Why My Coffee's Name is Italian and What It Means

From infographicsnews.blogspot.com

There is a popular myth that the best coffee in the world grows in Italy, possibly fed by the great number of Italian coffee names. This is clearly false because no coffee is grown or harvested in Italy at all. The country that grows the most coffee in the world is Brazil and the country that drinks the most coffee is the United States. We consume about 1/3 of the world's coffee harvest by ourselves, so why the Italian names? 

Well for starters, Italy came across coffee in the sixteenth century, many years before the States even became a country and second, it is possible that the best coffee is roasted, blended and drunk on the Italian peninsula because, even though they cannot grow it, Italians seem to love coffee.

Espresso Con Panna
Image from Starbucks Coffee Company Website

 

From the Affagato, a name that means "drowned" and is an espresso poured over gelato, to the Breve, an espresso with half & half, to the Marocchino, an espresso with steamed milk and cocoa powder, the majority of our coffee drinks were invented and named in Italy. The lovely chart below from infographicsnes.blogspot shows some of the differences between popular coffee drinks.



 

From infographicsnews.blogspot.com

Italian coffee names became so widely known throughout the world as the coffee language that when American G.I.'s invented their own type of coffee during World War I they added an "o" creating the "Americano".
My conclusion: we should all invent divine coffee beverages and name them weird things like "The Doctor Who" and "The Alarm Clock", etc. Until next time,
Yours Caffeinated,

Arah

Local Coffee Spotlight: The Hilo Farmer's Market

 

There are some coffee drinkers who couldn't care less where their coffee came from as long as it's coffee. Others (my father included) are very, very specific about how they want their daily dose of dark brown happiness.

My dad's particular style includes grinding whole beans in a tiny blender before carefully adding appropriate amounts of water-to-coffee grinds.

"If it's not high quality," he says, "I drink it with cream and sugar. If it's good, I take it black."

As someone who spent fourteen days this summer writing in the desert, I took coffee where I could get it, which meant a lot of little orange instant packets and hot water from a machine. I was so ridiculously excited for drip coffee when I got home that I decided to make my first coffee spotlight the good old bean kind that you brew at home, and my favorite place to get whole beans is the Hilo Farmer's Market.

"Budda's Cup" coffee booth at the Hilo farmer's market
Photograph by Arah Ko

You are probably bored of me mentioning it already, but if you're ever visiting the Big Island, I highly recommend you take a trip to at least one farmer's market, and the biggest one is in Hilo on Saturdays and Wednesdays from as early as you can wake up to around 2 o'clock in the afternoon. The market sells everything from T-shirts to bone necklaces, spam musubi's, honey and Thai food. Half the fun is wandering around the crowded booths trying to decide what to buy, and, of course, there is the coffee. On the average Saturday there are at least four booths selling coffee from different local companies. Some of my favorites are "Divine Hawaiian," "Big Island Coffee Roasters," and "Big Island Coffee."

Divine Hawaiian, Big Island Coffee roasters and Big Island Coffee at last year's home coffee cupping
Photograph by Arah Ko

Since we are talking about local whole bean coffees I have to recommend that you also take a tour of the actual coffee factories-- the Island is covered in them and the majority have mouthwatering free samples. In Kona you can just drive along the road and you'll spot colorful signs advertising the brands parked along the coast. On Hilo side you have to hunt for them on google maps or Yelp, but it's well worth the experience. Plus, I prefer Hilo side coffee, it has a thicker, less acidic edge to it.

Have fun coffee hunting,

Yours Caffeinated,

Arah

World's Biggest Coffee Mosaic... For Now

 

 

In June this year Russian artist Arkadi Kim broke the world record for largest coffee bean mosaic. It took Arkadi and several assistants more than ten days to complete the 30 meter long coffee art which contained over one million beans and weighed around 397 pounds.

 

The piece titled, "The Awakening" was on display in Gorky Park, Moscow where visitors could watch the mosaic go up while drinking coffee and listening to jazz music. Then on July 1st the beans were taken down and sent to a coffee plant for processing. It brings a whole new meaning to "Drinking in Art."

