Been wondering what the taste differences are between Catui and Arabica. Didn't realize until recently that Catui is a hybrid that has the potential to yield high densities yet more resistances bred into it. Sometimes taste is lost in cross pollinating. A lot of coffees out there have percentages of Catui mixed in.

Anyone have any thoughts on this? May help when planning coffee purchases.

genecounts wrote:Been wondering what the taste differences are between Catui and Arabica. Didn't realize until recently that Catui is a hybrid that has the potential to yield high densities yet more resistances bred into it...

Gene, the Catuai is a full Arabica, Mundo Novo x Caturra. I wonder if you instead meant Catimor crosses, ie Colombia, Castillo, and others that have some robusta genes (no pun intended) involved?

There is no coffee variety (that I'm aware of) named Catui.
Maybe you are a little confused by all these quite similar names:

Catuaí: pure arabica, artificial crossing between Caturra Amarelo and Mundo Novo

Icatu Vermelho (Red Icatú): interespecific hybrid , from artificial crossing of C. canephora (Robusta) e C. arabica (Mundo Novo cv. Bourbon Vermelho).

Icatu Amarelo (Yellow Icatú) is a hybrid from a natural crossing between a Icatú Vermelho and a cultivar of Mundo Novo x Bourbon Amarelo, therefore we could say that it's "1/4" robusta and "3/4" arabica.

Catucai : is a natural crossing of 'Icatu' and 'Catuaí', again a "1/4" robusta and "3/4" arabica

BTW: I had nice coffee from all of them, no Robusta taste that I could actually feel.

Icatu can be really tasty. The only thing I've noticed is that it has a tendency to go loomy (aka baggy) faster than most coffees. When they're processed well, they're pretty delicious.

I've heard of Catuai somewhere. It seems that this coffee variety is popular in Latin Amercia. It is not popular in Vietnam as in Vietnam, there are Caturra, Typica, Bourbon and Mocha as original arabica. But i like the color of Catuai's berries. Its full yellow looks very romantic