Whether getting one to go or lingering over a second cup, on September 29 be sure to observe National Coffee Day!
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.
When determining the body of a coffee, the bean, the roast, and the brew are all factors. The bean affects the texture of the coffee, whether its silky, creamy, thick or thin on the tongue and throat. However, the darker the roast and how it is brewed will alter the feel of a coffee’s body, too.
The region a coffee is grown determines its acidity. The higher the elevation the coffee grows, the higher the quality and the acidity. These coffees are considered brighter, dryer, even sparkling by cuppers.
- There are many legendary accounts of how coffee first came to be, but 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. It was here coffee seeds were first roasted and brewed, much like they are prepared today. Yemeni traders brought coffee back to their homeland from Ethiopia and began to cultivate the seed.
- In 1670, coffee seeds were smuggled out of the Middle East by Baba Budan, as he strapped seven coffee seeds onto his chest. The first plants grown from these smuggled seeds were planted in Mysore. It was then that coffee spread to Italy, to the rest of Europe, to Indonesia and the Americas.
- Brazil produces more coffee in the world than any other country followed by Colombia.
- Coffee is only grown near the equator, from the Tropic of Cancer to the Tropic of Capricorn, within a 1,000 mile limit.
- 1,200 different chemical components are in coffee. More than half of these components make up the distinguished flavor of coffee.
- 400 billion cups of coffee are consumed worldwide, making it the most popular beverage.
- 91% of coffee consumed is taken at breakfast. And sometimes is breakfast.
- Coffee is the second most traded commodity on earth.
- Shepherds discovered coffee in Ethiopia circa 800 A.D. Legend has it that 9th century goat herders noticed the effect caffeine had on their goats, who appeared to “dance” after eating coffee berries. A local monk then made a drink with coffee berries and found that it kept him awake at night, thus the original cup of coffee was born.
- Coffee was the first food to be freeze-dried.
- Coffee was originally a food. Coffee berries were mixed with fat to create an energy-rich snack ball. It was also consumed as a wine when made from the pulp of coffee berries.
- The world’s most expensive coffee is $600 a pound. And it comes from the feces of a Sumatran wild cat. The animal — called a Luwak — is unable to digest coffee beans. In the process of digesting the beans, they are fermented in the stomach. When the beans are excreted, they produce a smooth, chocolaty coffee.
- New Yorkers drink almost seven times as much coffee as the rest of the U.S.
- George Washington invented instant coffee. Not that Washington. Chemist George Constant Washington experimented with dried coffee before he created Red E Coffee — the first brand name instant coffee.
- The average worker spends $20 a week on coffee.
- Americans consume 400 million cups of coffee per day.
- In Turkey, the bridegroom as 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.
- Beethoven counted the number of coffee beans he used to make his coffee and insisted on 60 beans per cup.
- Tips, such as is left in restaurants for good service, comes from the days of the London coffeehouses where there were brass boxes monogrammed on the front with $ to ensure promptness. This encouraged customers to pay for expeditious service.
- Water is the only beverage more popular than coffee.
- DRINKING DECAF FUELS THE SODA INDUSTRY. After coffee beans are decaffeinated, several coffee manufacturers sell the caffeine to soda and pharmaceutical companies.
- CHOCK FULL O’NUTS COFFEE CONTAINS NO NUTS. It’s named for a chain of nut stores the founder converted into coffee shops.
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