EVERGREEN COFFEE ROASTERS
We have free delivery to London, Woodstock, and surrounding areas. Orders are delivered every Sunday, Visit our FAQ to learn more
What is coffee?
There is never a question too naive when it comes to a subject like this; a subject of ubiquity and bottomless complexity. What is coffee?
The story begins in a place far removed from Canada, a place much warmer, specifically a place in "the coffee belt". This window of latitude contains the coffee producing countries of the world.
Here, in a place like Mexico, Brazil, Yemen, India, are farmers who with great care, tend to their crops of coffee arabica or coffee canephora, which are flowering shrubs of the coffea genus. These unassuming shrubs are minded for their fruit, which resemble small cherries. It is thought that caffeine production evolved independently in certain species of the family, as a deterrent of animals, and an attraction to pollenators.
The prized "coffee bean" lies therein, which is in fact the seeds of these small fruits. The ripe fruit is harvested, and the flesh of the cherries are removed from the inner seeds, by way of mechanical pulping, and then flushing the pulped fruit off with water: a process known as "wet process".
Less commonly, but in line with tradition, coffee is "dry" processed, sometimes referred to as "natural" processed coffee. The ripe fruit is laid in the sun, and the remaining bits of fruit are hulled from the dried seeds after weeks of drying. This process is still commmon in hot, dry regions, and natural processed coffee is prized for the fruity taste that its own fermented flesh imparts on the seeds.
We are nearing the point at which a coffee roaster becomes involved: once the dried seeds, or "coffee beans" as we know them, are shipped to their destination, they are shelf stable for 1-2 years while waiting to be sold to a roaster. The raw, green, coffee beans are roasted until they resemble something that most of us could now identify as coffee. The heat of the roaster transforms the tough, grassy, astringent beans into brittle, brown, bold tasting coffee beans that are ready to be ground up and used to brew that familiar beverage.
