Kopi-Luwak coffee, before and after. Photo: chee.hong/Flickr
How many times have you enjoyed a cup of coffee only to find out it was brewed from cat poop? Well, okay, maybe not that often, but if you live in the Fort Myers, Florida area, it won't be such a rare occurrence after Sept. 29.
To celebrate National Coffee Day, Bennett's Fresh Roast coffee shop will for one day sell the world's most expensive coffee, Kopi Luwak, informally known as "cat-poop coffee."
Harvested exclusively from a collection of South-Asian nations, including the Philippines, Indonesia, and, of course, Java, Kopi Luwak coffee beans pass through the digestive tract of an animal called a civet, which eats the sweet berries that contain the beans, but cannot digest the beans themselves.
Although they are in the same sub-order as all the cat families, civets are related most closely to linsangs and genets, two other animals that you have probably never heard of (we know we hadn't!). Still, considering their feline appearance, behavior, and size, civets have become known as the Toddy Cat. And, at Paw Nation, our policy is, "if you can call it a cat, it's a cat."
"Meow." An African civet. Photo: Cliff 1066/Flickr
Bob Grissinger, the owner of Bennet's Fresh Roast, is excited to be selling this rare bean for the first time. "I've known about it for a long time," he told Paw Nation. "I have not tasted it yet, but I absolutely plan to. I love the terms that they use for it: 'earthy' and 'musty.'" Mmm!
Worried about bacteria? He told Paw Nation that between processing and brewing, the coffee is effectively sterilized and completely safe. Most places that sell this coffee blend it with other kinds of beans, but at Bennett's, they will have 100% pure Kopi Luwak.
If you live in the Fort Myers area go down to Bennett's Fresh Roast on Sept. 29 and grab yourself a steaming cup of cat-poop and let us know how it tastes!
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Why Vets Can't Always Smell What You Smell
I saw this process on Jeff Corwin's show, in Indonesia. I'll bet it's yummy..(I love coffee).
I have had a cup of Kopi Luwak once about four or five years ago at a very nice gourmet coffee/tea shop in the Dallas, TX area. While it wasn't bad, the unusual taste, almost moldy like, made it NOT MY CUP OF TEA (nor my cup of coffee!) BUT--I recommend the experience of tasting it to anyone who has a chance--it's one of those "just so I can say I did it" moments!
The coffee is featured in the movie THE BUCKET LIST
I'll stick with my Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, lol. Keep that weird stuff down in Florida.
Oh hell no.
This writer should have done a bit more research on the subject. The civet is actually a nocturnal animal that is more in the racoon/weasel family. He completely left out that the civet eats only the ripest beans and then during digestion in the intestine a certain enzyme in the digestive tract of this animal breaks down the outer shell/skin of the bean which usually gives coffee it's acidic/bitter after taste. The beans are cleaned throughly, sun dried, and then lightly roasted before ground and made into coffee. To just call it cat poop coffee is so wrong. Green eggs and ham people!!!!