The History of Yemeni Coffee and the Origin of Mocha

Yemeni coffee's enormous contribution to world history is best told through its iconic port city of al-Mahal. Under the Ottoman umbrella, Yemen fine-tuned and carefully protected its prized caffeinated merchandise. Because they were unwilling to sell live coffee plants or seeds, they established a global monopoly on the coffee trade around this sleepy port.

Coffee from Al-Makha began to be known simply as Mocha Coffee, a name that initially had little to do with chocolate coffee you can buy today. (Mocha is also used to refer to a coffee variety originating in Yemen, which SCA calls "genetically very close to bourbon.")

Farmers collect red coffee beans from trees, wrap them in plastic bags, carry them on their backs, load them in pickup trucks, and transport the crop through rugged mountain roads to nearby locations, where it is unloaded into large open containers to dry in the sun.

After drying the crop for a few days, farmers bag the crop and sell it to local merchants, who transport the beans to peeling and grinding plants and then sell the ground coffee to local retailers and exporters.

Even now, the world of Yemeni coffee is changing, developing and persisting in the midst of a catastrophic civil war and humanitarian crisis, and needless to say, there are many things hanging in the balance about the future of Yemeni coffee.

Yemeni coffee has a wild, rich flavor that makes some people uncomfortable and others popular.