Coffee 101: Coffee History
The History of Coffee (Part 1)
According to one story, the effect of coffee beans on behavior was noticed by a sheep herder from Caffa Ethiopia named Kaldi as he tended his sheep. He noticed that the sheep became hyperactive after eating the red "cherries" from a certain plant when they changed pastures. He tried a few himself, and was soon as "energized" as his herd of goats. The story relates that a monk happened by and scolded him for "partaking of the devil's fruit." However the monks soon discovered that this fruit from the shiny green plant could help them stay awake for their prayers.
Another legend gives us the name for coffee or "mocha." An Arabian was banished to the desert with his followers to die of starvation. In desperation, Omar had his friends boil and eat the fruit from an unknown plant. Not only did the broth save the exiles, but their survival was taken as a religious sign by the residents of the nearest town, Mocha. The plant and its beverage were named Mocha to honor this event.
The first coffee plants originated on the plateaus of central Ethiopia most likely in the province of “Kaffa”, several thousand feet above sea level.
There are various fanciful but unlikely stories surrounding the discovery of the properties of roasted coffee beans. One story has it that an Ethiopian goatherd was amazed at the lively behaviour of his goats after chewing red coffee berries. What we know with more certainty is that the succulent outer cherry flesh was eaten by slaves taken from present day Sudan into Yemen and Arabia, through the great port of its day, Mocha, now synonymous with coffee. Coffee was certainly being cultivated in Yemen by the 15th century and probably much earlier than that.
How it got from Ethiopia across the Red Sea to Yemen is mainly theory. The most likely scenario is the Ethiopian invasion of Southern Arabia in 525 a.d. The Ethiopians ruled Yemen for around fifty years, plenty of time to establish a growing cycle of tasty little red cherries...
Coffee created a new phenominon...the coffeehouse. Once visitors from the rest of the world tasted this exciting new brew in the coffeehouses of Mecca and Cairo, the spread of "Coffea arabica", was rapid.
Protective of their discovery, arabs refused to allow coffee seed to leave their country, mandating that all beans first be either parched or boiled. In 1650 AD a Moslem pilgrim named Baba Budan from India who was fascinated with the potential of these little red cherries, could not resist sneaking seven seeds out of arabia by attaching them to his belly. As soon Bada Budan reached his home, a cave near Chickmaglur in south India, he planted them and they flourished.
The Dutch eventually carried what is believed to be the descendants of the first seven seeds of Baba Budan, to Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and then to Java, where coffee growing was established commercially at the beginning of the 18th century.
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