Coffee bean

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For the chain of coffeehouses, see The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf.

A coffee bean is the seed of the coffee plant. It is the stone inside the red or purple fruit of the coffee plant. The fruits, coffee cherries or coffee berries, contain most commonly two stones lying with their flat sides together. The coffee beans consists of mostly endosperm which contains 0.8 - 2.5 % caffeine, a main reason for cultivating the plants. Coffee beans are an important export product for some countries.

Structure of coffee berry and beans: 1: center cut 2:bean (endosperm) 3: silver skin (testa, epidermis), 4: parchment (hull, endocarp) 5: pectin layer 6: pulp (mesocarp) 7: outer skin (pericarp, exocarp)

[edit] Etymology

Coffee beans are botanically not beans. The name derives from Arabic language ( قهوة‎ qahwa - "coffee" and bunn - "berry").

Coffee cherries on coffee plant (Coffea arabica).

[edit] Types

There are several species of the coffee plant: Coffea arabica, Coffea benghalensis, Coffea canephora, Coffea congensis, Coffea excelsa, Coffea gallienii, Coffea bonnieri, Coffea mogeneti, Coffea liberica, Coffea stenophylla. The seeds of species produce slightly different characteristic coffee. This differs also with the genetic subspecies and the coffee varietal, where the coffee plants are grown.

For cultivation are mainly used:

Coffea arabica: about 70 - 75 % of world trade
Coffea canephora (syn. Coffea robusta): is cultivated where Coffee arabica doesn‘t thrive
Coffea liberica: in limited areas
Coffea excelsa: in limited areas

In a small percentage of any crop of coffee cherries, the cherry contains only a single bean, instead of the usual two. This is called a peaberry.

Processing

Coffee Beans are removed from the coffee cherries or fruit, which is either discarded as waste or used as fertilizer.