SocraticGadfly: Sunday scatblog special – java gold version

April 22, 2010

Sunday scatblog special – java gold version

The height of coffee civilization might just be lurking inside civet crap. No, I'm not shitting you.

The price of $225 a pound for undigested, but eaten, beans pooped out by civets should make that clear.
The civet eventually excretes the hard, indigestible innards of the fruit — essentially, incipient coffee beans — though only after they have been fermented in the animal’s stomach acids and enzymes to produce a brew described as smooth, chocolaty and devoid of any bitter aftertaste.
Of course, at that price, fakery abounds — including gluing scat of other animals to coffee beans.

And, there's also this:
Alberto Pat-og, 60, a retired school principal, said he did not understand why foreigners were willing to pay so much for a cup of the stuff.

“We are a bit surprised,” he said. “A bit perplexed.”

His son, Lambert, 20, added, with a big grin, “We are ignorant.”
Ignorant of Western, especially, American, taste for the nouvelle, just because it's rare, different and pricey. It's called keeping up with the Goldman Sachs Joneses, dear Pat-og family.

Plus, there's the question of whether the civet makes the coffee, or whether naturally high-grade beans attract a civilized civet palate.

Anyway, read the whole interesting story.

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