Coffee Quiz

Coffee: A Mystery Wrapped in an Enigma

Considering just how much coffee is consumed on a daily basis by Americans, knowledge of where coffee comes from, how it is harvested, how it is processed, and how it ends up in your special stained steel thermos with the logo of your alma mater is a little slim. I am going to give you a quiz about coffee and we will see what you know. Rules: no using smart phones or google…just use all that brain and guessing power you have!

1. Which country produces the most coffee in the world?
a. Costa Rica
b. Colombia
c. Ethiopia
d. Brazil

2. In Central America, which country produces the most coffee?
a. Guatemala
b. El Salvador
c. Nicaragua
d. Honduras
e. Costa Rica

3. What type of coffee does Honduras export?
a. Robusta
b. Natural Arabica
c. Washed Arabica

4. Approximately how many bags (1 bag = 132lbs/60kg) of coffee did Honduras export during last year’s harvest (2010-2011)?
a. 2 million
b. 20 million
c. 4 million
d. 11 million

5. What color(s) are the ripe coffee cherries in the Arabica species?
a. Yellow
b. Red
c. Orange
d. A and B
e. All of the above

6. In Honduras, what method is used to harvest the ripe coffee cherries?

a. Strip-picking (all cherries picked off the coffee plant at once)
b. Selective-picking (only ripe cherries are picked)
c. Mechanical harvesting (machine based picking system)
d. Ground foraging

7. In Central America, what type of growing-systems do coffee farmers use in general?
a. Shade-grown monoculture
b. Zero-shade, sun-grown coffee
c. Full-sun polyculture
d. All of the above

8. What country is considered the birthplace of coffee according to popular legend?
a. Vietnam
b. Colombia
c. Turkey
d. Ethiopia

9. What is the art of coffee tasting called?
a. Aroma testing
b. Stewarding
c. Cupping
d. Drinking

10. How much coffee can Carly pick on a good day?
a. 300 lbs
b. 25 lbs
c. 125 lbs
d. 50 lbs

Answers!

1.(d) Brazil leads global production and has led in this category since the middle of the 19th century.
2.(d) Honduras leads Central America’s production. Honduras took the top spot from Guatemala this past harvest as Honduran coffees have improved greatly in quality so Honduran growers no longer smuggle coffee into Guatemala to export it as Guatemalan coffee.
3.(c) Washed Arabica; Robusta is not grown in Honduras and most Honduran coffee farmers fully wash their coffee. The natural method is used in countries with less than plentiful water supplies—the pulp/fruit is not removed before drying.
4.(c) This year, a little over 4 million bags were exported from Honduras.
5.(d) Ripe cherries can be yellow (Caturra and Catuaí varieties can both have yellow cherries). However, the majority of cherries are indeed bright red when ripe.
6.(b) The vast majority of coffee is selectively picked here in Honduras because of the mountainous terrain and the advantage of improving and controlling quality by selecting the specific cherries to harvest.
7.(a) The majority of small coffee farms in Central America are shade-grown monocultures. That is, there is a layer of shade trees that provides sufficient amount of cover and sun exposure to the coffee plants. In most of these parcels, coffee is the only commodity harvested in the farms. A lot of producers will have fruit trees or plant corn in the coffee farms but these are generally for domestic consumption.
8.(d) Legend has it that Ethiopia is the birthplace of coffee. Google Kaldi, Ethiopia, and coffee and you can get all the scoop!
9.(c) Cupping! This art is great fun and the way that buyers and roasters judge quality based on aroma, fragrance, the roast, all its characteristics, aftertaste, etc. A lot of coffee shops/roasteries have open cupping sessions where you can learn about this process.
10.(c) 125 lbs. This is about 5 buckets worth of coffee. It is not a lot in terms of how much coffee the majority of Honduran pickers can pick in a day. Some people are able to pick 250-350 lbs!

Thanks for taking my quiz! I had a lot of fun writing it and reflecting on how interesting and complex coffee is. If you have any questions or think that I have made a mistake, let me know.