What are the most common ways to treat raw coffee beans?

First of all, let's talk about how coffee comes.

Coffee tree from seedlings to flowering, the final fruit, is the origin of coffee.

Coffee fruit, also known as coffee cherry, coffee beans are the seeds inside coffee cherry.

After the coffee cherries are picked from the trees, the pericarp, pulp and pectin are removed. This process is called green bean processing.

Green coffee beans are processed differently, and they largely determine the taste and quality of coffee!

5 Ways to Treat Coffee Beans

I. Solarization

This is the most primitive coffee, the most simple, the oldest treatment method, according to relevant literature records, as early as 11th century AD 1000 years ago Arabs began to use the sun method to treat coffee fruit oh.

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First, coffee beans into a large sink, incomplete development of inferior beans will float on the water surface, sink in the bottom of the mature full fruit picked up, tiled exposure, often flip, pick out defects.

When the moisture content of coffee beans drops to 10%-14%, you can use a huller to knock out the peel pectin, and the whole solarization method is completed.

disadvantages

Sunlight method is completely dependent on the weather to eat, coffee fruit dryness is difficult to control. If the sun is not clean, it is easy to mix impurities. In the process of sun exposure, the flesh of coffee fruit has not been removed, so mold and decay often occur. Therefore, in many people's concept, the quality of coffee beans exposed to the sun is poorly controllable and the level is not too high.

advantages

In addition to the first step of the solarization method, which requires water to filter out inferior beans, the other steps do not require any water, and can be used repeatedly.

Because of the unique flavor of sun-baked beans, some excellent farmers began to take sun-baked beans seriously, such as shelving them to prevent pollution, and carefully selecting them, so today we can see a lot of high-quality sun-baked coffee beans.

flavor

Although the sun-dried beans are uneven in appearance and color, because the coffee beans mature naturally inside the fruit and are not disturbed by the external environment, the sun-dried coffee beans have a stronger flavor, a fragrant fermentation flavor and a sweet taste.

II. Water washing method

washing method washing, washing clean sour

Due to the shortcomings of the solarization method, in the mid-18th century, the Dutch invented the water washing method, which was widely favored. The biggest difference from solarization is that it uses fermentation to remove the skin.

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As in the first step of the solarization method, the inferior beans are removed first, and then the peel and pulp of the coffee fruit are knocked off with a pulping machine. They are thrown into a tank for fermentation for 16-36 hours, and the fermentation bacteria dissolve the pectin.

In order to remove the residue of fermentation bacteria and impurities, the coffee beans will be washed again, and then the coffee fruit will be dried by machine to reduce the moisture content to 10%-14%. Finally, the use of shelling machine to remove the silver skin wrapped in coffee beans can be completed.

disadvantages

Water washing, as its name suggests, mostly requires water, and in some countries where water resources are scarce, this treatment is unlikely to be adopted. The process of washing method is also relatively complicated, and the cost is much higher than that of solarization method.

advantages

It is screened and cleaned layer by layer, and the appearance and taste will be cleaner and more uniform. Also, since the pulp is removed at the beginning, there is no need to worry about mold like the sun method.

flavor

Coffee beans usually have a bright, clean acidity because they ferment acid in fermentation tanks.

III. Semi-washing method

Because water washing required too much water, semi-water washing was born. It is a mixture of solarization and washing, but also a compromise between the two.

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First, it removes the bad beans as in the previous two treatments; then, the coffee fruit is poured into a pulping machine to remove the skin and pulp.

To reduce water consumption, semi-washing involves removing pectin with a demucilager and drying or exposing the coffee fruit to the sun.

Reduce the water content of coffee fruit to 10%--14%, and then use the huller to remove the silver skin stuck to the coffee beans, that is, complete!

disadvantages

Although it is a mixture of washing and solarization, the process is as cumbersome as washing.

advantages

With water washing method clean, also do not need to consume a lot of water.

flavor

The semi-washing method has the least variables affecting the quality. The acidity of coffee is lower than that of washed beans and higher than that of sunlight. The sweetness is lower than that of honey treatment, but the cleanliness is better than honey treatment. The flavor is between honey treatment and washing.

4. Honey treatment method

The honey process (Miel Process in Spanish) is also known as: semi-solarization. It is the most fashionable and distinctive treatment method in recent years. The main difference between it and solarization method is whether the pulp is removed before or after solarization.

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Again, the first step is to remove the bad beans, then through the pulping machine, remove the skin and pulp, and then expose the sun to reduce the water content of the coffee cherries to 10%-14%.

Finally, the use of shelling machine to remove the silver skin stuck on the coffee beans, etc., can be.

disadvantages

Of the major coffee bean processing methods, it is the most complex and troublesome.

advantages

It is an improvement of the sun method, effectively changing the problem of moldy coffee beans, but also reducing the cost of water.

flavor

Because it is sun-dried with pectin, the sugar in pectin enters the beans during the drying process, making the coffee beans sour and sweet balanced and mellow. In recent years, many competition winners have come from honey processing technology, Costa Rica's honey processing technology is quite famous.

V. Fermentation method (in vivo fermentation of civets)

As for fermentation in animals, Xiaobian personally thinks it is extremely cruel. The most typical one is civet coffee (cat excrement coffee).

Principle:

Using lactic acid bacteria and digestive juice in animal digestive tract to remove pectin from pulp and attached pod surface, beans are discharged with feces, and after washing, they are precious fermented beans in vivo. In addition to civets, there are also phoenix pheasants, monkeys, elephants, etc., but the latter have not formed a scale, only civets stand alone.

At first, it was because the civet appeared at night, relying on its eyesight and sense of smell to pick the reddest coffee fruit to eat, and was not interested in half-ripe raw fruit, so the beans excreted were ripe and just good for the benefit. The beans were washed and baked to kill all bacteria. The most important feature is the soft flavor, taste multiplication, and its underlying flavor depends on the type of coffee the civet eats.