The Awakening is five meters longer than the previous largest coffee mosaic by Albanian Saimir Strati and no one has attempted to make a bigger one so far.

 

 

Photos from google images

 

 



Big Island Coffee: Kona, Ka'u, Puna and Hamakua

While visiting California last year I met someone in a library who was talking about the Kona coffee he had with breakfast that morning. "You know there is only a little bit of land in Hawaii to grow coffee," he told me, "that's not enough for everyone in the country to be able to drink it."
Looking up from my book I smiled, "Yes," I said, "I know, I live there."

For the past hundred years coffee from Kona district has been the internationally famous face of Hawaiian coffee. Kona is also the producer of some of the world's most expensive coffees. What most people don't know is that of the 7 million pounds of coffee produced in Hawaii every year, only half of it is from Kona.

Hawaii Island District Map
from google images

 

Coffee is grown industrially on five of the Hawaiian islands, most prominently on the Big Island where there are four major coffee districts: Kona, Ka'u, Puna and Hamakua.

 

Being a world famous and very expensive coffee, Kona coffee is often sold in bags of 10% Kona to lower the price. Kona farms are also very tourist friendly and you can visit many of the famous brand's farms and their manufacturing areas. There is also an annual Kona Coffee Cultural festival in early November. You can visit the site here

http://www.konacoffeefest.com/

 

Ka'u coffee is generally described as floral sometimes with chocolate, cherry, coconut, orchid or citrus flavors. "It's less acidic than Kona coffee." A girl at a Hilo farmer's market booth told me. Ka'u has done very well in both regional and international competitions. Over the last four years it has placed top ten in the Coffee Association of America Convention. Having earned a reputation as "one of the best coffees anywhere" Ka'u coffee is described as being on the rise in the coffee world. Ka'u coffee can be bought online, even Starbucks has some Ka'u coffee in stock occasionally. It can also be purchased on the island at the farms themselves, the Farmer's Market or the Ka'u Coffee festival held in May. You can see the Ka'u Coffee Festival site here: http://www.kaucoffeefest.com/Main/default.aspx

 

Coffee picking.
A naturally dried coffee bean in Puna.

 

Puna coffee, grown between Hilo and Volcanoes Nation Park has been described by the County of Hawaii Agriculture as being "an outstanding coffee with very full body, heavy, with nutty overtones." One of my favorite places to get Hilo coffee is at the Xpresso Coffee Cooth in Prince Kuhio Mall. In my experience Puna coffee is deep and delicious with a stronger caffeine buzz.

 

Hamakua has a few coffee farms on the slopes of Mauna Loa and is usually described as incredibly rich. The few times I've tried Hamakua coffee I've been pleasantly surprised at its wonderful body and aftertaste.

 

If you have a hankering for Hawaiian coffee it's worth looking into the award winning brands from different Hawaii districts and finding out which one you prefer.

 

Yours Caffeinated,

Arah



What's in my Frappuccino?!

Xpresso Blended Ice Mocha
Xpresso is a local coffee brand on the big island,
they have a booth in the Prince Kuhio mall,
their Hilo coffee is absolutely delicious <3


My #1 favorite drink before I swore off sugar was the classic Mocha Frappe. It wasn't until I stopped drinking them that I began to wonder just what was in a frappucinno... specifically sugar-wise.
I began sniffing around for frappe facts. My research was conducted on only Grande or Medium sized frappes so all coffee mentioned in this post is referring to a 16 fl. oz beverage.
 

A McCafe Iced Coffee
I got it as unflavored/ unsweetened as possible and it still tasted like candy...

 

First up for my study was the McCafe. Everything I have ever had from the McCafe has been sweet, so I wasn't surprised when I found out that their Mocha Frappe had 70g of sugar, their Choc. Chip Frappe had 66g sugar and their Caramel Frappe a whopping 71g sugar!

