Coffee is not only a morning (and all-day) favorite for many people all around the world but also a caffeinated drink that has quite a long history behind it. Whether you prefer decaf or caffeinated coffee, with lots of add-ins or none, and iced or hot; chances are if you’re reading this you drink it at least sometimes or have a vested interest in the topic. There are so many different forms of coffee to enjoy and even more once the topic ventures further towards multiple regions of the world.
But what exactly do you know about this drink? There are plenty of interesting things to learn from the history and information on coffee. Here are some of those fun facts about coffee you may not know to give your morning pick-me-up more meaning.
Goat Beginnings?
Coffee originated in Ethiopia in the 1500s, but it actually was discovered and deduced the use of from a goat herder! His goats kept eating the cherries from the coffee plant and getting the effects that coffee has on us, aka they were filled with energy and had trouble sleeping. He eventually figured out the connection, and this information was brought to the local monks.
Prayer Usage
Again going back to the origination of coffee, the first common uses by humans were in the case of monks. Many monks slowly discovered that creating a drink from the coffee plant gave them the energy to be able to stay up longer to pray. This meant that the usage of coffee in prayer was quickly spread across many monks, planting the seed for coffee’s later popularity.
It’s a Fruit
Ironically enough, coffee production actually involves growing and harvesting a type of fruit. Coffee beans, named for their likeness in size and shape to most legumes, exist within a cherry-like berry that grows on coffee plants. Those fruits have to be harvested to then get the beans we use for creating the common drink. In fact, the fruit itself is also edible and has many uses.
Limited American Production
Due to the climate and conditions needed to grow coffee plants and bring them to full term, the United States only has two current states that can successfully and heavily produce coffee for commercial use and sale. These two states are Hawaii and California, with Hawaii being much more predominant of a grower over California.
Coffee Capital
The world even has a country nicknamed the World’s Coffee Capital Country for consuming the most coffee over any other country. In fact, that place is Finland. This is surprising considering Finland can’t produce any of its own coffee, but nonetheless its occupants have been able to earn this country its nickname for being the highest consumption of coffee in the world.
Even if you don’t enjoy partaking in coffee for most or all of your life, it can be pretty neat to learn more tidbits like these about a drink that has taken the whole world’s attention for longer than many of us even realize. Anything that has a history going back so many years could have some interesting fun facts to learn, this is doubly true for coffee since many of us are so accustomed to just drinking it without learning much about its history or the drink itself and it can be enjoyed from so many regions of the world. Hopefully you learned something new today from this list of fun facts about coffee, and if you did you can share it with friends and family to let them join in on the fun of learning something new and interesting about this common drink!