PROCESSING COFFEE BEANS
In order to ensure that no unripe or unsuitable berries are picked, plantation employees select the berries by hand when they reach the appropriate stage of maturity on the coffee bushes. Large equipment may be used to harvest coffee beans from bigger and less specialized coffee estates, which can save time and money. The difficulty with using machines to harvest coffee berries, on the other hand, is that the berries are not selected for maturity before being harvested. This form of unselective harvesting is also done by hand on occasion, although it is less common.
After the coffee beans have been gathered, they are dried in order to preserve their flavor. Drying procedures may be divided into two categories: dry processing and wet processing. Dry processing is far less labor-intensive and is the simpler of the two methods. Wet processing, on the other hand, is a superior way of drying if you desire a softer cup of coffee.
The exterior flesh of the coffee berries is removed by machines during the wet processing process. By allowing the fruit to ferment, the soft outer layer of the berry’s inside is destroyed, revealing the firmer inner layer underneath.
After fermentation, the berry seeds are washed thoroughly with water and then dried before being used. Several methods of drying may be used to speed up the drying process, which takes a few days. Some facilities make use of specialized drying tables that enable air to flow around the coffee beans, allowing them to dry more fully and uniformly than other methods. Despite the fact that this is the more traditional technique of drying coffee, it is a process that is less often utilized. Another method of drying coffee seeds is to simply spread them out on big concrete surfaces and let them to dry naturally in the sun for many days.
This technique of drying is more labor-intensive since it necessitates the raking of the seeds to guarantee equal drying throughout the process. This process is also much more time intensive since it takes around a week for the seeds to dry, and the seeds must be raked approximately every three hours on a daily basis. The drying of seeds at other facilities is accomplished by the use of technology that blows hot air over the seedlings.
Whatever drying procedure is used, after the seeds have been dried, the parchment that has formed around the seed must be removed. Because the parchment has dried throughout the drying process, it may be easily peeled from the surface. It is known as hulling to refer to the process of removing the parchment from the coffee seed. Hulling is accomplished by the use of hulling machines, which are intended to remove the parchment and silver colored skin that covers the bean in a swift and efficient manner.
Beans are occasionally polished after they have been hulled. The polishing procedure may aid in the removal of any silver skin that has been adhered to the beans and is difficult to remove.
Additionally, polishing improves the aesthetic attractiveness of the beans by making them more glossy and smooth.
SELECTING AND GRADING COFFEE BEANS
After the coffee beans have been hulled and, in certain cases, polished, they are sorted into different grades. Grading is the process of separating coffee beans and classifying them according to the presence or absence of defects in the coffee beans as well as the size of the beans.
Grading starts with the beans being passed through a series of bars that separate the beans according to their thickness. The bars begin with a lesser distance between them, and by the time the bars reach the end of their length, the gap has grown significantly. ‘Screening’ is the term used to describe this procedure. Following their passage through the separating bars, the sorted beans are sent through screens with tiny holes in them, where they are sorted once again. These perforations help to further separate the beans according to their size.
After the coffee beans have been separated by size, they are separated further by the presence of flaws in the beans. The presence of various flaws, such as beans with shells remaining on them, beans that have not yet matured, and stones that have traveled through the various stages of the coffee manufacturing process, is possible. A large number of the defective beans can be sorted out by the use of equipment.
For example, stones are far heavier than coffee beans, and air machines can readily separate the beans from the stones by blasting the coffee with air while the machine is running. Other forms of coffee flaws, such as pea berries, have a different weight than a regular coffee bean; for example, a pea berry has a different weight than a traditional coffee bean. Because of the weight difference, sifting through machines is significantly less difficult.
Some defects in coffee beans, on the other hand, cannot be distinguished by weight.
Beans that are discolored or’sour’ must be separated by their aesthetic appearance. Fortunately, devices have been created that can sort various varieties of beans using optical sorters, which are becoming more popular. These optical sorters detect coffee beans that are different in appearance from the regular coffee bean and eliminate them from the batch of beans.
According on where the coffee beans are grown, the grading method for coffee beans differs from one region to another. For example, the state of Hawaii has developed five regulatory grades that are used to categorize and label coffee beans.
PROCESSING COFFEE BEANS
COFFEE BEANS IN THE OVEN
Typically, once the coffee beans have been sorted and graded, they are packed and transported out to distributors, where they are roasted to order. The vast majority of coffee beans are not roasted before being transported out to wholesalers, in spite of common assumption. Raw beans are sent instead of roasted since roasted beans do not keep as well or for as long as unroasted beans. Unroasted beans also have a shorter shelf life. “Green beans” refer to beans that have not been roasted yet.
The shipment of roasted beans has just lately become more widespread among coffee farmers. The introduction of gas valves on coffee bags has enabled this technique to be made practicable. These one-way valves aid in the preservation of coffee freshness and the extension of the shelf life of the coffee beans. Green coffee, on the other hand, continues to be the most effective method of transporting coffee beans throughout the country. When ‘green,’ coffee beans may be kept in a cold, dry environment for many years without losing their flavor or quality.
In addition to the growing region where the beans were cultivated and the kind of bean used, it is the roasting process that gives coffee its distinct taste. In terms of taste and scent, there are a plethora of various kinds of coffee roasts available, each of which has its own unique flavor and aroma when used to create coffee. The amount of time that a bean is roasted determines which of these three varieties of roast it will be. In terms of coffee roasting, there are four primary varieties: light roasts, medium roasts, medium-dark roasts and dark roasts. Light roasts are the lightest of the four types.
