Americans Spend An Average $1,092 A Year On Coffee. That Is Close To The Price Of The Newest iPhone.

Ah, the perfect cup of java.  According to an expert cupper (a professional coffee taster), there are four components of a perfect cup: aroma, body, acidity, and flavor.

• However, the earliest credible evidence of either coffee drinking or the knowledge of the coffee tree appears in the middle of the 15th century in the Sufi monasteries around Mokha in Yemen.  
• Here, monks first roasted coffee seeds and brewed coffee, much like we prepare them today. Yemeni traders brought coffee back to their homeland from Ethiopia and began to cultivate the seed.
• In 1670, Baba Budan smuggled coffee seeds out of the Middle East by strapping seven seeds onto his chest. The first plants grown from these stowed away seeds were planted in Mysore. Coffee later spread to Italy and the rest of Europe, Indonesia, and the Americas.
• While Brazil produces more coffee in the world than any other country, Colombia closely follows. Also, more than 50 countries around the world grow coffee, too. As a result, we choose from a bountiful selection of flavors for the indulgence of steamy cups of the black drink for connoisseurs to consume.
• Legend has it that Ethiopian shepherds first noticed the effects of caffeine when they saw their goats appearing to become “frisky” and “dance” after eating coffee berries.
• Originally coffee was eaten. African tribes combined coffee berries with fat to create energy balls.
• Coffee beans are actually the pit of a berry, which makes them a fruit.
• Coffee is the second most traded commodity in the world. (oil is first)
• There are two types of coffee beans: Arabica and Robusta. Seventy percent of coffee beans are Arabica. Although less popular, Robusta is slightly more bitter and has twice as much caffeine.
• Kona coffee is the United States’ gift to the coffee world. Because coffee traditionally grows best in climates along the equator, Hawaii’s weather is optimal for harvesting beans.
• California also recently got into the coffee game with dozens of farms now churning out pricey premium bags.
• However, Puerto Rico, which is a territory of the US, has a thriving coffee industry
• The term “a cup of Joe” comes from American servicemen (GI Joes) in WWII being seen as big coffee drinkers.
• George Washington invented instant coffee. A Belgian man living in Guatemala named George Washington invented it in 1906.
• French philosopher Voltaire is said to have drank 50 cups of coffee a day.
• Espresso means “pressed out” in Italian.  This refers to the way espresso is made — forcing boiling water through pressed coffee grounds. And although espresso has more caffeine per volume than coffee, it would take three shots to equal the amount in a regular cup of joe.
• The world’s most expensive coffee can cost more than $600 a pound. One of the most coveted varieties comes from the feces of an Asian palm civet. The cat-like creature eats fruit including coffee cherries, but is unable to digest the beans. The excreted seeds produce a smooth, less acidic brew called kopi luwak, but the means of production has drawn criticism from animal welfare activists.
• The average adult Finn goes through 27.5 pounds of coffee each year, according to the International Coffee Organization. Compare that to a measly 11 pounds per American.
• The word “coffee” comes from the Arabic word for “wine.”  Qahwah later became kahveh in Turkish, and then koffie in Dutch, which is where we get the English word coffee.
• Teddy Roosevelt reportedly coined Maxwell House’s slogan.  Our nation’s 26th president loved coffee so much that one of his son’s described his custom cup as “more in the nature of a bathtub,” according to Smithsonian.com. On a 1907 visit to Andrew Jackson’s former estate, the commander in chief supposedly dubbed a cup of Maxwell House joe “good to the last drop,” a catchphrase still used today.
• You can order coffee 25,000 different ways at Dunkin’.  The recently renamed doughnut chain did the math on its customizable java drinks. It sells 2 billion cups globally per year, enough for customers to pick each option 80,000 times.
• Brazil couldn’t afford to send its athletes to Los Angeles  for the 1932 Olympics, so the government loaded them in a ship full of coffee which was sold on the way to finance their trip.
• Coffee stays warm 20% longer when you add cream.
• In ancient Arab culture, a woman could only divorce her husband if he didn’t like her coffee.
• In Turkey, the bridegroom was once required to make a vow during the wedding to always make sure to provide their wives with coffee. If they did not do so it was considered grounds for divorce.
• An American spends on average $1,092 a year on coffee. That’s around $20 a week. That is also close to the price of the newest iPhone. Young people generally spend more on coffee than older people.
• The “Big Four” coffee roasting companies – Kraft, P&G, Sara Lee and Nestle – buy about 50% of the coffee produced worldwide.
• Studies have shown that patients with higher levels of caffeine in their blood were less likely to contract Alzheimer’s disease. They also found that coffee had positive results on Type 2 diabetes patients and even protected women from skin cancer. Who knew?
• Specifically in regards to women, studies showed that those who drank more coffee showed less signs of depression and tendencies towards suicide. In one study, it was discovered that women who consumed about four cups of coffee a day were 20% less likely to show suffer from depression.
• Beethoven counted the number of coffee beans he used to make his coffee and insisted on 60 beans per cup.
• The average coffee drinker consumes 3 cups of coffee per day.
• Every day, Americans drink more than 300 million cups of coffee; 75% of those cups are home brewed.
• The first American to be granted a license as a coffee trader was Dorothy Jones of Boston and the year was 1670.
• In 1991, researchers at the University of Cambridge in England set up a camera feeding a live picture of a coffee machine in the “Trojan Room” so employees could see whether or not the pot was full. If they could see ahead of time that it was empty, it’d save them a trip and inevitable disappointment. A couple years later, the camera was connected to the internet and soon became an international sensation. People watched from all corners of the world until it was turned off for good in 2001.
• According to a 2018 study by Wallet Hub, New York City has the most coffee shops, coffee houses and cafés per capita. (Maybe it’s no coincidence that the Big Apple takes first for most doughnut shops per capita, too.) Runners up include San Francisco, California; Portland, Oregon; Seattle, Washington; and Las Vegas, Nevada.
• Japan is now the third largest consumer of coffee. They even know to improve their skin, and reduce wrinkles, by bathing in coffee grounds that were fermented with pineapple pulp. Amazing! Beats mud-bathing.

Sources:

National Day Calendar

Mobile-Cuisine

Good Housekeeping

Agiboo

Romantic Homes

Coffee

The Daily Meal

Gone-Ta-Pott