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Coffee Trivia
How was coffee discovered? Can it help you with
asthma? Where are raw coffee beans chewed like candy? Is
coffee or oil the greater world commodity?
To answer these and many more questions about
coffee and its place in history, we've assembled 100
Coffee Trivia questions below for you to take in. So
grab a cup 'o joe, sit back and scroll on down!
1. Coffee was first known in Europe as Arabian
Wine.
2. The Arabs are generally believed to be the first
to brew coffee.
3. Milk as an additive to coffee became popular in
the 1680's, when a French physician recommended that
cafe au lait be used for medicinal purposes.
4. The first Parisian cafe opened in 1689 to serve
coffee.
5. Bach wrote a coffee cantata in 1732.
6. In the year 1763, there were over 200 coffee
shops in Venice.
7. The heavy tea tax imposed on the colonies in
1773, which caused the "Boston Tea Party," resulted in
America switching from tea to coffee. Drinking coffee
was an expression of freedom.
8. The founding fathers of the U.S., during the
revolution, formed their national strategies in
coffeehouses.
9. In early America, coffee was usually taken
between meals and after dinner.
10. In the year 1790, there were two firsts in the
United States; the first wholesale coffee roasting
company, and the first newspaper advertisement featuring
coffee.
11. The prototype of the first espresso machine was
created in France in 1822.
12. By 1850, the manual coffee grinder found its
way to most upper middle class kitchens of the
U.S.
13. The Civil War in the United States elevated the
popularity of coffee to new heights. Soldiers went to
war with coffee beans as a primary ration.
14. In 1900, coffee was often delivered
door-to-door in the United States, by horse-pulled
wagons.
15. The first commercial espresso machine was
manufactured in Italy in 1906.
16. In Italy, coffee and espresso are
synonymous.
17. The average age of an Italian barista is 48
years old. A barista is a respected job title in
Italy.
18. Italians do not drink espresso during meals. It
is considered to be a separate event and is given its
own time.
19. In Italy, espresso is considered so essential
to daily life that the price is regulated by the
government.
20. Italy now has over 200,000 coffee bars, and
still growing.
21. In Greece and Turkey, the oldest person is most
always served their coffee first.
22. In the ancient Arab world, coffee became such a
staple in family life that one of the causes allowed by
law for marital separation was a husband's refusal to
produce coffee for his wife.
23. Raw coffee beans, soaked in water and spices,
are chewed like candy in many parts of Africa.
24. In the last three centuries, 90% of all people
living in the Western world have switched from tea to
coffee.
25. Coffee represents 75% of all the caffeine
consumed in the United States.
26. Those British are sophisticated people, in
almost everything except their choice of coffee. They
still drink instant ten-to-one over fresh brewed.
27. Japan ranks Number 3 in the world for coffee
consumption.
28. In Japan, coffee shops are called
Kissaten.
29. Over 10,000 coffee cafes plus several thousand
vending machines with both hot and cold coffee serve the
needs of Tokyo alone.
30. For reducing wrinkles and improving their skin,
the Japanese have been known to bathe in coffee grounds
fermented with pineapple pulp.
31. The world can be divided into nations of coffee
drinkers and nations of tea drinkers.
32. The average annual coffee consumption of the
American adult is 26.7 gallons, or over 400 cups.
33. In 1990, over 4 billion dollars of coffee was
imported into the United States.
34. Coffee is the most popular beverage worldwide
with over 400 billion cups consumed each year.
35. Coffee, as a world commodity, is second only to
oil.
36. Only about 20% of harvested coffee beans are
considered to be a premium bean of the highest
quality.
37. The Arabica is the original coffee plant. It
still grows wild in Ethiopia.
38. The 2,000 Arabica coffee cherries it takes to
make a roasted pound of coffee are normally picked by
hand as they ripen. Since each cherry contains two
beans, it takes about 4,000 Arabica beans to make a
pound of roasted coffee.
39. Coffee sacks are usually made of hemp and weigh
approximately 132 pounds when they are full of green
coffee beans. It takes over 600,000 beans to fill a
coffee sack.
40. Until the late 1800's, people roasted their
coffee at home. Popcorn poppers and stove-top frying
pans were favored.
41. Citrus has been added to coffee for several
hundred years.
42. The Europeans first added chocolate to their
coffee in the 1600's.
43. Frederick the great had his coffee made with
champagne and a bit of mustard.
44. In the year 1809, Meslitta Bentz made a filter
out of her son's notebook paper, thus inventing the
world's first drip coffee maker.
45. Our sense of smell, more than any of our other
senses, makes our final judgement on coffee.
46. Coffee, along with beer and peanut butter, is
on the national list of the "ten most recognizable
odors."
47. Coffee lends its popularity to the fact that
just about all flavors mix well with it.
48. Nomadic tribes preserved the coffee cherries to
transport them long distances.
49. A four verse poem to coffee was written in
Mecca in 1511. It was one of the first.
50. It was the early 1400's, and with alcohol
forbidden by the Koran, coffee soon became the
replacement beverage.
51. Finely grinding coffee beans and boiling them
in water is still known as "Turkish Coffee." It is still
made this way today in Turkey and Greece or anywhere
else Turkish Coffee is served.
52. In the 14th century, the Arabs started to
cultivate coffee plants. The first commercially grown
and harvested coffee originated in the Arabian Peninsula
near the port of Mocha.
53. In 1554 in Constantinople, two coffeehouses
opened. They did very well. Soon there were many.
54. By 1600 A.D., coffee drinking had come to the
Orient. It soon became very popular.
55. The Venetians first introduced coffee to Europe
in 1615.
56. Lloyd's of London began as Edward Lloyd's
coffeehouse.
57. It was during the 1600's that the first coffee
mill made its debut in London.