 

If you don't know how much sugar that is, the total recommended sugar intake for a full-grown male is 45g a day!

Starbucks Mocha Frappe
Picture from official Starbucks Coffee Company website
(they take really good pictures...)

 

Starbucks was a little better, but not much. Their Mocha, Vanilla and Caramel Frappes were respectively 60, 69, and 64grams sugar. (You can find out their coffee facts on the Starbucks coffee site.)

 

 

So the question arises: what do I order if I don't order a frappuccino?

The answer-- pretty much anything else. Innocent, fluffy frappes it turns out, are really bad for you.

 

For yummy alternatives, McCafe's medium Iced Latte has only 8 grams of sugar.

If you prefer the Starbucks route, even the lovely Grande Caramel Macchiato has only 31 grams of sugar, which is still a lot, but not nearly as much as a Starbucks frappe which can be more than twice the amount sugar depending on the flavour.

 

Whipped cream also makes a bit of a difference. You can add it to your unsweetened beverage or take it away from your sugary one; McDonalds whipped cream portions are about 3g sugar and Starbucks whipped cream is closer to 2 grams. The difference in total sugar intake isn't much, but it helps.

 

Even better is getting a steaming (or iced) cup of plain coffee. Your medium/grande original coffee has zero grams sugar, zero grams transfat and zero grams cholestrol! *cheers wildly*

 

Yours Caffeinated,

Arah



Home Coffee Cupping...

 



Keaau Caffeinated, reporting in their first coffee cupping!

The Judges:

Arah Ko, Riana and Y.B. 

 

The Coffee:

(from left to right)

Buddha's Cup, Big Island Coffee Roasters, Divine Hawaiian Coffee, Kona Mountain and Big Island Coffee.

 

The coffees were brewed and tasted within a couple minutes of each other, they were rated on scent, body, flavor and personal preference among the judges.

The Verdict:

1st Place Coffee- Big Island Coffee Roasters!

 

Described as having a unique taste with low acidity with hinted flavours of cinnamon, malt and caramel, this coffee was truly delicious and was voted as the favorite of all three judges in our blind cupping. It is a light coffee with an amazing smell, before and after it is brewed. This coffee was also the Grand Champion of the 2012 statewide cupping competition!

 

Link to Big Island Roaster's Site: http://www.bigislandcoffeeroasters.com/

 

 

 2nd Place- Big Island Coffee!

This coffee had a strong and rich scent. Its flavour was oaky and savoury with a smooth body. This is a deeper, blacker coffee and completely addictive. It was the first one to run out after the cupping...

3rd Place Coffee- Divine Hawaiian Coffee!
This coffee had a taosty tobacco flavour with a long aftertaste, a little more acidic than the others. (I was unfortunately unable to get a picture for this one.)
Site: http://divinehawaiiancoffee.com/cart/

Yours caffeinated,
Arah



Shopping For Coffee

 

One of Hilo's most interesting attractions is the Hilo Farmer's Market. Packed with vegetables, fruits, honey, soap, ethnic foods, clothes, handcrafts and yes, coffee, the Hilo Farmer's market operates on Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays from however early you can manage to wake up to about 2 o'clock in the afternoon.

 

Big Island Coffee/ Kimchi booth at the Hilo Farmer's Market
Photo by Arah Ko 

 

The Hilo Farmer's Market has booths selling over half a dozen different Big Island coffee brands, so one bright Saturday morning I stopped by the market and picked up one of every brand I could find, determined to have my own home coffee tasting.

 

 

Divine Hawaiin coffee booth
Photo by Arah Ko

 

It didn't take me long to figure out that coffee tastings are actually called coffee cuppings. (Thank you wikipedia!) The coffee I bought was all medium roast and if I could get it, whole bean. I purchased coffee from Buddha's Cup, Big Island Coffee, Big Island Roasters, Kona Mountain, Divine Hawaiian Coffee and Sharkie's. I will be posting about the individual brands as well as the result of the coffee cupping soon!