10 Facts about coffee
- The first webcam was invented to monitor whether or not the coffee pot was empty.
- Coffee grows from seed to a shrub and then a tree. During the period as a shrub it prefers shade to direct sunlight;
- To get a coffee ‘bean’ you start with a cherry, which is picked, de-pulped, dried, washed (or semi-washed) then sorted by size (or graded);
- Espresso in Italian means “force something out”;
- The name Cappuccino comes from the resemblance of the drink to the clothing of the Capuchin monks;
- Coffee was the first food to be freeze-dried (not that we would recommend that :));
- Caffeine increases your levels of adrenaline, and releases fatty acids from fat tissues, leading to a better physical performance by those who consume caffeine before working out;
- The original coffea tree has been traced to Madagascar;
- Only water is a more consumed beverage than coffee;
- Coffee without milk is fat free.
2 Most common Myths about coffee
- It is often said that coffee is the second most traded commodity: This is FALSE. It is the second most actively traded commodity MARKET future price, or C-MARKET price. This means that it the second most volatile commodity in price behind oil. In fact it is actually just outside the top 50 of all commodities behind Beef and Wheat, and only just ahead of sugar;
- Goats discovered coffee: This is probably FALSE. The first reason this is a myth is that this myth can only be traced to the mid 1600s, and coffee consumption (although not roasted) can be traced to over 1,000 years ago. The second and more convincing fact is that when they have offered goats, dried leaves, dried straw or coffee cherries, the goats only ate the cherries when everything else has been finished, so if there is any truth to this it would be the coffee tree leaf, rather than the fruit, and we do not smoke coffee.
Of interest is when visiting Ethiopia we observed many goats walking among the forest and none of them were remotely interested in the coffee trees, both leaves and fruit.