2. The coffee you enjoy
every day has taken a
long journey to get to
your mug.
3. 1. Planting :
A coffee bean is actually a seed. Coffee seeds planted in
large beds in shaded nurseries. The seedlings are
watered frequently and shaded from sunlight until they
are sufficiently abundant to be planted permanently.
Plantation often occurs during the wet season.
4. 2. Harvesting the Cherries :
According to the variety, it takes about 3 to 4 years for
the newly planted coffee trees to bear fruit. The fruit,
known as coffee cherry, becomes a bright, deep red
when ripe and ready to be harvested.
The entire coffee is harvested in two ways :
Strip Picked : All cherries are plucked from the branch
simultaneously, either by machine or by hand.
Selectively Picked: Only ripe cherries are harvested, and
they are individually handpicked. The day's harvest is
then taken to the processing facility.
5. 3. Processing the Cherries :
Processing must start as quickly as possible to avoid fruit deterioration.
Coffee is processed in one of two ways:
Dry Method : An old method of coffee processing, freshly picked cherries
are simply spread across vast surfaces to dry in the sun.Depending on
weather conditions, this can continue for several weeks for each batch of
coffee until the moisture content of cherries drops to 11%.
Wet Method : Removes the pulp from the coffee cherry after harvest so
that the grain is dried with only the parchment skin left over.
6. 4. Drying the Beans :
Beans processed by the wet method, the beans in paste and fermented
dried at about 11% humidity to properly prepare them for storage. Dried
beans are known as parchment coffee, and are warehoused in jute or sisal
bags until they are ready for export.
5. Milling the Beans :
Prior to exportation, parchment coffee is processed in the following manner:
Hulling , Polishing, Grading and Sorting.
7. 6. Exporting the Beans :
Ground beans, now referred to as green coffee, are loaded
onto ships in jute or sisal bags loaded into shipping
containers, or shipped in bulk in plastic-lined containers.
7. Tasting the Coffee :
Coffee is tested several times for quality and flavor. This
process is known as cupping and generally takes place in a
room specially designed to facilitate the process.
8. 8. Roasting the Coffee :
Roasting transforms green coffee into aromatic brown beans that we
buy at our favourite stores or cafes. Most roasting machines maintain a
temperature of about 550 degrees Fahrenheit. After roasting, the beans
are immediately air-cooled or water cooled.
9. Grinding Coffee :
The goal of a good grind is to obtain the most flavor in a cup of coffee.