Have you heard the story of Kaldi and the dancing goats? … according to legend, coffee was discovered in Ethiopia centuries ago when a goatherd noticed how frisky his goats became after eating the berries from a particular kind of bush. Kaldi tried eating these berries himself and found that he felt friskier as well. And from there, word got around. Whether or not this particular tale is true, Ethiopia is universally regarded as the Birthplace of Coffee, and today still provides us with some of the most delicious beans in the world.

Monks, upon hearing about this amazing fruit, dried the berries so that they could be transported to distant monasteries. They reconstituted these berries in water, ate the fruit, and drank the liquid to provide stimulation for a more awakened time for prayer.

By 1100 A.D., coffee bushes were being cultivated on the Arabian peninsula. Here is where the beans were first roasted and boiled by Arabs making “qawha.”

Coffee first arrived on the European continent by means of Venetian trade merchants. Once in Europe this new beverage fell under harsh criticism from the Catholic church. Many felt the pope should ban coffee, calling it the drink of the devil. To their surprise, the pope, already a coffee drinker, blessed coffee declaring it a truly Christian beverage.

Coffee houses spread quickly across Europe becoming centers for intellectual exchange. Many great minds of Europe used this beverage, and forum, as a springboard to heightened thought and creativity. In England, they were called “penny universities” — a penny was charged for admission and a cup of coffee. By 1763, Venice had more than 2,000 coffee shops!

In the 1700's, coffee found its way to the Americas by means of a French infantry captain who nurtured one small plant on its long journey across the Atlantic. This one plant, transplanted to the Caribbean island of Martinique, became the predecessor of over 19 million trees on the island within 50 years. It was from this humble beginning that the coffee plant found its way to the rest of the tropical regions of South and Central America.

Coffee was declared the national drink of the then colonized United States by the Continental Congress, in protest of the excessive tax on tea levied by the British crown.

Espresso, a recent innovation in the way to prepare coffee, obtained its origin in 1822, with the innovation of the first crude espresso machine in France. The Italians perfected this wonderful machine and were the first to manufacture it. Espresso has become such an integral part of Italian life and culture, that there are presently over 200,000 espresso bars in Italy.

Today, coffee is a giant global industry employing more than 20 million people. This commodity ranks second only to petroleum in terms of dollars traded worldwide. With over 400 billion cups consumed every year, coffee is the world's most popular beverage. If you can imagine, in Brazil alone, over 5 million people are employed in the cultivation and harvesting of over 3 billion coffee plants.

Sales of premium specialty coffees in the United States have reached the multi billion dollar level, and are increasing significantly on an annual basis. Organic and Fair Trade coffees have become an important segment of the specialty coffee industry and are growing at an even faster rate as coffee drinkers learn more about the origins of their daily cup.