CULTIVATION AND HARVESTING
 

The coffee plant is an evergreen shrub, which matures in 7/9 months, and then it has to be harvested. It grows up in equatorial and tropical
belts, where there is a warm-damp climate and temperatures around 25°C: this plant suffers wind, cold and frost and all the atmospheric events
particularly strong and violent. Coffee is a plant which germinates in a continuous cycle (after the rain): this means that mature cherries stand next
to unripe cherries and that the harvest is not homogeneous, with beans too much ripe or too much unripe.

 
Recently, the industrialisation of harvesting has supported the "stripping" diffusion, that's to say a harvesting method of cherries that doesn’t consider the different degree of drupe maturity. To avoid the "stinker" problem (that's to say coffee cherries too much ripe and fermented), the more accurate method of harvesting, even if more onerous, remains that named "picking" (manual harvesting of ripe cherries only). The other very usual harvesting method, that can be also done by special machinery, is named "stripping" (indifferent harvesting of every cherries).
This procedure is adoptable where the rains are concentrated in some periods of the year: only in this way the cherries ripening can be tendentially homogeneous and the harvest can be with less defects
(unripe or too much mature cherries).

The most commercially diffused coffee species are two:

 Arabica coffee, more diffused and precious for taste and aroma but also more sensitive to heat, damp and
diseases. For this reason it is cultivated in high altitude, between 900 and 2,000 meters.

Robusta coffee, more intense for aroma and caffeine; it's more proof against parasitic and atmospheric gents. For this reason it is cultivated in lower altitudes, between 300 and 600 meters.

The biggest producers are:

1) The countries of Latin America, Central America and Caribbeans, which roduce mostly Arabica coffee.

2) The countries of equatorial area of Asia, which produce Robusta coffee of good quality, assimilable to Arabica coffee.

3) The countries of Africa, which produce middle quality Robusta coffee.

After the harvest, the coffee berries have to be treated in order to separate the internal beans from the external pulp. Even in this case two different methods can be used.

1) Dry method, which gives so-called natural coffees

2) Damp method, which gives so-called washed coffees

In the first procedure, after harvesting, the fruits are put to desiccate in the sun for some days, until the pulp is totally dried. Then, the pulp is treated by a debarking machine which breaks the pulp and the membrane around the bean, sets free the internal beans, ready to be packed in jute bags.

In the second method, the procedure is more articulated and expensive but the yield is certainly superior. The pulp of the fruits is taken off by a machine, the beans covered by their membrane ferment in big water basins and then dry up in the sun until their membrane sets them free.

ROASTING

By the roasting the coffee bean cracks, under the pressure of the carbon dioxide, dilating its typical central fissure and increasing the volume of 60%, loosing so the 18/20% of their weight.

The roasting degree depends on the kind of coffee used:
1)The Arabica coffees need a clearer and less accentuated roasting not to alter the delicate
aromas that characterize them. The caffeine varies between 1% and 1.7%.
2)The Robusta coffees need a darker and more accentuated roasting to cover their characteristic
woodiness. These coffees have a bitter and more astringent taste: the caffeine varies between 2% and 4%.

In the south of Italy is requested a stronger roasting, in order to obtain as final product a darker coffee with a more intense aroma; on the contrary, in the north of Italy is requested a clearer roasting, in order to obtain a sweeter and less intense coffee.
Anyway, the roasting temperature doesn't not exceed 215°C because the cellular walls of the coffee bean wouldn’t support the heat. The cooling phase, after the roasting, is generally by air (aspiration of the air from the surroundings), because the one by water would be too much expensive and with a lot of disadvantages as coffee absorbs water because it is a hygroscopic product.                                                                                                             Go Up