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Coffea arabica (Rubiaceae)

This plant originated in Northeastern Africa, in the highlands of Ethiopia and the Boma plateau of Sudan. It is a vigorous bush or small tree that reaches heights of 3–3.5 m (9.8–11.5 ft). It bears red or purple berries that contain two seeds, the coffee beans. It lives for, usually, half-a-century. Caffeine from the white flowers attracts honeybees, by setting up an olfactory memory among those pollinators.

The plant was brought to Yemen in the 15th century. By the 16th century it was also known in Persia, Egypt, Syria, and Turkey. Venetian traders (who else?) brought coffee to Europe. Coffee was introduced to Paris in 1669 by Suleyman Aga, the Turkish ambassador to the court of King Louis XIV. Aga was sent by Mohammed IV with sacks of coffee beans.

Europeans subsequently set plantations of coffee in Africa, in Ethiopia, Uganda, and Côte d’Ivoire predominantly — the latter often with the C. robusta species, which provides a less coveted drink; and in Latin America, in Brazil first and foremost. From the Turks, who occupied their country for one-and-a-half century, Hungarians became heavy coffee drinkers — my parents included. They were coffee-addicts and made me into one.

Even though we lived in German-occupied France, my parents made me the gift of an enchanted childhood. One of my beloved memories is being entrusted with running the family coffee-grinder.

On D-Day, the first house in France to have been liberated was that of the Gonbrée family in Bénouville, it was — what else? — a café. Because of the omnipresent cafés in every French city, one thinks of the French as heavy coffee drinkers. Yet, we come out only 21st in the world, just one rank ahead of Americans. Who come first but the Finns — with the rest of Scandinavia following them. Brazilians, with their numerous daily cafezinhos are only in
10th position.

However, in terms of coffee-drinking in France, a leading contender was the novelist Balzac: to quote from an entry on the Web, ” clothed in the white hood of a Dominican monk, and equipped with ink, quills and an endless supply of coffee, Balzac began his writing day at 2 am, leaving his desk only to attend to his personalised Limoges cafetière, which kept his thick Turkish coffee warm throughout his long nights of writing. It took 15 cups or more to fuel these writing bouts. “

Published inPlants