There is a reason why it’s the world’s rarest coffee. A very good reason. Kopi Luwak, when you can find it, will set you back a minimum of $120.00 per pound. This puts it ahead of even Panama’s Hacienda La Esmeralda Geisha, which set the record as the most expensive coffee ever sold at auction in May 2006.
But finding Kopi Luwak coffee is even more difficult than finding a gemstone quality diamond, of which twelve tons were produced in 2005. Kopi Luwak production was something under a thousand pounds.
If it’s so good, why don’t they sell more of it? Perhaps because the route the coffee takes to market is rather convoluted—as convoluted, in fact, as a cat’s intestines.
“Kopi Luwak” is Indonesian for “Coffee Cat”. The luwak is a wild cat which feeds on, among other things, coffee berries. Living the trees above the Indonesian coffee plants, it descends each night feast on the ripest coffee berries. The following morning, the forest floor will be decorated with luwak droppings.
Now comes the good part. No one knows why, but at some point, the Indonesian coffee growers, realizing that the luwak droppings were loaded with undigested coffee beans, began collecting them and cleaning them. Waste, but want not?
The remaining berry pulp and bean “parchment” is scrubbed away, and the beans lightly roasted. Those adventurous enough to drink the resulting coffee describe it as,”rich …with hints of caramel or chocolate,” and “earthy”, “musty”, or “spicy”. It has such a natural sweetness that those who have tasted it say it needs no sugar, and is exceptionally smooth.
Professor Massimo Marcone of the University of Guelph tested the roasted beans, and found they had a lower bacterial count than beans which had no intestinal journey in their history. And the acid fermenting them broke down the proteins which gives other coffees a somewhat bitter taste.
Marcone has suggested developing a chemical fermentation process to eliminate the luwak from the equation, decreasing the cost and increasing the production of the coffee.
Who’s the Kopi cat now?
