Coffee is a brewed drink prepared from roasted coffee beans, which are the seeds of berries from the Coffea plant. The genus Coffea is native to tropical Africa (specifically having its origin in Ethiopia and Sudan) and Madagascar, the Comoros, Mauritius, and Réunion in the Indian Ocean. The plant was exported from Africa to countries around the world.
“Even bad coffee is better than no coffee at all.”
Coffee is slightly acidic and has a stimulating effect on humans because of its caffeine content. Coffee is one of the most popular drinks in the world.It can be prepared and presented in a variety of ways (e.g., espresso, French press, café latte, etc.). It is usually served hot, although iced coffee is a popular alternative.
Clinical studies indicate that moderate coffee consumption is benign or mildly beneficial in healthy adults, with continuing research on whether long-term consumption lowers the risk of some diseases, although there is generally poor quality of such studies.
The earliest credible evidence of coffee-drinking appears in Yemen in southern Arabia in the middle of the 15th century in Sufi shrines. It was here in Arabia that coffee seeds were first roasted and brewed in a similar way to how it is now prepared.
Coffee seeds were first exported from East Africa to Yemen, as the coffea arabica plant is thought to have been indigenous to the former. Yemeni traders took coffee back to their homeland and began to cultivate the seed. By the 16th century, it had reached Persia, Turkey, and North Africa. From there, it spread to Europe and the rest of the world.