Folklore surrounds the discovery of coffee. According to legend, a goatherd named Kaldi was wandering the countryside of Yemen, having a normal day, when he noticed his goats were acting far more perkily than usual. He discovered his goats had been eating a new berry off a tree, and picked a few for himself. He enjoyed the invigorating effects and passed on the discovery. Eventually enterprising monks figured out how to brew coffee to stay awake during extended prayer hours.
While the dancing goat theory may be far-fetched, coffee still traces its origin from Yemen and Ethiopia. People in the Middle East enjoyed coffee for years before it spread to Europe. The ports of Java and Mocha predominantly exported coffee to Europe when the coffee market opened there, explaining a few common nicknames for the beverage.
There are different qualities of coffee, much like there are different qualities of cars. Coffee beans have their Pintos and their Porches, with the price naturally reflecting the quality.
The lowest quality coffee is Robusta, Coffea canephora, used mostly in cheap, mass-produced coffee grounds found at super-sale locations. It is grown at low altitudes.
The highest quality coffee is Arabica, coffea arabica, yet there are even shades of quality within that grade.
The first Arabica coffee growing area is in sub-tropical regions, like Mexico, Zimbabwe, Brazil and Jamaica. In this area coffee is grown between 1800 and 3600 feet, and produces one coffee harvest a year. This coffee is considered the lower-grade coffee of the Arabica family.
The second Arabica coffee growing area is equatorial, such as Kenya, Ethiopia and Columbia. They grow their coffee at 3,600 to 6,300 feet, and can often get two coffee harvests in a year. This coffee is considered the highest grade coffee available.
Some new variations of the Coffea arabica are emerging. The C. arabica var. typical, is the standard coffee tree that all variations emerge from. The second most popular variation of Arabica coffee is the C. arabica var. bourbon, which produces 20 to 30 percent more coffee than typical, and is grown between 3,500 and 6,500 feet. Bourbon coffee has a slightly different taste, and is considered as high quality as the typical variation.
Blue mountain variety coffee only grows in limited areas like Jamaica and Kona, Hawaii. It grows at high altitude, is famous for its flavor and is liked for its resistance to coffee berry disease. Both Jamaican blue mountain and Kona coffees are very expensive.
Coffee is big business, requiring large farms with many acres of trees to keep up with world demand. One coffee tree only produces one or two pounds of coffee a year, and for every 100 pounds of coffee cherries picked, only 12 to 20 pounds of coffee beans will make it to export.
Coffee is harvested during the dry season when the coffee cherries are bright red, shiny and firm. They can be picked by hand, stripped from the tree, or harvested mechanically.
Hand picking only the ripe beans produces the best quality coffee, as only the ripe beans are picked. However, it is more cost effective to strip the beans or harvest mechanically, as it requires far less labor.
When stripping the beans, the cherries are pulled from the tree and fall onto sheets laid on the ground. The workers then toss the coffee in the sheets so the leaves and twigs will fly away in the wind. The unripe and overripe cherries are then discarded later in the process.
Coffee pickers can pick between 100 to 200 pounds of coffee a day. Once picked, the coffee cherries must be processed immediately.
How the coffee is processed affects its flavor. You can find dry-processed, pulped, or wet-processed beans. Dry-processed is also known as the natural method. Pulped beans are in-between dry and wet, leaving out the fermentation before drying.
Dry-process coffee has strong body, tastes sweet, and is smooth and complex. Typically Indonesia, Ethiopia, Brazil and Yemen produce dry-process coffee.
Wet-process coffee tastes cleaner, brighter and fruitier. It is a more expensive way to process coffee, and can be cost-prohibitive in some areas. The quality of beans is more consistent, and they tend to produce a more acidic coffee.
Most coffee processors dump their coffee cherries into a large vat of water to separate the ripe cherries from the over- and under-ripe ones, as well as any sticks or leaves. The ripe and green coffee cherries are dense and sink, while the unwanted debris floats at the top where it can easily be skimmed off.
Dry-process coffee is then taken out to dry on patios with the cherry skin still attached.
If coffee is wet-processed, it goes to a huge pulping machine that shoves the beans up against a screen large enough for only the bean to get through. Ripe cherries are soft enough to break under the pressure and release the beans through the screen. Green cherries are tough and will not break apart, ensuring that only ripe beans make it through the screen for further processing. These beans will still have a little bit of the cherry stuck to their surface, called mucilage, after coming through the screen.
From there, coffee beans can either go outside to dry (pulped), or are taken to fermentation tanks (wet-processed). The beans sit in the fermentation tanks in water for 16 to 36 hours, which helps to remove the mucilage. Once again, the highest quality beans sink to the bottom, and can be separated and fermented by themselves. Once the beans have fermented, they go to drying patios.
Drying patios are made of asphalt or cement. Coffee on the patios is shifted every 30 to 40 minutes to warm, open areas on the patio, allowing the previous area to dry and warm in the sun. While most patios have long rows of beans, some farms create figures with their beans, making for interesting viewing and great pictures from rooftops.
Some places in Africa are using raised beds to dry their coffee. The beans are rotated by hand, and the airflow both over and under the beans causes a more uniform drying pattern. Several coffee-growing areas get too much rain to dry their coffee outside, and must use artificial mechanical dryers to get their coffee ready for shipment.
Once coffee is dried, the beans are usually hulled to remove any last mucilage. Then the beans are graded and sorted by size and density, either by hand or on a conveyor belt. Once again, the heavier beans are the higher quality.
Coffee is shipped green, as green beans can safely sit for a year, whereas roasted beans have a shelf life of only a few weeks. That green coffee arrives at coffee shops or factories, where the beans are roasted in preparation for grinding, brewing and keeping the world moving.