How Much Do You Know About Coffee??
Posted by Paddy on 29/11/2011
Even though Paddy and Scott's is all about having fun there is the serious side to our business and the growing of the coffee bean is a major part of that. So if you are a coffee guru or want to know more about the coffee you drink, this blog is for you!!.
How much do you know about coffee?
Most coffee trees will produce their first crop of coffee cherries when they’re about 5 years old. If the trees are looked after properly they'll continue producing great coffee on a yearly basis for about 20 years, however, once fully mature these coffee trees will only produce about two kilos of coffee cherries per year.
Harvest time usually differs in different countries but at this time most coffee trees are usually filled with coffee cherries. When these cherries are quite red, shiny and firm, they are in the prime condition for picking but we're not after the cherry but the seeds inside!
A coffee cherry usually comes with an exterior skin that is quite thick and has a bitter taste. The fruit of a coffee cherry is sweet and has a texture very similar to a grape. After the layer of fruit you usually have a parchment, the parchment is covered by a thin and slippery layer which is called mucilage
What the parchment really does is protect the entire area surrounding the bean. When the parchment is removed you will usually find two somewhat transparent coffee beans which are bluish-green in colour. These beans are usually covered with a thin layer which is called a silver skin. 90 to 95% of the time most coffee cherries provide two coffee beans. A coffee cherry that has a single coffee bean is known as the pea berry.
Ripe cherries are harvested using several different methods including selective hand picking, mechanical harvesting and stripping. At Paddy & Scott's we tend to buy from growers who selective pick the coffee beans leaving the unripe cherries behind, however, the method used to collect the coffee will be dependent on a number of reasons and conditions.
When the coffee is harvested the coffee beans will then be processed by using either a dry or wet process. The dry process usually entails leaving the coffee beans to dry in the sun while they are still within the cherry. This tends to create a rich, smokey coffee which is smooth and quite earthy (our Great with Friends blend is a great example). Wet processing is more complex and removes the four external layers that surround the coffee bean in one go creating a clean, bright, fruity coffee (our All Day coffee is a perfect example) and lastly we have the traditional pulping method whereby natural fermentation helps remove the silver skin. Coffee produced this way usually results in a sweeter, stronger taste profile (our Morning Coffee is a perfect example) however, you can only use this method of producing coffee in areas that have a low humidity.
Coffee is mostly harvested in dry seasons. The nature of the dry season usually differs from one country to the other. Countries such as Brazil usually harvest their coffee in periods between March and October. In Columbia coffee is usually harvested between the months of October and February or alternatively it is harvested in the months between April and June.
As part of our continual learning and our journey in working with our plantations Scott and I can only look forward to our visits to plantations next year, definitely one of the perks of the job!!
