Red Sparrow - Anaerobic Natural Chinese Yun Catimor

* Chinese Barista Championship 1st Place 2021 *

The Red Sparrow is a small bird native to Gaoligong Mountain, located near the Red Dragon Estate coffee farms. Lao Wang loved the bird’s rebellious streak, so he gave its name to his very best anaerobic natural Catimor. The idea was to change the way people think about Yunnan coffee, and it’s safe to say it’s working.

In February 2021, Zhao Xin, a green buyer for the Chinese barista Pan Wei, asked Lao Wang to send over Yunnan coffees and fresh coffee cherries ahead of the Chinese Barista Championship (CBC). Out of everything he tried, Pan Wei picked Red Sparrow for the competition.

Catimor isn’t a variety you’d usually expect to see on a championship stage, which makes this all the more special. Red Sparrow was tested against famous varieties like Geisha, Bourbon and Typica, and Pan Wei went on to win the 2021 CBC with it.

Lao Wang’s Journey

Lao Wang grew up listening to his parents talk about Baoshan’s traditional small-bean coffee, and he always wondered just how good Yunnan coffee could be. Eventually, he went back to his hometown to see the coffee-growing areas around Baoshan for himself.

Red Dragon Estate

Between late 2016 and early 2017, Lao Wang drove his father’s car through nearly 80% of the mountains in Baoshan’s Lujiangba region. That road trip eventually brought him to Red Dragon Estate, a farm sitting at 1,887 metres, which is seriously high for coffee in China.

There he met Uncle Yang, who had been growing coffee all his life. Uncle Yang’s dedication and local know-how convinced Lao Wang that this was the place to start. He had no money at the time, so he promised Uncle Yang above-market prices for fully ripe cherries, plus free seedlings of new coffee varieties. After just two meetings, Uncle Yang became the first employee of Lao Wang’s new company.

In 2017, Uncle Yang and his family hand-picked a large quantity of cherries from Red Dragon Estate, including a dedicated selection of fully ripe, completely red cherries for Lao Wang to taste. They tasted so clean and sweet that they changed the way Lao Wang thought about coffee for good.

From then on, he only used fully ripe cherries. He named it his All Red Cherry Plan, and it’s still at the heart of everything Red Dragon Estate and Voiceless do today.

Learning the Craft

In June 2017, Lao Wang headed to Beijing to learn everything he could about coffee. Over six months, he qualified as a Q-Grader and completed intermediate roasting training, advanced SCA courses, barista training and the Gold Cup Standards. He came home with the skills to take Yunnan coffee to a whole new level.

In April 2018, he started his Typica Renovation Project, planting around 70,000 Typica seedlings at 1,887 metres on Red Dragon Estate. It’s a long-term project to bring new varieties to Yunnan and keep pushing cup quality forward.

In 2019, Lao Wang founded Voiceless, named after his belief that “good coffee speaks for itself, without the need for a human’s voice.” Its slogan, “We just speak by our coffee”, sums up how he works: let the quality do the talking.

Yun Catimor is a version of Catimor found only in Yunnan. Catimor is a cross between Caturra and the Timor Hybrid. Farmers value it for its resistance to coffee leaf rust and its high yields, and it’s by far the most widely grown variety in Yunnan.

Lao Wang found that a gentle, carefully controlled anaerobic fermentation softens the earthy aftertaste Yunnan Catimor is often known for. Pair that with his fully ripe cherries and you get all of the variety’s fruit and sweetness, which is exactly what makes Red Sparrow so special.

In an anaerobic natural process, whole coffee cherries are fermented in sealed, low-oxygen containers before being dried as a natural, with the seed still inside the fruit.

For Red Sparrow, fully ripe cherries undergo an extended fermentation in sealed barrels, then are dried as whole cherries on raised beds.

Fermenting without oxygen slows the process down and changes which flavour compounds develop. The result is often more intense fruit character and sweetness than a standard natural, which really comes through in Red Sparrow’s honeydew melon and dragonfruit notes.

New to processing methods? Our beginner’s guide to coffee processing explains washed, natural, honey and anaerobic coffees side by side.

Dial In With Accuracy

Red Sparrow is an expressive, fruit-forward coffee, so accurately measuring your dose and yield will help you hit the sweet spot. We strongly recommend using a reliable scale. See our guide to the best coffee scales and our bench favourite, the Felicita Parallel.

Brewing Tips

• Rest window: Follow the recommended 27–55 days off roast for the best clarity and balance.
• Filter brewing: Start with a 1:16–1:17 ratio and a medium-fine grind, then adjust to balance the melon sweetness and black tea finish. Grind quality makes a big difference with filter, so here’s our pick of the best filter coffee grinders for home.
• Espresso: Red Sparrow is at its best as a black espresso. Start around 1:2–1:2.2 for a sweet, expressive shot. An even, level tamp matters here too; see our guide to the best coffee tampers.

Explore More Recipes

To try recipes from world-class coffee brewers, explore our guide to the best filter coffee recipes of 2026.

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