There is something very extraordinary about this simple beverage we drink on a daily basis known as Coffee. The world has this staple drink as the assigned breakfast drink other than tea. Billions of people all over the world drink coffee every day. People love coffee for various reasons. Some love its aroma, some its taste, some love the vibes that coffee shops have, and others for the epic conversations they have had over a cup of coffee.
Coffee is Anything But Mundane
Most of us just visit the local shop or barista, browse through the options, fish for coffee and end up with one not knowing anything about it or its background. Remember coffee is anything but mundane. The major processes it undergoes are somewhat ignored and people end up saying that we get coffee from coffee beans. That’s true but up to a certain extent only.
The Coffee Extraction Process
Coffee in fact is made from a cherry. The coffee beans that we know of do not grow on plants in a bean form. These coffee beans are actually the very pit of a cherry that is bitter to taste. It’s the useless part of the cherry which we don’t eat. After a whole lot of processes of drying up this cherry in the sun for about 30 days, the farmers are finally able to get the beans. The beans are from where we get our coffee finally after roasting.
Peek Into Coffee Plantation
Coffee is either grown in high altitude areas like Ethiopia or Africa and on the other hand in low altitude areas like Indonesia. The coffee grown in high-altitude areas have lactic acid in it. This adds to the creaminess, fruitiness, and a bit of sweetness present in it. Whereas most coffee giants like Starbucks get their coffee from Indonesia, Lipton gets its tea from there too.
What Is All This Roast About ?
There is nothing technical in it. It is just a scale from really light coffee beans to dark coffee beans. These color coffee beans come from how long they were inside the oven. Roasting is cooking coffee to be plain. Dark roasted beans are roasted in the oven for a long and have a more artificial burnt, caramelized, chocolate roasted flavor to them. By artificial, we mean that the bean has used up all its natural sugar, amino acids, and flavors in the roasting process. If you are looking forward to tasting a more natural coffee stick to the light roast beans.
Caffeine -The World’s Most Favorite Chemical
Let’s break it down for you as to why coffee makes us feel awake. Adenosine – a chemical that our bodies release after sunset that triggers a set of reactions to make you feel sleepy. Adenosine reacts to decrease Adrenaline. Whereas when we drink coffee, the caffeine that goes in reacts to increase Adrenaline and makes us feel less sleepy. You see now that caffeine works smart not hard. It is a chemical reaction that makes caffeine produce more Adrenaline.
Brew Methods – French Press and Pour Over Coffee
We have heard very fancy brew methods being thrown around like confetti in coffee shops. Most of the time we don’t get them to be honest. Read on graduate as a coffee nerd.
French press is a brew method that works by a method called total immersion. The coffee and water sit together for 5 whole minutes and all soluble items in the coffee shift to the water. This makes coffee more oily, thick, and good textured
Pour over coffee is another brew method where water is poured over coffee and all that material available in it goes to the cup or glass underneath it. Here coffee mixes with water for a mere 2 seconds.
Congratulations you are a coffee graduate now! Thanks for sticking till the very end. From the next time onward when you see a cup of coffee or are about to order one, all this tedious and extraordinary process of how that coffee really made it to your lips will be something worth sharing with your coffee date. This could be an interesting topic to begin the conversation with too.
