Initially people simply ate the cherry. Later they soaked the cherry's seeds (what we call beans) in water to make a beverage. Then they learned to pound the seeds (what we now call grinding) into a fine powder, which made a better tasting beverage. Even later they learned to cook the beans (what we call roasting) before grinding.

Eventually these coffee trees found only in Ethiopia were smuggled around the world. Coffee now grows in countries located between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn.

Taste differences in coffee can be attributed to where the coffee is grown. Coffee is very absorbent. Thus, coffee takes on the taste characteristics of the climate and soil in which it was grown. This is why Kenya coffee tastes oh so much different from a Guatemala coffee.

Specialty Coffee
Basically there are two types of drinkable coffee in the world. Technically these are called arabica and robusta. More commonly they are referred to as gourmet and truck stop. We industry insiders call them specialty coffee and canned. There are several reasons why specialty coffee is more expensive.

Arabica coffee naturally has more flavor than robusta coffee. Surprisingly it also has about one-third less caffeine than it's cheaper cousin. (Yes, that truck stop brew has more caffeine.) Specialty coffee tastes stronger because it has more natural taste not because it has more caffeine. Also, specialty coffee tends to be roasted darker, which adds more flavor to the beans and thus the cup.

Arabica sells for a premium not only because of its taste, but because of how it is grown and processed. Arabica plants take longer to start producing crop, are more susceptible to disease, are grown at higher altitudes and use much more hand labor, all of which add to production costs.

Our roasting company, the Nashville-based Bongo Java, like most other reputable specialty roasters, only uses arabica coffee.

Coffee Beans
Coffee beans are actually the seeds inside coffee cherries. These cherries look just like the cherries we're used to. However, they don't taste as good. The cherries grow on trees that are cut to about eight feet to allow for easier picking. The cherries start green and are ripe when they turn red. Each coffee cherry normally holds two beans. Some freak cherries only hold one bean. These are called peaberries and tend to have more intense flavor. Machinery is used to separate the beans from the cherry. The remaining part of the cherry is recycled in the fields as fertilizer. After separation, the beans go through a preparation process that includes soaking, drying and storing periods before being shipped to roasters as so-called "green coffee."

Roasting
Coffee beans have little taste before they're roasted. Unroasted beans (called green beans) have a slight grassy smell and are very hard. Roasting coffee is somewhat like cooking anything else: the cooking process brings out the real taste of the coffee. When roasted, the beans actually double in size but lose about 15% of their weight. Since coffee is sold by the pound, roasters have an economic incentive to roast coffee light. This is why most cheap, canned coffee has a very light brown color compared to specialty coffee which is roasted much darker. Some shops will even charge more for very dark roasted coffee.

Storing/Freshness
Coffee has a short shelf life. We recommend drinking coffee no more than two weeks after it is roasted. Many roasters suggest that vacuum packaging and proper storing will allow coffee to be consumed without freshness loss for up to six months. However, we feel that coffee loses its flavor much more quickly. Thus, we suggest buying only what you will drink in a week or two. If it is very inconvenient to buy coffee every couple of weeks, then buy a bit extra and store the coffee in a air tight container in the freezer.

How can you tell if a coffee is fresh? First, only buy whole bean coffee. We're happy to grind your coffee. However, we strongly recommend using this ground coffee within three days.

All pre-ground packaged coffee is stale no matter how it is packaged and all ground coffee will be stale within a couple of days. It's that simple. Coffee contains natural gasses. These gasses slowly escape from the beans. Most specialty roasters package beans in bags with one-way valves. This allows the gasses to escape while keeping out the air that would destroy the beans. If fresh coffee were to be put in air tight bags without one-way valves, the escaping gasses would blow the bag or can apart. Grinding coffee removes all the gasses and exposes the beans to lots of air thus making the coffee not fresh.

Storage
Coffee's three worst enemies are light, air and moisture. The longer coffee is exposed to air, light or moisture, the quicker it will go stale. Therefore, always store coffee in an air tight container that blocks the light.

If the coffee is going to be drunk within a week, the airtight container on your counter is all you need. If you are going to store the beans for longer than a week, then we'd suggest putting the airtight container in the freezer. Warning with freezing beans: moisture is coffee's enemy. Therefore, put the container right back in the freezer after taking out the beans you need for that day. Don't let the beans thaw while you go through your morning breakfast ritual.

Grinding
We highly recommend grinding your coffee immediately before brewing. As we said, grinding makes coffee go stale faster. Go ahead and invest $20 or so for a halfway decent grinder. Grind according to machine's instructions. A good grinder will make all the coffee particles about the same size.

Brewing
There are so many ways to brew coffee that we couldn't possibly get into all of them. We'll just say that DON'T EVER USE A PERCULATOR. Use a brewer that only lets the water go through the ground coffee once. Or use a French press.

However you brew, start with two tablespoons of ground coffee per eight ounces of brewed coffee. Adjust proportion NOT THE GRIND according to taste.

Use good, fresh cold water. Coffee is 98% water. Thus, if you don't like the taste of your water you won't like the taste of the coffee.

Information courtesy of Bongo Java Roasting Co.