There is a ritual that I practice every morning. I fill my kettle with water, turn on the stove, grind some coffee beans, fill my french press with them, and wait for the steam to start whistling. I had my first cup when I was 7 years old. Everyone in my family had coffee in the mornings, but I was not allowed to taste it until one day my aunt, who was visiting us from Spain, told me: “I will let you drink one cup if you can do it without adding any sugar to it”. I said yes! ...and I loved it. The unique bitter coffee flavor, unmasked from any other thing. The aroma steaming from my cup. That one was the first of many more.
Coffee is a flavor that goes great with chocolate among other ingredients, and it is used in desserts, cakes, confections, ice creams... Two species of coffee trees are commercially exploited: Arabica and robusta. Robusta beans-- that are prized for its resistance to frost and disease, its faster fruiting, and its tolerance for warmer climates and lower elevations--are more neutral in flavor than the Arabicas, and contain about twice as much caffeine. Plantings in the Americas are mostly Arabica, in Africa mostly robusta, and in India, about half and half. Jamaican, Java, mocha, and kona (Hawaiian) coffees are prized because these Arabica beans are not prolific and are grown in relatively small regions.
Coffee beans undergo two stages of processing. First comes fermentation, during which the berry pulp softens and becomes more easily separated from the seeds. Then, the seeds are roasted: all of the flavor and aroma that we enjoy in coffee is created by roasting the beans. The hotter and longer the beans are roasted, the darker and more strongly flavored they get. During the roasting process moisture is lost and a chemical reaction takes place: starches are converted into sugar, proteins are broken, and the whole cellular structure of the bean is altered.
When brewing your morning coffee, remind this:
- Use water just off the boil--it extracts the desired substances rapidly
- Don’t boil the water while brewing or the flavor will scape with the steam
- Takes about two minutes of contact with the water at about 200˚F (93˚C) to achieve a good flavor
- If brewed too long, flavor deteriorates
- Less brewing time results in a weak but sour flavor because the beans’ acids are among the first substances to dissolve
- Don’t hold the brewed coffee at a high temperature for too long or reheat it too often: much of the aroma will be lost, and
- Certain molecules are broken down into acids, which give the coffee a sour edge
