up a gourmet hot beverage for guest, family, or just for yourself. Nowadays
there are a number of coffee clubs and circles in which coffee drinking has
become somewhat of a social club. These social clubs meet in the community or on
the Internet.
Where did the good old days go where you could get just a regular, good cup of
coffee all across America.
It's all because there is a big craze over coffee these days. People are almost
worshipping the coffee bean now. People get a thrill out of ordering and buying
special coffees from specialty stores. They really like grinding their own
coffee beans. They like visiting places such as Costa Rica and bringing back
their special blends. And "coffee tasting" seems to be about as popular as "wine
tasting".
They even have furniture and home interior designs with a coffee theme. This
would make great gifts for the coffee buff.
Coffee got its beginnings around 900 A.D. where it was at first used as a
stimulant. It was also at times used as a wine and a medicine. It doesn't look
like anything is much different today.
There are not many products such as coffee that have continued "as is" for
hundreds of years. And yet people are still scrutinizing and getting creative
with it today and probably will be for years to come.
What is also interesting is that coffee is second to oil in dollar volume as a
world commodity.
Did you know that there is two times more caffeine in a pound of tea than in the
same amount of roasted coffee? This may be good news for those of you who hate
the taste of decaffeinated coffee however wait just one moment. A pound of tea
will make about 160 cups whereas a pound of coffee will usually make about 40
cups. This means that a cup of tea has about 1/4th the caffeine of a cup of
coffee.
The content of caffeine in coffee decreases as it is grown at higher altitudes.
If you want less caffeine in your coffee, grow it higher. Gourmet coffees are
typically grown at higher altitudes so they have less caffeine than their
grocery store counterparts.
There are many different types of coffee beans and way too many to describe in
this article. Here are just a few of them:
You have Latte, Espresso, Low-Fat, Organic, Cal, Decaf, Half-Decaf, Black
Forest, Cappuccino, Cafe au Lait, Alpine which has brown sugar, Arabian (lightly
spiced and without filter), Cafe con Miel (Spanish for coffee with honey), and
Cafe de Olla (a sweet coffee made with chocolate).
And you really should attend a coffee tasting at least once. You will get to
experience how making and brewing gourmet coffee is slowly becoming a form of
art. What is fun about the coffee tasting is that you could get a chance to
taste two dozen or more different blends. You may even leave to start your
journey as a coffee connoisseur. Any way you look at it, the tasting experience
will be fun if you like coffee.