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For someone who has been rather intimate with coffee over the years, I’m not much of connoisseur. Despite working for a coffee publication, visiting coffee plantations in Honduras and the Dominican Republic, and spending a few months as a barista at a now-defunct coffee chain, my idea of a quality cup of coffee begins and ends with Dunkin Donuts. There, on or about 8:30 a.m., I can count on my friend to smile and wordlessly place a medium-size black coffee with three sugars down on the counter in front of me. The next 20 minutes is probably the best of the day—at least until I have my next cup.
I am not alone. According to the National Coffee Association’s 2007 trend report, more than 57 percent of American adults drink coffee every day (compared to only 51 percent who drink soda daily). Driving those numbers is an astonishing increase in coffee consumption among younger Americans; coffee drinking among 18- to 24-year-olds increased from 16 percent in 2004 to more than 37 percent in 2007. That’s a whole new generation of coffee drinkers. Add to that the continuing growth in specialty coffee consumption—over a $12 billion industry in the U.S. alone in 2006—and it adds up to a big hill of coffee beans.
The emergence of specialty coffee shops over the last 20 years (from a scant 1,600 shops in 1991 to more than 21,000 today) has also had an unintended but beneficial side effect: the growth in organic and sustainably produced coffee. Although just a slice of the overall coffee market, organic coffee consumption has been growing at a ferocious clip over the last several years. According to the Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA), more than 56 percent of coffee shops in the United States sell certified organic coffee. According to Jane McCabe, editor and co-publisher of Tea and Coffee Trade Journal, the leading magazine covering the industry, organic coffee may comprise as much as 10 percent of total coffee sales. Considering that much of the world’s coffee is produced in the third world, environmentally fragile as it is, purchasing organic coffee is a great way to ensure that there is lower impact on producing countries like Costa Rica, Uganda, Indonesia, and Malawi.
So, what are the things to consider when purchasing your next bag of coffee beans?
Certified Organic
Coffee that is certified organic by the United States Department of Agriculture will bear the USDA Organic seal. This certifies, by an agency accredited by the USDA, that the coffee contains a minimum of 95 percent organic ingredients. Ultimately, it means that the coffee you are buying was produced using methods that had a low impact on the environment. When practiced properly, organic agriculture utilizes an approach that maintains soil fertility without the use of toxic fertilizers, reduces the use of toxic pesticides, and employs only materials and methods that are allowed in organic production. The certification is often hard to obtain—and more difficult to maintain. In order for a producer to become certified, his coffee must be grown for a minimum of three years without synthetic pesticides and fertilizers, be kept sufficiently far away from conventionally grown crops, and maintain a sustainable crop rotation that prevents soil erosion and the depletion of soil nutrients.
Fair Trade
This is a phrase that is bandied about a lot now that it’s cool to be concerned with the environment, but what does it really mean? It is especially important in the coffee industry, considering how much of the world’s coffee is grown in the third world. “Fair Trade” basically means that coffee is produced with standards that guarantee fair working conditions, equal treatment of women, a low impact on the environment, and a fair price for goods. In a nutshell, Fair Trade coffee can’t come from slave labor and can’t be purchased for exploitive pricing. Thanks to the prevalence of socially conscious people in the coffee industry, this notion has become the standard in the specialty coffee business. It is important to note to that not all Fair Trade certified coffee is organic, but 85 percent of it is. Fair Trade coffee producers received a fixed price of $1.41 per pound in 2005.
Bird Friendly
When I heard about “bird-friendly” coffee I wondered if this was some kind of joke, so I asked the editor of Tea and Coffee Trade Journal if this was for real. According to Jane McCabe, “Yes, it’s for real. Danny O’Keefe’s Songbird Foundation is one organization that is helping the coffee farmers not destroy forests and encouraging bird propagation in coffee origins.” Another resource is the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center. According to them, bird-friendly coffee is “organic certified coffee grown on farms with a shade cover that provides substantial habitat for migratory and resident birds in tropical landscapes.” Created in the late 1990s, the bird-friendly idea aims to make coffee plantations a great place for migratory birds, and focuses on making shade coffee farms the perfect stopover. When you purchase bird-friendly coffee you can be sure you are sipping the nectar of beans grown on one of the world’s 19 bird-friendly farms, and helping some of our feathered friends while you get your morning fix.
Organic Decaf?
One of the things decaf drinkers should be aware of is that most of it is decaffeinated through a chemical process that uses methylne chloride to extract the caffeine. Organic decaf coffees, however, use the Swiss Water process, which removes caffeine from coffee without altering the organic integrity of the beans. In this process, the flavor compounds are extracted from green coffee beans—along with all of the caffeine within them—by soaking in them in water. A filter removes the caffeine, while returning the flavor-charged water back to the bean so that the character of the beans’ original flavor is unchanged. Decaf drinkers should insist on Swiss Water–decaffeinated coffees only
Organic Vanilla Nutmeg Coffee
I can honestly remember a time when there was no such thing as flavored coffee—or, at least, it seemed like it. Except for holidays and special occasions, coffee was simply coffee: a 25-cent cup of Joe, served in a paper cup that said “It’s Our Pleasure to Serve You.” Times sure have changed. Now there are hundreds of different ways to have your morning coffee, Starbucks is more expensive than gas on a gallon-per-gallon basis, and flavored coffees are simply routine. Because organic coffees are not yet offered in a wide variety of flavors, here’s a great natural way to turn your high-quality organic coffee into a flavored treat, perfect for an afternoon pick-me-up.
Makes 8 servings
1 vanilla bean, coarsely chopped
½ cup organic coffee beans*
¾ teaspoon ground organic nutmeg
2 cinnamon sticks
*Note: You’ll need a coffee grinder to extract the maximum flavor from the coffee and vanilla beans. However, if you don’t have a grinder, place a third of a cup of pre-ground coffee in the filter basket, along with one finely chopped vanilla bean, and proceed as usual.
Place the chopped vanilla bean and coffee beans in a coffee grinder and grind. Fill the filter basket halfway with coffee, add the ground nutmeg, and pour the rest of the coffee. Place the cinnamon sticks in the coffee pot and brew using 6 cups of water. After brewing, let stand (on the heating plate) for at least 5 minutes. Remove the cinnamon sticks and serve.
Know Your Joe
Bird-Friendly Info
Songbird Foundation, www.songbird.org
Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center,
http://nationalzoo.si.edu/ConservationAndScience/
MigratoryBirds/Coffee/lover.cfm
Best Organic Coffee
Gillies Coffee Co., www.gilliescoffee.com
Where to Get it on Long Island
Fairway Market
50 Manetto Hill Mall, Plainview
(516) 937-5402
Chris O’Hara lives in Huntington with his wife, three kids, and two
dogs. He drinks a minimum of four cups of fully caffeinated coffee
every day.