58. In 1670, Dorothy Jones of Boston was granted a
license to sell coffee, and so became the first American
coffee trader.
59. William Penn purchased a pound of coffee in New
York in 1683 for $4.68.
60. Adding sugar to coffee is believed to have
started in 1715, in the court of King Louis XIV, the
French monarch.
61. The year was 1716 when Venetian coffee shop
merchants began distributing leaflets exalting their new
product: coffee. This may be the first example of
advertising for coffee shops.
62. In 1727, as a result of seedlings smuggled from
Paris, coffee plants first were cultivated in Brazil.
Brazil is presently by far the world's largest producer
of coffee.
63. Before the first French cafe in the late
1700's, coffee was sold by street vendors in Europe, in
the Arab fashion. The Arabs were the forerunners of the
sidewalk espresso carts of today.
64. The vacuum pack, invented in 1898, made it
possible to preserve roasted coffee. Preserved coffee,
though, not fresh coffee.
65. Espresso is to Italy what champagne is to
France.
66. The French philosopher, Voltaire, reportedly
drank fifty cups of coffee a day.
67. Retail espresso vendors report an increase in
decaffeinated sales in the month of January due to New
Year's resolutions to decrease caffeine intake.
68. Scandinavia has the world's highest per capita
annual coffee consumption, 26.4 pounds. Italy has an
annual consumption per capita of only 10 pounds.
69. The modern day espresso street vending cart
evolved from a Boeing Company shuttle cart, purchased
from surplus, and was first utilized to serve people
espresso at an arts and crafts fair in Edmonds,
Washington.
70. Coffee trees are evergreen and grow to heights
above 15 feet but are normally pruned to around 8 feet
in order to facilitate harvesting.
71. Coffee trees produce highly aromatic,
short-lived flowers producing a scent between jasmine
and orange. These blossoms produce cranberry-sized
coffee cherries. It takes four to five years to yield a
commercial harvest.
72. Coffee beans are similar to grapes that produce
wine in that they are affected by the temperature, soil
conditions, altitude, rainfall, drainage and degree of
ripeness when picked.
73. Brazil accounts for almost 1/3 of the world's
coffee production, producing over 3-1/3 billion pounds
of coffee each year.
74. Coffee is grown commercially in over forty-five
countries throughout the world.
75. Hawaii is the only state of the United States
in which coffee is commercially grown.
76. Hawaii features an annual Kona Festival, coffee
picking contest. Each year the winner becomes a state
celebrity.
77. In Hawaii coffee is harvested between November
and April.
78. Over 5 million people in Brazil are employed by
the coffee trade. Most of those are involved with the
cultivation and harvesting of more than 3 billion coffee
plants.
79. Before roasting, some green coffee beans are
stored for years, and experts believe that certain beans
improve with age, when stored properly.
80. The vast majority of coffee available to
consumers are blends of different beans.
Coffee Trivia #81-100 top
81. Coffee is generally roasted between 400F and
425F. The longer it is roasted, the darker the roast.
Roasting time is usually from ten to twenty
minutes.
82. After they are roasted, and when the beans
begin to cool, they release about 700 chemical
substances that make up the vaporizing aromas.
83. Over-roasted coffee beans are very flammable
during the roasting process.
84. After the decaffeinating process, processing
companies no longer throw the caffeine away; they sell
it to pharmaceutical companies.
85. Commercially flavored coffee beans are flavored
after they are roasted and partially cooled to around
100 degrees. Then the flavors applied, when the coffee
beans' pores are open and therefore more receptive to
flavor absorption.
86. Studies tell us the human body will absorb only
300 milligrams of caffeine at a given time. Additional
amounts are cast off and will provide no additional
stimulation. The human body dissipates 20% of the
caffeine in the system each hour.
87. Roasted coffee beans start to lose small
amounts of flavor within two weeks. Ground coffee begins
to lose its flavor in one hour. Brewed coffee and
espresso begins to lose flavor within minutes.
88. The first coffee drinkers, the Arabs, flavored
their coffee with spices during the brewing
process.
89. Iced coffee in a can has been popular in Japan
since 1945.
90. Fruit-based flavors all mix well with
coffee.
91. Irish cream and Hazelnut are the most popular
whole bean coffee flavorings.
92. Latte' is the Italian word for milk. So if you
request a latte' in Italy, you'll be served a glass of
milk.
93. Turkey began to roast and grind the coffee bean
in the 13th Century, and some 300 years later, in the
1500's, the country had become the chief distributor of
coffee, with markets established in Egypt, Syria,
Persia, and Venice, Italy.
94. In the later part of the 1600's, a cafe in
Venice began serving beverages made from water and ice.
It also served roasted coffee.
95. Coffee as a medicine reached its highest and
lowest point in the 1600's in England. Wild medical
contraptions to administer a mixture of coffee and an
assortment of heated butter, honey, and oil, became
treatments for the sick. Soon tea replaced coffee as the
national beverage.
96. In the book, Trip Through Happy Arabia, a
Frenchman documented his travels through Arabia. This
was in the year 1716, and in it was one of the first
documentations of the history of coffee.
97. About 1885, a process by which natural gas
heats a roasting chamber and hot air is the only heating
medium was developed, and this remains the best and most
popular method of roasting coffee.
98. Regular coffee drinkers have about one-third
less asthma symptoms than those non-coffee drinkers. So
says a Harvard researcher who studied 20,000
people.
99. Australians consume 60% more coffee than tea, a
sixfold increase since 1940.
100. The most widely accepted legend associated to
the discovery of coffee is of the goatherder named Kaldi
of Ethiopia. Around the year 800-850 A.D., Kaldi was
amazed as he noticed his goats behaving in a frisky
manner after eating the leaves and berries of a coffee
shrub. And, of course, he had to try them!
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