What are the Growing Conditions for Kopi Luwak Coffee? Introduction to Luwak Coffee Bean Cultivation

Introduction to FrontStreet Coffee's Indonesian Civet Coffee

"Civet coffee" is merely an alias for this variety; its official name is "Kopi Luwak." In Indonesian, "Kopi" means coffee, while "Luwak" refers to a wild animal called the civet cat. The origin of civet coffee can be traced back to Indonesia's colonial era, when the Dutch government prohibited locals from consuming and roasting coffee from the plantations. However, they discovered by chance that coffee beans excreted by wild civets after feeding in the plantations possessed a distinctly different and delicious flavor.

Civet coffee (Kopi Luwak): Kopi (Indonesian for coffee), and Luwak is what Indonesians call an arboreal wild animal known as the "civet cat."

Civet coffee, produced in Indonesia, is one of the world's most expensive coffees. Indonesia grows vast quantities of coffee crops, and there exists a wild animal called the civet cat—an omnivore with a pointed mouth and dark gray fur. Its favorite food consists of fresh coffee beans, which undergo fermentation and digestion within its body before ultimately being excreted as feces. The feces consist of individual coffee beans, also becoming the world's most expensive excrement. Due to its extreme rarity, the price is exceptionally high. Civets are distributed throughout the Indochinese Peninsula, India (northeastern region), Bangladesh, Bhutan, Sikkim, Nepal, and the Kashmir region, but only the Sumatran civet, namely the Indonesian civet, can produce civet coffee.

Civets prefer to select the most mature, sweet, plump, and juicy coffee fruits from coffee trees as food. However, only the fruit pulp on the outside of the coffee cherry can be digested by the civet, while the extremely hard original coffee beans are excreted from the body.

After civets consume coffee beans, the beans ferment and lose their shells within their stomachs. Additionally, hormones secreted by the stomach mucosa break down proteins, producing amino acids that reduce the original bitterness of the coffee beans. Since the coffee beans cannot be digested, after cleaning the civet's excreted feces, the coffee beans become the most valuable raw material.

The longer civet coffee beans are stored, the more intense their aroma becomes. Coffee brewed from civet coffee beans is also relatively thick, leaving fine residue at the bottom of the cup after consumption.

Although civet coffee has a mellow and fragrant taste, modern civets are all farmed, and the coffee's flavor still depends on the quality of the coffee fruits fed to them. While coffee fruit qualities generally have their own characteristics, Arabica varieties are typically of better quality than Robusta varieties.

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