General

What makes it different

Vietnamese coffee is overwhelmingly robusta — a different species from arabica, with roughly twice the caffeine, far more bitterness and far less aroma. Judging it by arabica standards is a category error; it is not trying to be bright.

Compared with Da Lat

Da Lat is the counter-argument to everything Vietnam is known for: arabica, high, carefully processed, sold to a fast-growing domestic specialty market. Same country, two species, one thousand metres apart.

How this place shapes the taste

1. Variety: Overwhelmingly robusta, with arabica only at higher elevation

   The decisive factor. Almost everything about the cup follows from the species rather than from the place.

2. Altitude: 500–900 m for robusta; 1,400–1,600 m for the arabica around Da Lat

   Robusta thrives where arabica struggles. The two are grown a thousand metres apart and should never be judged together.

3. Soil: Deep red basalt, exceptionally fertile

   Among the best coffee soils anywhere, and why yields per hectare here are the highest in the world. Fertility here becomes volume rather than complexity.

4. Rain & humidity: A pronounced wet season and heavy dry-season irrigation

   Irrigation has drawn down groundwater significantly. This is the origin where the environmental cost of the crop is most visible.

The expansion that moved the world price

After economic reforms in the late 1980s, Vietnam expanded coffee planting in the Central Highlands at extraordinary speed and became the world's second-largest producer within about fifteen years. The resulting oversupply contributed to a collapse in global coffee prices around the turn of the millennium, pushing growers from Central America to East Africa below the cost of production. What happens in one origin is felt in all of them.

Brewing it

Made for the phin filter: dark roast, coarse grind, slow drip over condensed milk and ice. In espresso it contributes crema and body, which is why it is in more blends than anyone admits.