Every roaster cherishes their collection of extraneous matter found in coffee. You hear stories of such glamorous items as live bullets (that expode in the roaster of course) and fingers. But that doesn’t happen to mere mortals like myself. In fact, good coffee isn’t supposed to have any “chud” in it …but wouldn’t that be dull?
So here is a selection from my humble collection of Misc Stuff found in my coffee:
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Sticks, mostly found in DP Ethiopians. Most appear to be from the coffee-trees themselves…
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Assorted Beans: red beans, black beans, and an odd acorn or two. Not enough to make Jambalaya though…
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One genuine Sumatran Bee. I imagine to poor thing was enjoying a sweet coffee-tree flower when his time came —wouldn’t his buddies be suprised he ended up on the Internet!
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Corn, corn, corn! Mostly found in Colombian and Mexican
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This is the grinder-killer: nails (perhaps from a wood skid) and other metal items. Install magnets in your grinder hopper!
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Unidentified frond
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Rocks, certainly the most common foreign material. Found in every coffee, washed or dry. That bright one is colored concrete
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This is my prize! An unidentified globule that emerged from the roaster with a cluster of roasted beans stuck to it, and chaffChaff is paper-like skin that comes off the coffee in the roasting process. Chaff from roasting is part of the innermost skin (the silverskin) of the coffee fruit... ...more. It reminds me of some kind of candy. I have no idea what it is….
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Now, if you are seeing this and freaking out, don’t. This represents foreign matter found in many many thousands of pounds of coffee. Coffee is strictly graded and priced based on the absence of defects like these and the quality of the milling and sortingCoffee is sorted by size, density, and color in its preparation for export.: Sorting refers to several steps performed in the preparation of coffee for export. Coffee is... ...more.
The globule was probably just melted plastic. And the only finger I found in the coffee was my own, and they DID reattach it (just kidding). If you want to scare yourself, you would have access to the stuff a low-grade commercial roaster finds in their coffee Vietnamese RobustaAteng is a common name for Catimor coffees widely planted in Sumatra and other Indonesia isles.: Ateng, with several subtypes, is a common name for Catimor coffees widely... ...more or Chinese Yunnan ArabicaArabica refers to Coffea Arabica, the taxonomic species name of the genus responsible for around 75% of the worlds commercial coffee crop.: Arabica refers to Coffea Arabica, the... ...more. THAT might be really horrifying…
| Another point of interest: if you ever see fine round, dark green granules in a bag with green coffeeGreen coffee refers to the processed seed of the coffee tree fruit. Coffee is a flowering shrub that produces fruit. The seeds of the fruit are processed, roasted,... ...more, don’t worry. I know it looks like insect poop, but it is quite likely the dried up coffee embryo that normally lives inside the fold of the bean. Sometimes they dry up and fall out, accumulating in the bottom of the bag. You know how a peanut has that little thingy on the one flat interior side of the nut. Well, its the same thing. Chances are you have seen this in Costa Rican, Colombian or other wet-processed Central American. |
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