Best Coffee Information - Curious Facts About Coffee

Fascinating Coffee Stories and Exhilarating Coffee Knowledge

A typical coffee roasting exposes the coffee beans to temperatures from about 400 degrees to 425 degrees Fahrenheit for about fifteen minutes - shorter for a lighter roast, longer for a darker roast.

German housewife Melitta Bentz used some blotting paper one day, actually some of her son's notebook paper, and thus invented the coffee filter. With her husband Hugo she started the Melitta Bentz Company in 1908, and the brand still is popular today.

Horse-pulled wagons delivered coffee from door to door in the year 1900 in the United States.

According to a Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA) estimate, more than $12.2 billion was generated by specialty coffee in 2006, with three-fourths of it occurring in coffee beverage retail establishments and coffee cafes.

A coffee plant may produce two pounds of coffee in a year from about four thousand coffee berries resulting in about eight thousand coffee beans (taking into account peaberry coffee beans).

Also see:

The Top Ten Coffees in the World

World's Best Coffee Quotes

Who puts whip cream in their coffee? The Austrians, that's who!

Brazil generates more than $3 billion each year in coffee revenues producing more than 44 million bags of coffee and exporting about three-fourths of it.

The aroma of a fine espresso may stay with a person for up to ten minutes after the espresso is consumed.

In 1651 the first coffee advertisement was distributed in a handbill reading: “The Virtue of the coffee drink first publicly made and sold in England, by Pasqua Rosee, in St. Michael's Alley Cornhill, at the Signe of his own head.” The handbill now sits in the British Museum.

Best Coffee Information continued:

About six to eight months after a coffee plant flowers the coffee berries, known as coffee cherry, turn bright red and are ripe and ready for harvest. Before the cherry turn red they go from yellow to orange.

The fragrance of the tiny white blossoms of coffee trees is said to create a scent with hints of orange and jasmine.

Why is it important to hand pick coffee if you want premium quality coffee beans? The main reason is that coffee beans don't ripen all at once on a plant, but instead even a single branch may have unripe green coffee berries, ripe berries (cherry), and also overripe blackened cherry. A skilled coffee picker picks only those cherry that are at the optimal ripeness, thus producing the finest quality coffee beans.

The first espresso machines, in the true Italian style, were elegant and ornate, providing a source of entertainment during the brewing process and the steaming and foaming of the milk. The barista was the consummate showman whipping up a tasty cappuccino.

Espresso Brewing and Coffee Brewing Information

For tips on brewing the perfect cup of specialty gourmet coffee see the Espresso Coffee Guides section on coffee brewing.

For easy to follow instructions on how to make amazing espresso drinks see Espresso Drink Recipes and the How to make a Latte. Also provided are the steps for Pulling A Perfect Espresso Shot.

For the history of espresso and coffee see World's Best History of Coffee, and for a complete list of coffee terminology with detailed definitions see the Espresso Coffee Guides Coffee Terms.