Different Places, Different Tastes

       As the topic shown above, I'm going to introduce several places that produce coffee.
Let's start with Asia.

Asia
     Vietnam and Indonesia are the most productive countries in Asia. However, the coffee in Vietnam is not pretty good because of its location and poor hygiene, so they're ofter sold to some big enterprise at a lower price. On the contrary, Indonesia has one of the most well-known coffee -Mandheling, the strong after taste of it has gained lots of popularity in Taiwan.



Africa
     There are many countries in Africa produced coffee with distinctive aromas and tastes, such as Ethiopia, Kenya.  Among them , the state in Ethiopia called Yirgacheffe is my favorite one . Once you drink it , the fruity smell will impress you definitely .


Latin America
      Panama, Brazil, Colombia ,Costa Rica...... , the perfect climate and location make Latin America be the great place to plant coffee.  For example, the best coffee ever, Geisha, is an original variety in Panama. This aromatic coffee has taken the champion for years. What's more, Costa Rica also makes itself more famous by its many kinds of honey production.




Next time if you see a variety of coffee on the menu ,  I suggest that you try different kinds and find the your favorite one!!!

About the Flavor of Coffee

          How do we know whether the cup of coffee is good or not.  It all depends on what kinds of flavor it owns. Generally, there are two biggest part of the flavors-- 'aromas' and 'tastes'. I'll give a brief introductions of them .

Tastes : sour, sweet, bitter, and salt

         We will find the tastes of coffee after sipping it.  It's worth to be mentioned that according to the 2015 WCE (世界烘豆大賽 ) champion-賴昱權, all of these tastes all have a good one and the bad one . Take 'sour' for example,  the one that makes us feeling comfortable called 'acidity',  and the other called 'sour'.  Besides, the good bitter will leave a distinguished body, lingering in our mouth for a long time . However, the bad one is just like the night when we stayed up late to finish the homework.

By the way, I'll show you guys more the difference between excellent and inferior coffee next week. 

Aromas :enzymatic,sugar browning,dry distillation

    We can smell the aromas of coffee before and after brewing it, and they are divided into lots of categories. Generally, the light and medium roasted coffee will have big part of  flowery(wet process) or fruity(dry process) aromas. As for dark roasted coffee , the aromas of chocolate and nut are pretty obvious.

Coffee Flavor Wheel
source

Coffee Production

     To make fragrant coffee beans ,There is a crucial process between planting and roasting--Production,which is aim to clear all the pulp or fruit , and only leave seeds,so that we can do the next step.

    Three common forms of processing: wet process, dry process , and semi-dry process

each methods can have significant effects on the development of coffee's flavor.

1.Dry process(日曬法):

     Dry process is the oldest fashion of processing. The clean cherry is cleaned at first , then put on the tables or layers to dry itself under the blazing sun . By this method, beans will develop a much more 'fruit aroma (果香)' then the others. In my opinion , it is the best choice to if we want to enjoy variable of flavors.

Dry process coffee pods on the beds

   

2.Semi-dry process(半水洗法):

      Semi-dry process is often used in Indonesia and Brazil. In this process, farmers remove the outer skin from the cherries mechanically with locally built pulping machine. The well-known Mandheling(曼特寧) coffee is produced by this way. 

    In recent years,semi-dry process develops more kinds. For instance, honey processing is another one that impressed me a lot. It gives coffee a stronger body with enhanced sweetness and round acidity.

Most of the pulp removed – semi-dry process. The “mucilage(黏液)” remains.    

3.Wet process(水洗法):  
    The most common used method, not only does it save much more time than dry process , but it also need less human to finish the job. Moreover, wet process can enhance the 'flower aroma' and generate more awesome acidity of coffee.

The Wet Method

The Coffee Tree and the Raw Coffee Bean

    As the topic showed above, I am going to talk about the basic process of coffee drink--trees. To begin with, here is my own experience: I have planted about ten coffee trees several years ago. Under the sun's nourishing and my care for years.It will take approximately 3 to 4 years for the newly planted coffee trees to bear fruit from blooming. The fruit, called the coffee cherry, turned a bright , deep red when it was ripe and ready to be harvested,finally it became the useful beans that impressed me with it's fabulous taste.

The mature coffee cherries

The coffee trees flower before they bear fruit 

From green to deep red , this is the process of the beans growing up

Let's talk about the varieties of coffee trees next:

       There are two biggest species -- Arabica(阿拉比卡) and Robusta(羅布斯塔) , they account for most of the coffee beans in the market. However, on top of them, Geisha, an original variety in Panama, is worth noticing. Geisha has won the best coffee bean title for years because of its high complexity and incredible aroma . Besides ,it is called "the most expensive coffee on earth" . One pound of it costs more than 4000 NT dollars.   I'll share my feeling about sipping Geisha one day!!

Coffee Variety Tree