Coffee: Where It Came From and How It Got So Popular!

Here in Chadron, we have a few really good coffee shops. Now, contrary to what you might be thinking, I am not a crazy coffee drinker. I do love coffee every now and then as a treat though! This morning I decided to use a gift card I received to a local coffee shop and put it to good use. I walked in, read their specials and decided that a sugar and spice latte sounded good. It was delicious! As I sat at a table in the corner drinking my coffee, I wondered how it became popular here in the U.S since most coffee is grown in South America. So then came the inspiration for this blog post!

According to the National Coffee Association, nobody really knows how or when coffee was discovered. One legend states that a man named Kaldi noticed that his goats became very energetic after eating from a specific tree and then brought his findings to the local monastery. Coffee was brought to Europe in the 17th century, however it wasn't exactly received with open arms. In fact many thought it was a little suspicious and local clergy in Venice condemned the drink in 1615. However, when Pope Clement VIII was involved, he tried the drink for himself and was quite satisfied! After this, coffee houses began to spring up all over Europe and coffee eventually found its way to the British colonies. The Boston Tea Party, a revolt of the American colonists against King George is what led Americans to start drinking more coffee. Now it is one of the most desired drinks in the world!

Most of the coffee today is grown in Brazil or South America. Coffee beans are actually seeds, but when they are ground up they make coffee! Coffee seeds are usually planted in large beds and covered with a shade. In South America and other tropical areas there are the wet season and the dry seasons. The wet season is when the most rainfall happens, so that's when most coffee seeds are planted. Then the next step is harvesting the cherries. Depending on the type of coffee plant, it can take up to three or four years for a coffee plant to produce fruit. The cherries are strip picked from the plants and processed to separate the seeds from the cherries for wet coffee. When making dry coffee the cherries still contain the seeds until they are dried at the mill. Then the beans are dried and fermented to be sent to a mill for further processing. At the mill the beans are hulled by either removing parchment from wet coffee or removed from the entire dried cherry husk for dry coffee. The last step at the mill is grading the beans based on size, weight, and color flaws or other imperfections. After the beans are processed they are exported to other countries for people like you and me to enjoy!

I hope you enjoyed learning a some fun facts about this popular drink!