What’s your Cup of Coffee?

Coffee Shops these days have an amazing variety of different types of coffee making it nearly impossible to decide which coffee is best for you. The one common element is that they tend to begin with a shot or two of Espresso.

Here are the main coffee types and how they are made.

• Cappuccino is one of the most popular and is made from one third espresso, one third hot milk and one third frothy milk
• Latte is another “milky” coffee made from a ratio of 1:6 espresso:hot milk
• Macchiato, maybe not so popular, is basically espresso with a little touch of milk
• Con Panne is espresso with a dash of cream
• Mocha is a cup of hot chocolate with a dash of espresso
• Americano is a longer drink of espresso with added hot water

To make the best hot milk and froth for your Cappuccino and Latte you can use any type of milk – full cream, semi-skimmed or skimmed just as long as it’s fresh. It’s the protein in the milk that makes the froth and this diminishes after about 4 days. Always use a stainless-steel jug to do the frothing as it conducts heat better, fill it to just under half full with cold milk and begin frothing. When it’s too hot to touch at the base the froth is ready. Give it a couple of taps to get rid of any bubbles, and then gently spoon the froth onto your espresso for that perfect cappuccino!

These cups of coffee and easily be made at home with either Cappuccino Makers, Espresso Machines or Combi Coffee Makers and there are lots available at high street stores at reasonable prices.

Probably the cheapest method of making coffee, except instant coffee, of course, uses a Cafetiere or a Filter Coffee Machine. Both are simple and cheap machines which use ground coffee, the cafetiere being the most simple as it doesn’t require electricity.

For that special cup of coffee why not try a Bean to Cup Machine which, as the name suggests, uses Coffee Beans.

Relatively new to the market are the Pod Coffee Machines which use pre-packed “pods” of coffee and are barcoded to produce a perfect cup of coffee every time. Again, there are many on the market but one of the most well known is Tassimo which has lots of well known brands of coffee available in pods for use in their machines.

The Health Effects of Coffee

Scientific studies have examined the relationship between coffee consumption and an array of medical conditions. Most studies are contradictory as to whether coffee has any specific health benefits, and results are similarly conflicting regarding negative effects of coffee consumption.

Coffee appears to reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, heart disease, diabetes mellitus type 2, cirrhosis of the liver and gout. Some health effects are due to the caffeine content of coffee, as the benefits are only observed in those who drink caffeinated coffee, while others appear to be due to other components. For example, the antioxidants in coffee prevent free radicals from causing cell damage.

Coffee’s negative health effects are mostly due to its caffeine content. Research suggests that drinking caffeinated coffee can cause a temporary increase in the stiffening of arterial walls. Excess coffee consumption may lead to a magnesium deficiency or hypomagnesaemia, and may be a risk factor for coronary heart disease. Some studies suggest that it may have a mixed effect on short-term memory, by improving it when the information to be recalled is related to the current train of thought, but making it more difficult to recall unrelated information. Nevertheless, the mainstream view of medical experts is that drinking three 236 ml cups of coffee per day (considered average or moderate consumption) does not have significant health risks for adults.

An American scientist Yaser Dorri has recently suggested that coffee beans can restore the appetite after cooking and refresh olfactory receptors. He believes the intense odorants in coffee release the sensory receptors in the nose. This scientist suggests that people can regain their appetite by smelling coffee beans. He has suggested this method to be also used for animals in research institutes.

Source: wikipedia

The History of Coffee

Coffee use can be traced at least to as early as the 9th century, when it appeared in the highlands of Ethiopia. According to legend, Ethiopian shepherds were the first to observe the influence of the caffeine in coffee beans when the goats appeared to “dance” and to have an increased level of energy after consuming wild coffee berries. The legend names the shepherd “Kaldi.” From Ethiopia, coffee spread to Egypt and Yemen, and by the 15th century, it had reached the rest of the Middle East, Persia, Turkey, and northern Africa.

In 1583, Leonhard Rauwolf, a German physician, gave this description of coffee after returning from a ten year trip to the Near East: ” A beverage as black as ink, useful against numerous illnesses, particularly those of the stomach. Its consumers take it in the morning, quite frankly, in a porcelain cup that is passed around and from which each one drinks a cupful. It is composed of water and the fruit from a bush called bunnu. “

From the Muslim world, coffee spread to Italy. The thriving trade between Venice and North Africa, Egypt, and the Middle East brought many goods, including coffee, to the Venetian port.From Venice, it was introduced to the rest of Europe.

Coffee became more widely accepted after it was deemed a Christian beverage by Pope Clement VIII in 1600, despite appeals to ban the “Muslim drink”. The first European coffee house opened in Italy in 1645. The Dutch were the first to import coffee on a large scale, and they were among the first to defy the Arab prohibition on the exportation of plants or unroasted seeds when Pieter van den Broeck smuggled seedlings from Aden into Europe in 1616. The Dutch later grew the crop in Java and Ceylon. Through the efforts of the British East India Company, coffee became popular in England as well. It was introduced in France in 1657, and in Austria and Poland after the 1683 Battle of Vienna, when coffee was captured from supplies of the defeated Turks.

When coffee reached North America during the colonial period, it was initially not as successful as it had been in Europe. During the Revolutionary War, however, the demand for coffee increased so much that dealers had to hoard their scarce supplies and raise prices dramatically; this was partly due to the reduced availability of tea from British merchants. After the War of 1812, during which Britain temporarily cut off access to tea imports, the Americans’ taste for coffee grew, and high demand during the American Civil War together with advances in brewing technology secured the position of coffee as an everyday commodity in the United States.

Source: wikipedia