Homestyle Gossip

Whether you’re a casual coffee drinker or simply need your cup every morning, you’ve probably wondered about different coffees and their origins. Every coffee is from a different region and has features that make it different from others. This includes the consistency of the coffee produced, the smell, the strength, and of course the taste. Let’s take a brief look at some of the coffee producers.

Although many people think that the biggest producer is Colombia, in reality it is Brazil. Brazil is responsible for exporting over 20-23 million 63 Kg bags of coffee beans every year. To clarify what that means, 63 Kg equates to around 132 lbs. If you do the math on that one, that’s over 3 billion pounds of coffee in a good year. Although Brazil is the biggest producer, they are not known for quality coffee beans.

Colombia comes in second with less than half of what Brazil imports. The country exports 9-10 million bags of coffee every year. Colombia is known for their quality coffee. Their coffee is known for a great aroma and for its full flavoured beans with varying hints of fruitiness, bitterness, and woody taste. Many coffee drinkers saw a huge difference from the domestic brand to authentic Colombian coffee.

Tied for third place are Indonesia and Vietnam. Indonesia used to be the third biggest supplier of coffee beans but Vietnam has slowly surpassed production over the last few years. Indonesia’s top coffee beans are known for its full body, low acidity, and earthy taste. Vietnam on the other hand is not known for high grade coffee despite their production.

Today coffee is a big part of our culture. There are cafes where people sit for hours drinking quality coffee, major coffee brands such as Starbucks, and food that a big part of our population depend on in order to get going in the morning. It is also a big part of gourmet culture where coffee is paired with delicious pastries and food.

If you are a coffee enthusiast and looking for high grade coffee beans, the best option is to buy coffee online. There are many sites that sell specialty coffee from various regions. You’ll be surprised by the number of rare coffees that are available and how different they can taste from one region to another.

You will also want to buy coffee online because it’s easy to compare and figure out which ones to buy. You can read reviews from customers, compare different beans, and even do some comparison shopping between online stores to get the best price possible. It’s simply the best option for enthusiasts.

That’s a brief overview of coffee and where it originates from. There are many other producers of coffee beans and many undiscovered flavours that are bound to excite your palate. Going online is the easiest way to find what you are looking for and buy specialty coffee that is hard to find otherwise.

Coffee is a stimulant and non alcoholic drink that has been around for a long time. Its stimulant effect comes from the caffeine that it contains and it is a good way to warm up on a chilly day. The taste of coffee varies depending on how the coffee is brewed and the type of beans used for brewing it.

Home roasting of coffee beans is a do it yourself process where the raw coffee beans are actually roasted in a pan or over a fire. The raw coffee beans are obtained after the coffee is picked from the tree. The outer skin is then fermented and the inner bean seed is dried. You buy coffee beans from your local store and roast them to remove the acidity. You can then use this to brew coffee.

During roasting the water is forced out of the bean and then the bean expands to almost 100 per cent of its original size. Some of the complex sugars are broken down to release carbon dioxide while the others form the flavour and essence of the coffee. After roasting and staying for over a week, coffee starts to lose some of its flavour and appetising aroma. This is what makes home brewed coffee so much better than industrial coffee. The flavour is still intact.

For a good roasting experience the following conditions must be met: the coffee beans must be heated to over 3700F. They must be kept in constant motion to prevent over roasting or uneven roasting. This means you should be personally present to keep turning them over. Make sure the kitchen is properly ventilated to clear the smoke emanating from the roasting.

Roasting coffee at home requires you to have a standard frying pan. The pan’s size determines the amount of beans roasted simultaneously. The quality of the coffee beans will depend on the altitude at which they are grown besides the country of origin. Low altitude and high altitude coffee beans all have different tastes. A seasoned coffee taster will tell you the altitude at which coffee beans were grown when he or she tastes the coffee.

The most important point when roasting coffee is to know when to stop the roast. Here are some guidelines you can use to know when your coffee is completely roasted:

Colour: you could use some already roasted beans to see how your beans should look after roasting. The colour normally changes from light green or brown to a darker shade of brown. As the roasting proceeds they will become greasy as they lose their natural oils.

Smell: the smell will change from the fresh vegetable smell to that of industrial coffee.

Time: the time you spend to fully roast beans is typically 15 minutes. After it lapses and if you correctly roasted your beans turning them constantly, they are ready for making coffee.

Roasting coffee beans is a learning process, and the more experience you have the better you will become at it.

