Culinary Chemistry / The Scientific Principles of Cookery, with Concise Instructions for Preparing Good and Wholesome Pickles, Vinegar, Conserves, Fruit Jellies, Marmalades, and Various Other Alimentary Substances Employed in Domestic Economy, with Observations on the Chemical Constitution and Nutritive Qualities of Different Kinds of Food.

by Friedrich Christian Accum

NATURAL HISTORY OF THE COFFEE TREE.

The tree which produces coffee contains ten species, chiefly natives of the East Indies, South America, and the Polynesian isles. The only species, however, that we have to notice in the present work is the coffee Arabica, of which there are two varieties, though both are sold in our shops as Turkey coffee, and possess similar qualities.

The tree seldom rises more than 16 or 18 feet high, with an erect main stem, covered with a lightish brown bark: the leaves are oblong-ovate, and pointed; the flowers are set in clusters; they are of a pure white, and possess a very pleasant odour, but their duration is very transient. The fruit resembles a cherry, and grows in clusters, ranged along the branches under the axillæ of the leaves, which are of a laurel hue, but rather longer than a laurel leaf. It is an ever-green, and makes a beautiful appearance at every season in the year, but particularly when it is in flower.

The coffee tree has of late years been much cultivated in America, but the coffee which has been thence brought to Europe has been very little esteemed. This great difference in the goodness many have attributed to the soil in which it grows, and therefore have supposed it impossible for the inhabitants of the British islands ever to cultivate this commodity to any real advantage; but this is certainly a mistake, as is affirmed by several persons of credit, who have resided abroad, who say, that the berries which they have gathered from the trees and roasted themselves, were as well flavoured as any of the coffee brought from Mocha; so that the fault is in the drying, and bringing over; for if in the drying of the berries they be laid in rooms near the sugar-works, or near the house where rum is distilled, the berries soon imbibe the surrounding effluvia, which will greatly alter their flavour. In like manner the coffee brought in the same ships with rum and sugar, were the coffee ever so good, would hereby be entirely altered.

Raw coffee materially becomes ameliorated by age. It should be kept in bags, or vessels permeable to air, and in a dry, or rather warm place.