It is created from beans that are lighter in color than dark roasts. The reduced roasting time of the beans is responsible for the lighter hue. The taste of these beans is not as intense as the flavor of beans that have been roasted for a longer length of time. The roasting process causes the oils in the bean to rise to the surface of the bean; however, since light roast beans are not roasted for an extended period of time, they do not have enough roast time to allow this to occur. If you compare light roasted beans to other darker roasts, you’ll notice that they’re more acidic and have less of a “roasted” taste to them.
Moderate roasts are produced from coffee beans that are a medium brown in color.
Because they are not roasted for an extended period of time, medium roast beans do not have greasy areas on their surface. Despite the fact that these beans are roasted for a longer period of time than light roast beans, they have a richer taste and less acidity than light roasts. As the sugars in the bean caramelize more fully, the taste profile of medium-roasted coffee tends to be richer in body than the flavor profile of light-roasted coffee. In the United States, this is the roast that is commonly favoured.
Medium-dark roast beans are in the middle of the dark roast spectrum, between the darkened and black beans of the dark roast category and the non-oily beans of the medium roast spectrum. As a result of not being roasted for a long enough period of time, these beans do not have oils on the exterior of the bean. It should be noted that these beans have a little bitterness, which is common in dark roasts.
Despite their dark hue, dark roasted beans have a lustrous and oily surface due to the release of oils from inside the beans, which have risen to the surface.
Roasting over a longer amount of time and allowing the oils to rise to the top of the bean results in a bean with a bitter flavor. Within the dark roast bean category, there is a great deal of variation – some beans may be completely black, while others can just be slightly darker than medium-dark roast. When beans are roasted longer and more deeply, they tend to lose some of their unique features and take on a more intense roasted flavor. For those with a trained palate, certain deep-roasted beans might even taste scorched in some cases!
Coffee blends with distinct taste characteristics are formed during the roasting process. Depending on the duration of roasting time, flavors added to beans straight after roasting (in the case of flavored coffee,) roasting temperatures, and a variety of other variables, these flavor profiles may differ significantly in flavor.
During the roasting process, the longer a bean is exposed to heat, the less caffeine it contains. Despite the fact that this is a general rule of thumb, there is no reliable technique to assess the precise amount of caffeine difference across the many kinds of coffee roasts. Aside from the fact that lighter roasts contain more caffeine, what can be ascertained is if a coffee is completely caffeinated, halfcaffeinated, or decaffeinated, and how much caffeine is in each roast.
COFFEE WITHOUT CAFFEINE
It is possible to decaffeinate coffee when the beans are still raw, or ‘green.’ Many of the firms that process green coffee beans also do the decaffeinating step. These firms use their preferred technique of removing caffeine from green coffee beans.
The Swiss water procedure and the steaming process are the two most prevalent techniques of decaffeinating coffee beans. Green beans must be soaked in water between 160 and 210 degrees Fahrenheit for many hours in order to eliminate the oils that contain caffeine, according to the Swiss water method.
The steaming technique necessitates the steaming of green beans prior to the employment of a solvent to dissolve out the oils that contain the caffeine by evaporation. Whatever technique is used to extract caffeine from green beans, corporations are able to profit from the sale of the caffeine that has been extracted. The majority of the time, this substance is marketed to pharmaceutical corporations.
When coffee beans have been decaffeinated, they may be used to make half-caffeinated coffee, which is simply manufactured by combining caffeinated and decaffeinated beans in equal parts.
RETAINING COFFEE
Whether green beans are roasted by a manufacturing company, a distributor, or a customer, the storage procedure is critical to ensuring that the product’s quality and consistency are maintained.
As previously stated, the ideal approach to preserve coffee while preserving its quality is to keep the beans ‘green’ for as long as possible. Because green beans are raw beans that have not yet been ‘compromised’ by the roasting process, they will not lose their nutritional value if kept in a cold, dark area.
Having said that, green beans should still be stored in a tightly sealed container to avoid contamination. After the beans have been roasted, the best method to store them is in a vacuum-packed foil bag with a one-way vent. Due to the fact that this technique of storing keeps the beans from absorbing scents from the environment, the beans’ quality is preserved. These bags also enable for the containment of the taste and oils from roasted beans.
Coffee should always be kept in a cold, dark location away from moisture – coffee should never be stored in the refrigerator! Additionally, all coffee should be kept away from heat sources such as heating vents or kitchen equipment that create heat, since these items may also have an impact on the taste of roasted coffee.
What about those foil coffee bags that you have opened but have not yet consumed in their entirety? If possible (and suggested), just grind enough coffee to serve yourself and your guests in one sitting. When using a twelve cup coffee machine, for example, grind enough beans to produce twelve cups if desired, but do not ground the whole bag of coffee beans. Grinding the whole bag of beans involves letting ground coffee to sit for an extended period of time, during which time the coffee will lose its taste and integrity.
So, what should you do with the coffee beans that are left over after you have opened the sealed bag of coffee? Keep your unused beans in a jar that can be sealed. This container may be constructed of ceramic, metal, or glass; nevertheless, it should be maintained out of the sun, away from moisture, and away from heat – especially if the container is glass. In order to keep your roasted beans as fresh as possible, the ideal sort of coffee storage container is opaque and has an airtight cover.
