biological processing . Monsoon processing happened pretty much by accident because , in the early days of sail , coffee cherries harvested in Asia had to wait out the monsoon season before they could be transported . So , they would be stored in huge , open-sided warehouses , where they would swell and ferment . Biological processing was also a serendipitous discovery , but it has recently become somewhat controversial . It is accomplished by wild ( or domestic ) animals eating the yummy cherries , digesting them , and ‘ discarding ’ the seeds . The perfectly processed seeds are then picked out of the scat . This produces a great coffee – but for one very important reason . The animals are choosy , and they pick only the best , ripest cherries to munch so they pre-select the finest coffee . Since the movie The Bucket List , one biologically processed coffee – kopi luwak – has become extremely popular and very expensive . So , enterprising – and not too scrupulous – farmers are imprisoning hundreds of civets in tiny cages and feeding them haphazardly harvested coffee cherries , and selling the resulting s ** t as high-priced kopi luwak .
• Angelo Angelo is most is most likely likely to to process his his coffee by the dry or fully washed method . .
Drying
Once the bean has been separated from the cherry , it has to be dried . There are three methods . Patio drying is simply spreading the beans on a cement or clay floor and allowing them to dry in the sun , regularly raking them to prevent clumping . A similar method , known as African raised bed drying , involves laying the beans out on raised beds of some kind of mesh , and also turning them regularly . One advantage of this method is that it takes up less space , as the beds can be stacked like bunk beds .
An enhancement of this method , which is used in very rainy regions , involves covering the beds with a huge roof and sides that can be lowered for rain protection , or raised to allow airflow . These structures are called parabolic dryers , and they ’ re not very high tech , so it ’ s quite likely that Angelo will have built one in his back yard . For both these methods , drying takes between two and four weeks . Large-scale coffee producers tend to machine dry their beans in huge contraptions that look very much like giant tumble dryers – a process that is completed in 24 to 48 hours .
Selling and storage
Angelo is lucky that he lives in Mexico , where there are companies dedicated to sourcing speciality grade coffee . So , he can take his carefully nurtured and processed beans for assessment . If the beans have zero major defects , and an acceptable minimum minor defects , they will go through a secondary process of roasting , cupping and scoring for taste . If Angelo ’ s beans score 80 or more according to the Speciality Coffee Association ( SCA ) cupping score sheet , they will qualify as speciality grade coffee , and will fetch a premium price . As Angelo heads home , smiling , with his donkey , Dapple , the beans will be milled , sorted and graded .
Unfortunately , this system is not as efficient in every coffeegrowing country in the world and , in some cases , the grading takes place later – often after the coffee has been sold to a co-op or a government board – so the farmer is not directly rewarded . But this is changing , and the move towards conscious consumerism has increased the demand for speciality grade coffee with a verified chain of custody and provenance .
Milling , sorting and size grading
After the lot has been sold , the dried and denatured cherry is milled to remove any remaining pulp and the parchment , and the beans are pre-sorted using a gravity bed and screens . They will then be further sorted either visually or by an optical sorter , and graded according to size and defect – or lack thereof .
Then they get packaged and transported to the purchaser , who – in the case of Angelo ’ s speciality grade beans – will be a speciality coffee roaster or distributor . This special coffee will then be sold in smaller lots to speciality artisanal roasters who will lovingly bring out the best quality of the beans , and will sell them freshly roasted to a small , discerning market – people who can taste the difference between Angelo ’ s tenderly nurtured coffee and the somewhat less gently produced mass-market coffee . They will take the coffee home , carefully grind it just before brewing it using their current favourite method , and savour every sip .
And Angelo , high on a mountain in Mexico , will be lovingly tending his coffee trees – as will his many counterparts in Africa , Asia and South America . Speciality coffee is a growing trend . Italian Lifestyle JHB : 011 447 4703 | CT : 021 425 6169
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