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The smell of spring, the taste of coffeeThe month of May is refreshing, inspiring and seducing, I thing I’ll take my coffee and sit outside! Did you know that coffee grow on trees? Trees that grow around the equator and that needs to be 3-5 years old before they get flowers that makes fruit. Fruit that takes nine months to season and turn red or sometimes yellow. To make one kilo of coffee it takes about 5 000 berries and the berries are mainly picked by hand.
Coffee is a particular plant and is grown in a belt around the equator and reaches from central and South America to Papua New Guinea. The most northern coffee producing countries are Mexico, India and Vietnam. The most southern are Brazil, South Africa and Indonesia, warm and exotic countries. No wonder many of us get a passionate relationship with this drink. Did you also know that after oil, coffee is the world’s largest merchandise?  Washed and clean or dried and sweetMainly we distinguish between two ways of refinement when it comes to coffee. After the berry is picked from the bush the pulp and film has to be removed. This is done either by the dry or the wet method. The dry method is the easiest, and is often used in dry areas and on small plants. “Unwashed coffee” To remove the pulp around the coffee beans the berries are spread out on large terraces where they are turned several times a day so that the sun and wind will dry them evenly. In the evening the berries are swept up in large piles and covered so the moist want take in. after 1-3 weeks the pulp is dried to a crispy holster which is easy to remove. “Washed coffee” A machine removes the pulp. Afterwards the beans go in to washing channels, where the good beans are sorted from the bad. Then the beans are transported to large tanks. Here they lie and ferment for 12-36 hours. There is a chemical reaction in the beans that affects the taste of the coffee. After the ferment the beans get another round of washing before they are dried. The point of the drying is to stop the ferment process and reduce the water in the bean. Coffee in NorwayNorway is among the countries in the world that imports the best coffee. That is why we can allow a lighter burning. If the coffee is burned to hard the good flavours and aroma will disappear and it is easier to camouflage bad quality. It is no doubt that we are coffee loving people; there is about 0,3% of the worlds population living in Scandinavia, but this small are imports about 5,5% of all the coffee in the world. This makes about ten kilos per person. What to choose?The selection of coffee has developed enormously the last few years. You can choose between traditional brands mixed with coffee from several countries, or coffee from one country in particular or one particular plant. You can choose between whole beans, different grades of grinding, dark burned or light burned and possibly flavoured coffee. What to buy should be decided by taste. In the same way as wine, coffee is an agricultural product that gets its flavour from the soil, height, the sun and production method. You should also consider how you would like to drink your coffee; maybe you would like a darker coffee with some acidulousness for your milk based drink and a more delicate and fresh acidulousness to enjoy after dinner?Do you have good taste?When you measure coffee it is normal to use describing words like aroma, acidulousness, body, flavour and aftertaste. The coffee can have a taste of chocolate, nuts, blackcurrant, vanilla, caramel, apricot, citrus, burned, grass, potato, flowers, spices, leather, peas, soil, tobacco, etc. Our taste buds are at our tongue, but we capture a lot of aroma through our nose, that is why you should “sniff” the coffee before tasting it. It will give you a richer and more whole taste experience. It is the ability to recognize smells that will decide how you describe the taste experience.Trendy?Many people think that caffe latte and cappuccino are new trendy drinks, but this is in reality only an internationalisation of the way people have been drinking coffee for a long time. Coffee with milk was for many an introduction to the grownups world. In France and Italy coffee is mostly a “public” drink, while in Northern Europe it is an “at home” or “at work” drink. So even though we are drinking coffee in new places, it is still at work (29%) or at home (55%) we drink the most coffee. In total only 2,5% is drunk at a café or a coffee shop. Strawberry mocha shake1dl strong coffee, preferably espresso1dl milk 3tbs sugar 2balls of vanilla ice cream A handful of strawberries Mix in a blender to a fluffy milkshake Serve in tall glasses |
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