest and highly concentrated Honduran coffee among all the alternatives.

What happens here is that they take a siphon and basically steam the beans, which then liquefies in the glass above, basically turning solid beans into a liquid, thus making the concentration much better.

If you want to try this by yourself, you should use a siphon brewer.

List of Siphon Brewers

Recommended Coffee Types for Honduran Coffee Beans

Hondurans may have their traditional method of making coffee into a Lungo, but that doesn’t prevent us from trying out different types as well. Below you will find the types of brews that I found the most delicious with the brands we talked about above.

Espresso – Best Way to Brew Honduran Coffee

As we have already mentioned above, Honduran ground coffee is extremely acidic, which is what Espresso lovers are looking for.

Contrary to common perception, there are many various methods to enjoy Espresso – you may not have to invest in a high-quality manual machine and learn the skill of putting in the ideal shot. You may want to experiment with an automated or capsules Espresso machine, and other ways. However, no matter what sort of home barista you want to be, you will definitely need to master the fundamentals of Espresso and how to use the device of your choosing.

Learn How To Make Espresso

Mocha

A classic mocha is an Espresso beverage with a dollop of poured milk and cocoa powder on top. It is a coffee that is lighter than a cappuccino yet weaker than pure Espresso. It is a simpler, more straightforward drink. If you visit a tiny, more local coffee house, you may get a macchiato just by inquiring for only one.

Mocha is another perfect option if you want to taste genuine flavored Honduran coffee. Adding a little bit of chocolate helps enhance the already pre-existing chocolatey flavor of Honduran beans. This is exactly what makes this type of coffee one of the best Honduras coffee that you can ever taste.

Check Out Our Mocha Guide

Cappuccino

The cappuccino is a common Espresso and milk beverage. The law of thirds is commonly misunderstood: 1/3 Espresso, 1/3 steamed milk, and 1/3 molded milk. It is regarded as a classic Italian drink, but Honduran beans are a pretty good match for it.

The milk does not dilute the taste too much but enhances the existing undertones of fruits and chocolate. When I first had it, I have to say I was pretty pleased, but not as much as with the Mocha.

Learn How to Make Cappuccino

Things to Avoid with Honduras Coffee Beans

As I mentioned, not all types are as good as the ones listed above. Below you will find coffee brewing methods I don’t really recommend with Honduran beans.

Cold Brews – due to Honduran beans’ acidity, it is highly recommended you avoid cold brews for one very simple reason, It is too bitter and any added sweets are not going to work. But Brewlogy, You may ask, didn’t you say that a Mocha is great with Honduran beans? Yes, lovely reader, you are right. But the biggest issue here is that it is much harder to combine those sweet and relaxing tastes in a warm brew than a cold brew. With a cold brew, you will still be overwhelmed with the bitterness of these beans.

Doppio – Although an Espresso is recommended, a Doppio may be too much with these beans. This is why it is recommended to be avoided while drinking organic Honduras coffee.

Frequently Asked Questions on Honduras Ground Coffee

Is coffee from Honduras good?

What does Honduras coffee taste like?