What are the fruits and seeds of coffee? What the coffee beans look like.

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Coffee Cafe Coffee popular Science

​ coffee fruit (coffee cherries) is oval, coffee flowers lag behind, the fruit is only the size of a match head, after 6 to 8 months of growth will slowly become larger. The size of the coffee fruit varies according to the cultivation environment and variety. If it is Arabica, the fruit will be the size of 1.5~2cm, with a more cross-sectional diameter of 1 to 1.5 cm, while the fruit of Robasca will be slightly smaller than that of Arabica.

When the ​ fruit is ripe, the pulp becomes very soft. The flesh of the coffee fruit is not thick, but it tastes sweet. In the harvest season, we can often see the children who come to help put the flesh into their mouths to eat.

When ​ peels off the flesh, he will see a thin skin on the seed, which is the endocarp of the coffee bean, and the seed wrapped in the endocarp is also called "parchment coffee bean". There is also a sticky layer on the surface of the inner pericarp, which is called pectin. If you want to take out the coffee beans, you have to remove the pulp, pectin and endocarp.

​ coffee beans are basically two growing opposite to each other. So one side of the coffee bean will be flat. This kind of coffee bean with one side, we call it "flat bean".

There are also some coffee fruits in ​ that grow only one seed (5% to 20% of the total), which is due to fertilization or environmental factors, resulting in a serious deterioration of the seed growth on one side, which looks round (in this case, the seeds on the other side will not be produced). This round coffee bean is called "round bean".

​ selects "round beans" from "flat beans" in the coffee bean selection process (the process of distinguishing between sizes and picking out coffee beans of poor quality). As the number of coffee beans is rare, they should be sold differently from the coffee beans that they are used to. Coffee beans in Brazil, Blue Mountain and other places are very famous, and the price is higher than that of coffee beans. But for farmers, there should be even coffee beans in a fruit, but only one has grown, which will greatly affect the output of coffee beans, so this is not a happy thing.

Close-up of coffee beans, cross-section of coffee beans

The freshly ripe coffee fruit on the tree

Ripe coffee fruit

The coffee fruit after the peel is cut.

After removing the peel of the coffee fruit, there are two coffee beans inside

Two coffee beans with endocarp and silver skin

Internal structure of coffee fruit (coffee fruit includes exocarp, mesocarp, pectin layer, endocarp, coffee bean silver skin, endosperm, embryo.)

Detailed description of the internal structure of coffee beans (pectin layer, endocarp, silver peel, endosperm, cotyledons, Hypocotyl, radicle)

Coffee bean endocarp, coffee bean silver skin and coffee bean internal structure