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Portal:Coffee

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Introduction

A cup of black coffee

Coffee is a beverage brewed from roasted coffee beans. Darkly colored, bitter, and slightly acidic, coffee has a stimulating effect on humans, primarily due to its caffeine content. It has the highest sales in the world market for hot drinks.

Coffee production begins when the seeds of the Coffea plant's fruits (coffee cherries) are separated to produce unroasted green coffee beans. The beans are roasted and then ground into fine particles. Coffee is brewed from the ground roasted beans, which are typically steeped in hot water before being filtered out. It is usually served hot, although chilled or iced coffee is common. Coffee can be prepared and presented in a variety of ways (e.g., espresso, French press, caffè latte, or already-brewed canned coffee). Sugar, sugar substitutes, milk, and cream are often added to mask the bitter taste or enhance the flavor. There are also various coffee substitutes.

Though coffee is now a global commodity, it has a long history tied closely to food traditions around the Red Sea. The earliest credible evidence of coffee drinking as the modern beverage appears in modern-day Yemen in southern Arabia in the middle of the 15th century in Sufi shrines, where coffee seeds were first roasted and brewed in a manner similar to how it is now prepared for drinking. The coffee beans were procured by the Yemenis from the Ethiopian Highlands via coastal Somali intermediaries, and cultivated in Yemen. By the 16th century, the drink had reached the rest of the Middle East and North Africa, later spreading to Europe. (Full article...)

A modern coffee vending machine in Leuven, Belgium

The coffee vending machine is a vending machine that dispenses hot coffee and other coffee beverages. Older models used instant coffee or concentrated liquid coffee and hot or boiling water, and provided condiments such as cream and sugar. Some modern machines prepare various coffee styles such as mochas and lattes and use ground drip coffee, and some fresh-grind the coffee to order using a grinder in the machine.

The machine was invented in the United States by the Rudd-Melikian company in 1947, debuting as the "Kwik Kafe". Several U.S. companies also began manufacturing the machines in 1947, and by 1955 over 60,000 existed in the U.S. Today, coffee vending machines exist in various areas of the world, and are very common in Japan. (Full article...)
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A cup of Ipoh white coffee in Old Town Kopitiam in Melbourne, Australia
Ipoh white coffee (Chinese: 白咖啡, Tamil: ஒயிட் காபி) is a popular coffee drink which originated in Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia, resulting in Ipoh being named one of the top three coffee towns by Lonely Planet. The coffee beans are roasted with palm oil margarine, and the resulting coffee is served with condensed milk. (Full article...)

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A coffee plantation in Quimbaya, Quindío, Colombia. View from the road to La Union (Quimbaya), looking south towards Montenegro.
A coffee plantation in Quimbaya, Quindío, Colombia. View from the road to La Union (Quimbaya), looking south towards Montenegro.
Credit: Shaun McRae
A coffee plantation in Quimbaya, Quindío, Colombia. View from the road to La Union (Quimbaya), looking south towards Montenegro.

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Roasted coffee beans
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