The Coffee Corner : information informationenCommunityServer 2007 SP2 (Build: 20611.960)Coffee History and How it's Produced, 22 Oct 2008 14:46:00 GMTf44090d1-a969-42dd-bc2f-08ef65ab6445:7157Alexgreene2<p><img src="" align="left" border="5" hspace="10" width="200" alt="" /><b>Coffee in the US &nbsp;</b></p><p>Coffee I think is the greatest drink on the planet. It is the second most popular drink in the world only to water. The average American drinks&nbsp; 3.1 cups of coffee a day, and 80% of American&#39;s drink coffee. 52% of Americans over the age of eighteen drink a cup of coffee every morning with 62% of coffee drinkers put sugar or sweetener in their coffee. </p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><b>How Coffee is Produced and Roasted<br /></b></p><p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Brazil is the world leader in coffee production with 30% of the market. Second of course is Columbia. All coffee growers live near the equator because its the perfect temperature to grow coffee. Most people don&#39;t know that a coffee bean is at the center of a coffee cherry. Coffee grows on trees in little red cherries. These cherries are usually hand picked because they have to be ripe in order to taste right. The coffee is then shucked from the cherry and then cleaned. The bean then is laid out to dry. There are a couple different drying methods one of which is spreading them on a cement roof top and using a rake to turn them. After the bean is dried they are ready to be roasted. When you roast a bean there are two stages, the first pop and the second. The bean will actually make a popping noise like popcorn when its being roasted. All coffee is at least roasted to the first pop. At the first pop many coffees will be pulled out and these are what you refer to as light roasts. After the second pop are what are referred to as the dark toasts. The longer you roast the beans the better that chance that you will have beans that break. This is why some dark roasts are more expensive because you can&#39;t use the beans that break apart because they will go bad and dry out. After the roasting the coffee is ready to be sent out and brewed. </p><p><b>Coffee History </b></p><p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Coffee has been around since 1608, but only to the upper classes. The first coffee house was in Venice in 1683. At first Christians thought that Coffee was invented by the devil because the Arabs drank it instead of wine, so they assumed that it must of been from the Anti-Christ. It wasn&#39;t till Pope Clement VIII wanted to try the beverage to make sure that it was evil that he decided to bless the beverage as a Christian beverage. This of course resulted in a massive import of coffee.<br /><br /><br /><br />&nbsp;</p><img src="" width="1" height="1">informationcoffeeroastmadegrownhistoryhowproduced