How Do I Turn Coffee Beans Off The Tree Into Coffee To Drink?

5 June 2009 in Coffee maker

2 Comments to How Do I Turn Coffee Beans Off The Tree Into Coffee To Drink?

Coffee beans are the seeds of the coffee “cherry”; two seeds normally grow within each cherry. On the tree, the beans are covered by the silverskin (a vestigial remainder of the fruit’s development, also called the spermoderm). The silverskin is covered by a parchment skin (the endocarp), which is covered by a slimy layer (the parenchyma), surrounded by a thin layer of pulp (the mesocarp), all covered by an outer skin (the exocarp). These layers must be removed prior to roasting, though some silverskin often remains attached.
Dry processing is the oldest method of processing coffee. The cherries are washed and then spread out on drying racks to dry in the sun for several weeks, or alternatively, are dried by machine. During this drying process, the pulp ferments, lending a particular taste to the bean. How the coffee is handled during drying—whether sun-dried coffee is protected against adverse weather or temperature, the machine driers’ temperature, etc.—effects the eventual quality and flavor of the bean. After the beans are dried, they are machine processed to remove the dried outer layers.
Wet processed beans have their outer skins removed by machine processing, then the fruit with the exposed pulp is allowed to ferment in tanks where bacteria and naturally occurring enzymes consume the pulp. The beans are then washed and dried, also either by sun or machine, and the dried beans are then milled to remove the remaining layers.
Some beans are semiwashed. The outer skins are removed, but the pulp is allowed to dry on the beans. The beans are then hulled as in the dry process, but the pulp is usually wetted as part of this step.
Solar Water Fountains on 5 June 2009

Pick when cherries are rips and ready to fall off the tree. Extract and wash the pits (beans). Clean and dry them. Roast them to your liking.
torskie on 5 June 2009

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