What are the 4 types of coffee?
This comprehensive guide focuses on the four main commercial coffee types: arabica, robusta, liberica, and excelsa. Each brings its own unique characteristics to your cup, influencing flavor, growing conditions, and commercial applications. Arabica and robusta are the two main forms of coffee, and while robusta is strong and sharp, arabica is naturally gentler, sweeter, and aromatic. When arabica coffee beans are brewed, you experience flavours that unfold slowly. Notes in the coffee can be chocolatey, nutty, and fruity, depending on the beans grown.There are four different types of coffee beans, those being Robusta, Arabica, Liberica, and Excelsa. However, the Arabica coffee bean is the most common, making up about 60% – 70% of the coffee that is produced globally. Robusta is also a more common coffee bean used in coffee.In the US, McDonald’s uses 100% Arabica coffee beans. Arabica beans are typically sweeter with a softer, fruitier taste than Robusta beans. Most super market coffee is made from Robusta beans.It is in terms of appearance that we find the first differences between these two species. Arabica coffee beans are generally ovular, flat and oilier than robusta. That’s why they taste sweeter, zesty and somehow fruity. On the other hand, Robusta coffee beans tend to be slightly smaller and rounder.
Is coffee a berry or bean?
This fruit is often referred to as a coffee cherry, but unlike the cherry, which usually contains a single pit, it is a berry most commonly found having two seeds with their flat sides together. Even though the seeds are not technically beans, they are referred to as such because of their resemblance to true beans. A coffee bean is the seed of the coffee plant’s fruit, commonly called a coffee cherry. Despite its name, it’s not actually a botanical bean but a seed. The coffee plant produces small, round, red, purple, yellow, and sometimes pink fruits known as coffee cherries. These cherries contain the coffee beans.