Coffee, one of the most loved & heavily consumed drinks in the world, is basically made by brewing the roasted seeds of a coffee plant, producing a dark, rich, aromatic and bitter drink. Coffee trees are currently being cultivated in over 70 countries all around the world, each area producing its own distinctive taste and blend. Today, you can buy coffee online, in the usual grocery stores or just about anywhere else.

Before they become available to you in supermarkets, the product actually goes through a complex series of processes. They start out as fresh seeds that are especially picked by hand. Harvesting coffee berries are said to be one of the most labour intensive part of the manufacturing process. Berries need to be at their peak of ripeness to be harvested, not sooner nor later. However, green and less ripe beans can also be harvested and made into a different blend.

After harvesting, the covering is taken out with the help of a machine and the seeds, now known as the beans, are left out to ferment. The fermentation process is important to help remove the mucilaginous flesh away from the beans. After this, the beans are thoroughly washed with large amounts of water to take out the fermentation products and residues. When done, they are spread out in drying tables and are raked every now and then for more thorough drying.

When dried, they are then heated and roasted. The roasting process is very important because it changes the physical and chemical characteristics of the bean. The heat reduces the moisture content of the beans, which can in turn reduce its density and strength as well. Beans are roasted at an average temperature of 200 °F. Commercially available coffee beans can be pre-roasted by the manufacturer or they can be roasted at home by coffee drinkers.

Roasted beans are generally graded by their taste – from light, medium light, medium, medium dark, dark or very dark. As mentioned before, the degree of the roast can affect the strength and the taste of the coffee. Thus, customers who buy roasted beans need to know just how string they want their coffees to be. Darker roasts are more subtle in taste generally because of their low-fibre and high sugar content. Lighter roasts on the other hand, are stronger because of their high content of aromatic oils and acids.

There are also certain kinds of coffee that are already decaffeinated. The process is done when the coffee berries are still green. The beans are placed in hot water and in a certain solvent to dissolve the caffeine-containing oils within the seeds. This is a great choice for people who love to drink coffee but are not allowed to take in caffeine or any kind of stimulants for health reasons.

So whether you plan to buy coffee online, your local coffee shop or supermarket, remember the above mentioned things in mind. There are now a wide number of specialty shops that sell great quality coffee both online and in stores so you’ll never have trouble looking for that perfect blend.

People all over the world consume on average 330 million cups of coffee each day. This happens every day. The stats shouldn’t come as a surprise seeing as how one of the first things millions of people do each day upon waking is make a pot of coffee. This makes coffee the third most popular drink in the world preceded only be water and soda. To increase the freshness of their morning cup of coffee, many tend to buy coffee online.

Everyone has their own way to enjoy their favourite cup of coffee. Whether it be straight up black, or mixed with cream (flavoured or not) and sugar, perhaps frothy or a double whammy shot like espresso. The point being that there are many ways to enjoy a cup of coffee. Incidentally, espresso is the most popular way to enjoy coffee.

There are a few tips that you should follow to make sure you are brewing the best cup of coffee you will ever have.

Tip 1: Use Cold water to brew your coffee

There are some people that think brewing your coffee with hot water will actually make the coffee hotter when it is poured, it doesn’t. You want to use cold water so that you get that rich and fresh taste. If possible use bottled spring water or purified water to brew your coffee.

Tip 2: Clean Your Coffee Pot Thoroughly Before and After Each Use

If not each and every time you make coffee, you should clean your filter and your brewers on a regular basis. Things like dirt and oil and left over grinds can build up over time. As they build up the taint the taste and flavour of your coffee. Clean filters and brewers are one of the best ways to get a really great cup of coffee.

Tip 3: Use egg shells in the grounds

Yes, that’s right. To brew a smooth tasting cup of coffee break up eggshells in the coffee ground before you start brewing. The egg shells will absorb some of the acidity making the coffee very smooth. This is great for people that love their coffee everyday but that are finding their stomach just can’t handle it any more. You don’t have to give up the cup, just brew it with eggshells.

Tip 4: If you want a cup of coffee with more kick drink medium roasts coffees

The old saying the darker the berry the sweeter the juice, with coffee the lighter the roasts the more kick the coffee has. Dark roasted coffees have less caffeine because the beans are roasted longer. The longer a berry is roasted the more caffeine the berry loses.

Tip 5: Buy roasted coffee beans asap after they have been roasted

The best way to get the freshest coffee aside from owning your own roasting facility is to buy coffee online. Getting the freshest beans means brewing the freshest cup of coffee. It is also recommended that you buy whole beans and grind them at home just before use.