Anybody tried to grow their own coffee beans?

[moopups]

Seeing the 8 dollar per pound stuff selling readidly makes me think it might be something to check out.

[AngieM2]

do you look like Juan Valdez? (from some older coffee commercial fame?)

You might be able to do it down there. let us know how it works out.

Angie

[HermitJohn]

If you are willing to roast your own, you can get green coffee beans much cheaper than $8 per pound. Marias sells at cost a pound of supposedly inferior beans to show you the superiority of their own beans. Well the one time I made a small order from Marias, they sent some "old-past their prime" premium beans. Some rediculously small price and they were better than any canned coffee at grocery store. I think to get such price on your own, you would have to buy a wholesale quantity. I have no idea where you would buy such if you arent in the coffee biz. As to higher quality green coffee beans, take a look on ebay. I gave between $2 and $3 per pound for some good quality beans last year and am still using on them.

[Grandmotherbear]

Coffee is a great understorey shrubby tree that grows well in wooded areas in Palm Beach. Red berries are produced twice a year. It does need compost, supplemental feeding and watering to produce well. The one plant we had produced such small amounts that we used to save the seeds (beans) in the freezer. When we finally got around the 1/3- 1/2 lb mark, they were freezer burned. Next time we only held them for a second harvest planning on only making a cup or two of coffee. We burnt them in the toaster oven while attempting to roast them, but went ahead anyway and mortared and pestled em, and brewed them in a coffee filter. The results were strongly reminiscent of the time the chunk of glowing charcoal got into the coffee pot during the campout...If you find a batch of trees (they are growing all through the wooded areas around my Hospice) you might get enough to make a decent potful, but I leave them for the fox, coons and birds that are trying to make their living a block from I 95....the leaves are glossy dark green with a stripey effect, several long skinny leaves off one stem...

[DW]

Loved the last description of the taste! In the pioneer days didn't they used to parch something in a pan to use for coffee?

[inc]

theres a lot of stuff they used. parched dandelion, chicory root. lots of seeds, many poisonous. the only wild drink with the caffeine is the ilex

[indypartridge]

According to a recent article in LIFE, it takes 4000 beans - picked by hand -to make 1 pound of roasted coffee. After what Grandmotherbear wrote, it doesn't sound worth it! There is good news: the same article said coffee cuts the risk of Parkinson's disease by half, cirhosis by 53%, and colon cancer by 24%. And it makes me less cranky in the mornings!

[Grandmotherbear]

When the old Scoutmaster of the troop quit, the new boys' dad volunteered to be Scoutmaster, and his friend from church (grandfather age) was 1st assistant scoutmaster. I was 2nd assistant scoutmaster. Remember that Grandfatherbear was not a camper and these gentlemen were totally new to Scouting and had never been members of Florida Trail Association, where I had been active as a local and statewide officeholder for many years.

On the first campout we took the troop on, we all rolled out at dawn and Arnold and Ron looked at me "You're the girl, you fix the coffee" they said.

"You're kidding, right?" I asked "After all, Grandfatherbear brings me my first cup of coffee every morning".

They were not kidding.

I remembered attending the Living History Cow camp at Lake Kissimmee State Park, set in 1874. One thing I remmebered was the cowboy coffee, which was a huge coffeepot with about a half pound of coffee poured in and boiled in the fire, and the grounds settled by pouring cold water in on it.

So I promptly replicated that....

After we got done chewing our breakfast coffee we used the rest of it to scrub the baked on eggs from the camp skillets. I camped with those gentlemen for another 5 years and they were always VERY happy to make the coffee in the mornings!!

[whodunit]

I tell ya Hermit John keeps talking about Sweet Maria's one of these days I am going to have to order some from them. Bean to their site, loads of info.

Mrs Whodunit